More informative update - God is good!

My dear readers near and far, all beloved and with me in my heart:

God is good, all the time. All the time, God is good!

Yesterday's post was more for fun than for anything else, and so I thought before another crazy week begins, I should try to catch up on a few other things that happened. I have enough to make like 5 posts, no joke. Sorry for posting so soon again, but at least this way if I post more often you can decide what you want to read about and what not, and still have some inspiration from Chile jajaja ;) :)

At least I will try to start with a few things... :) and as always a few pictures. :)

A few weeks ago I had the profound pleasure of accepting an invitation for lunch at the house of the Wahl family – parents, grandma, and 12 children make up this lively and lovely household! It was such a pleasant afternoon. The background story and what came later shows how beautiful and present Divine Providence is…and how utterly good and merciful he is in spoiling little me!

There is a worldwide program through Schoenstatt that provides young women with the opportunity to visit various Schoenstatt centers throughout the world, working a few hours each day in return for room, board, and the possibility to get to know another culture and Schoenstatt family. (Information here and here, FYI). Throughout the years I have been super blessed to get to know many girls from all over the world who have come to stay at our center in Wisconsin (Waukesha, but very close to some historic Schoenstatt sites in Milwaukee, if you are wondering). One such girl was* named Sofía Wahl (the second oldest in the Wahl family!), and we became very good friends when she went to WI 3 years ago.

Fast forward to last year. One day she called me on Skype, and told me some very exciting news: she had been accepted to join the community of the Schoenstatt Sisters of Mary! Naturally I was surprised and very happy for her. Because God is good, Sofia’s “vestición” in Spanish and “Reception” in English, where the novices receive their sisters’ dress (pictures, general information, plus a beautiful video from the last reception in the USA! fun fact: I make an appearance as violinist again haha), was scheduled and took place last weekend, November 21!! Which means that I got to go!! I actually played violin in the choir, which was very meaningful to me. Another special thing about the Reception is that it is the moment when the novices officially receive their new name as a Sister of Mary. *Hence, my friend Sofi is now “Hermana María Sofía”. J Really, very special.

I hope you’re following my story here. Back to visiting the Wahl’s house, as Hna María Sofía had been my friend, had been to my house numerous times, and had spoken to her family about me, they wanted to have an opportunity to meet me (and I was dying to meet them too!!), so even though Hna María Sofía was obviously not at home any more, I got to spend a lovely afternoon with her family.

Back to the reception last weekend, it was really a beautiful day. The night before, as part of the choir we had our final rehearsal, and I got to visit the shrine late at night with three very dear friends, and then I slept over in the national girls’ youth house of Chile, there on the same property. On Saturday, we started early in the morning getting ready and running through a few songs before the most special Holy Mass at 9:30 am. The novices came in, radiant in their bridal white. With great joy and songs we celebrated with them, they received their dresses and a candle, and went out to prepare! What joy, boundless joy for all when they came in dressed as Sisters of Mary! It was very exciting!!

After Mass there was a time to greet the novices and have some appetizers. While the novices had lunch with their families, we girls youth had lunch in the girls’ youth house, and prepared a few things for the later afternoon. We gathered as Girls’ Youth with the novices, to share and thank them for their great yes to God! After some time in the large group, each novice went with her own youth, the girls from her own area, so that we could personally present to each one and spend some time talking as well. In our group, I was already friends with the majority of the girls, so that was really great. There was a song that I wrote while Hna Maria Sofia was in the USA called “RTA We Crown You”, and she had told her family how much she loved it, so her sister Ita suggested that we all learn it and sing it for her. So, I agreed, and with choreography and all we sang haha. She still remembered the chorus, I was very impressed. And so grateful that we could share that little bit between us.

Now the novices are in what they call “closed novitiate”, where they only share amongst the 5 of them and their novice mistress, so I will not be able to talk to her again. But I can write her, pray for her, and know she prays for me too! Please keep Hna. María Sofía, Hna. Maria del Sol, Hna. M. Paz, Hna. M. Rosario and Hna. Maria Belen in your prayers too!!

Enjoy the pictures!!

Pictures from the Wahl's house. In the last one, we made a pyramid as you can see. They were more than sweet, and made me feel right at home. <3

A picture from the shrine at 10:45 pm, so quiet and beautiful

with my santuarito <3 lighting a candle in prayer and memory of a friend's mother who recently passed away...

The board her friends made for her! I was supposed to help and in the Whatsapp group and everything, but at the last minute couldn't go on the day they got together.

But I did manage to send pictures of her time in Milwaukee and of the two of us. Does anyone remember when I had that neon green jacket in the picture on the right? Oh the memories...

Church of the Holy Spirit! Getting ready on the big day!!

The Wahl siblings and cousins, or at least those who could make it. They said a few weren't able to...haha...can you find Hna. María Sofía?

The two of us ;)

The 5 novices!

Awful picture of the 5 novices, sorry...

Showing her our board.

More pictures! Truly, it was a lovely day and experience. I am so proud to be her friend, and so grateful that I was able to be there on her very exciting day!! God is good, don't ever forget it.

Lots of love,

Abby

Gringa Goals = us

Dear lovely people,
Happy Advent!! Only 4 weeks left to prepare our hearts for the coming of our Infant King!!
There is so so much I want to write and share but I never find time!!!! Please say a prayer that I can find time to share all that I want to share here on my blog before coming home in 2 weeks!!  Can you believe that the time has passed so quickly?!
Anyway, today I had the pleasure of spending the morning with my friend Morgan, about whom I wrote in my last post (blog link here). We decided to write a post together. :) So here goes.
[note about the term "gringo/a". Sometimes I'm totally fine when people call me gringa, sometimes it's kind of offensive because it can have a negative connotation, rather stereotypical and judgemental depending on the person and circumstance. But I do refer to myself as gringa at times because it is simpler that "estadunidense" and I can make fun of myself. But I prefer to call myself gringa than for others to call me gringa, in general. FYI.]

Special post alert! In celebration of Thanksgiving, two gringas got together one day to create some good ole fashioned apple pie (spoiler alert: It was a success!).

While our families were feasting on a delectable Thanksgiving dinner in Hartland, Wisconsin, we found ourselves here in Santiago in school (explanation: Our families both happened to be celebrating Thanksgiving at our grandmas' houses, coincidentally in Hartland but have never met each other before. Yet.)

We were also unable to go to a Thanksgiving meal with other exchange students as we had hoped, but we didn’t let that stop us from baking some amazing apple pie. Mind you it was completely from scratch. Despite the challenges, we were completely victorious in our efforts.

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, why not list a few things that we are thankful for? :)

• Family near and far - Chileans and Americans
• Good background music to motivate us while baking
• The end of the school year (here)/semester
• Safety
• WiFi
• Spring (blue skies, green grass, and lots of flowers)
• Opportunities to experience another culture
• Public transportation
• Being able to find all of the ingredients in the store
• Meow Meow
• Apple pie

Here are some pictures from the pie-making experience.

(Abby note: OK sorry for all the selfies. I usually don't take so many. We just had to capture the moment,)

If these pictures make you jealous, check out the recipes that we used.

Pie.

Crust.

So, in conclusion, we didn’t get to have a typical Thanksgiving dinner, but nonetheless, we got to eat some exquisitely wonderful apple pie. It was delicious. Because we are awesome. Gringa goals. haha we're not that arrogant, but we hope you enjoyed the post and the alliteration. ;)

October in my crazy Chilean life

Well, well, well...Look who's back! Sorry for not posting in SO LONG, I have just been SO BUSY! But I am well, safe and happy, so don't worry! I have so many things that I would love to post and share with you all, so I am going to be posting more often in order to get a little more caught up. That's the idea, we'll see if that really happens in my crazy Chilean life. :)

1. I have to let you know that there is another American at my school! She is in the other homeroom of my grade, so we don't always have classes together, but we do have a few. Her name is Morgan, and she is from Ohio. We always talk in Spanish, even though none of our classmates can understand why, hahaha...even when we went shopping at the mall one day we spoke in Spanish the whole time. In general I try to avoid talking in English when I'm out and about (especially when I'm alone) because I would rather not have everyone be alerted to the fact that I am a "gringa". But anyway, I would like to encourage you to check out Morgan's blog if you have a moment, because she posts about different sorts of things with all her exciting, different experiences she's had, and she's also much more faithful in her posting. ;) The link is: https://ryechile.wordpress.com/
Here are some pictures of us exploring the mall when I needed to run some errands a while ago :)

 An alpaca store...

 One example of the millions of American stores and restaurants...I could have forgotten I was Chile.

Crepes!

Other pictures with Morgan (as long as we're on the subject ;))

Picture with Ro, Consu, Morgan and me. :) Friends from school/Schoenstatt :D

2. My birthday! I turned 18 on October 17th, by the way. Last year I was in Germany celebrating the 100th birthday of Schoenstatt, and thought every birthday after that would be such a let down haha. I was very wrong. This year I went on a 27 km foot pilgrimage called "La Caminata de Santa Teresita" :) It is allegedly the route that St Teresa of the Andes walked when she entered the carmelites. There were SO MANY PEOPLE!! It was awesome. I went with a group of Schoenstatt Girls Youth, which was super fun. I think it was the first birthday when I got sunburnt :D Here are some pictures :)

So they dumped a bag of confetti on my head...

There were several stands along the way, including one for Schoenstatt! It was kind of a low key stand when we arrived... Then I found myself on the stage, with my phone plugged in playing Schoenstatt music, and my friends and I dancing and singing in the microphone...well, one more thing in my crazy Chilean life haha

 My turn to carry the pilgrim MTA :) <3

At the end of the trek! :D

Many more things to post! I will try to touch back again soon <3 Big hug from Chile!!!

Abby

New friends, memories and adventures

Dear everyone,

Many many many greetings and a huge hug for each and every one from little me here in Chile. I'm sorry I have been so inconsistent with posting, I have honestly just been very busy!! 

I want to share a wonderful experience I had two weekends ago, and also share about the very unique way in which I celebrated my 18th birthday ;) :D 

The weekend of October 9-11 was very special. Firstly, because there was a "feriado", like a national holiday, so there was no school or anything on the 12th either :D Secondly, it was special because I was invited to a "campamento" in Colina, like a weekend for Schoenstatt girls youth at a shrine called "Valle Hermoso Del Niño Jesús", or "Beautiful Valley of the Child Jesus". This shrine is very special because it was just dedicated last November!! The girls were so wonderful, and welcomed and included me with all their hearts. It was fantastic. Although the weekend started on Friday, I arrived with a few university girls from Providencia (Colina is located just outside Santiago, like 45 minutes from Providencia) on Saturday morning. Over the weekend I had the opportunity to spend time in the shrine, time in the sun, time to get to know my new friends...and also the opportunity to share with the other girls about my Schoenstatt girls youth and Schoenstatt Movement back at home. For once I didn't bring my violin (at first they weren't very happy, but no one asked me, so I didn't bring it! Poor little thing needed a break from being played so often...), but I was asked to sing and one of my songs became one of the hits of the camp. It was cute, all the girls so excited to sing in English. :) 

The first night we slept on the floor of another Schonestatt high school that is in that area, and the second night we slept on the floor of a room in the house by the shrine and had all night adoration in the shrine. I ended up going with a few friends at 3.30am and stayed until 5.30am more or less...needless to say Tuesday when school started up again I was still very tired 😄 

Another fantastic thing about the weekend was the fact that we all got to help clean up the place on Sunday. My group was in charge of cleaning the shrine. We cleaned for about 4 hours...it was intense but so special! For once the abundance of Schoenstatt music I have on my phone finally came in handy, as we plugged in my cell to speakers so everyone could jam while working 😉 

All in all it was an unforgettable weekend, and I enjoyed myself SO MUCH ❤️❤️❤️

Panorama of the house and shrine. It's so beautiful! And new 😊 

Picnic lunch and singing time.

Supper Saturday night...basically most adorable thing ever. The crowns were for us to wear, by the way.

We walked for about an hour to travel between the shrine and the high school. We went with our banner and singing and all...😄 the theme of the weekend (and with which the girls have been working...) was "Sí Reina, por tu Corona hacia lo más alto!", "Yes Queen, towards the highest for your crown!"

Bonfire behind the shrine! I taught the girls a song/game that we learned in our youth back at home, which they loved and which we did a few more times because they really loved it that much. I think it originally came from Switzerland actually... :)

Adoration begins!!

Me and a few girls outside the shrine. 

Why do we love the shrine? Mine is the one that begins with "ahí"...FYI. 

More pictures...photo creds for the following to my friend Nacha! Perhaps some similar things...but I hope you enjoy!

More pictures of picnic lunch...nearly all our meals were picnic. So much fun :)

 Playing guitar in the chapel of the school where we slept Saturday night.

These two adorable little girls were hanging out with us on Sunday. Laura is wearing Hermana's apron, hence the interesting photo haha.

 Cleaning the shrine!

 Me cleaning the shrine!

I cleaned the interior walls for at least a good hour...it was exhausting but so rewarding.

 It just *sparkles* with cleanliness! :D

Running to the shrine! <3

Playing guitar in the newly cleaned shrine <3

And more pictures with the girls! <3 <3 <3

I think this is already a lot to digest. Lots of pictures and words. :) So I will leave you with this and promise to post again soon about my exciting adventure on my birthday last Saturday!
Until soon! Chao!

Con cariño,
Abby <3