We got a light rain all night long! But please keep praying for more rain for our area. Enough water came through the downspouts to raise the levels of each of our three rain tanks by at least a few inches. We feel like God gave us our "daily rain" instead of our daily bread. Because the rain was soft and lasted most of the night, the ground had a chance to absorb the much needed moisture, too. One of the things on our agenda today was for Eta to come and help work in the yard. She brought Skita with her, and because the ground was soft, we decided that today would be a good day to dig up dirt and carry it over to our house to prepare the canoe planters for some seedlings.
While the kids and I did school, Skita and Eta weeded and prepared a small place for me to transplant delicate things like Chinese cabbage. They took small sticks of bamboo, pounded them into the ground, then wove pandanus leaves in and around the sticks to create a small barrier for little feet and animals that like to walk right through my fruits and veggies. I've had problems with rows of my slippery cabbage being knocked down because people walk right through, so hopefully this will create both a visual barrier and a physical barrier. Around 11, the kids took a break from school, and all of us went with pickax and bush knives in hand to dig and carry bags of dirt. We worked for about an hour before we had enough dirt. We were pretty grimy, gritty, and sweaty when we came home to cook lunch!
After we cooked some popcorn for our friends, we took turns grating old coconut husks to toss in with the newly dug dirt in our raised bed. Sarah is really earning a name for herself for being a willing worker and for wanting to learn the Lavukal way of doing things. Benjamin is also earning a good name for himself as a willing worker and a very funny guy. Later in the day, I heard stories from my friend Sylvester about Benjamin. She came back from the garden just as he was carrying the last bag of dirt back to our house and they struck up a conversation. She kept going on and on about how willing he is. And when I was visiting yesterday afternoon with some of the ladies who had gathered at the deceased woman's house (there will be a large group there all week), I also heard about what a hard worker Sarah is as she made her kimita only a few feet away on the shore. I'm really proud of my kids and the choices they make. They are a huge part of the ministry here.
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