Sugar Cane!

Every Monday we go to Queen Elizabeth's Home for Children & yesterday the kids introduced us to their sugar cane crop.... by breaking down a salk, stomping on it to break it up into pieces & then chewing on the insides... it was quite educational.  They let me taste it too, I wasn't really a fan...it was just an odd taste, not really as incredibly sweet as you might think.

the sugar cane garden (I don't really know what you'd call it, garden, patch, crop)

What you chew on... one kid told me it cleans your teeth, which I highly doubt

 

  

 

This sweet boy has consistently asked me every time he's seen me about my watch he says "Miss, let me see your watch.... can you find a watch for me?"  But it's never in a rude or begging kind of way.... I hope someday I can get him a watch! 
They love watches! They're always pushing all the buttons & when I leave my watch is beeping & alarms are going off all hours of the day, haha.  One boy there has a watch... so they must be able to keep a watch of their own.  It's tough to know what you can give the kids because often it gets taken away... but maybe if it's strapped to their body, they can keep it? 

This is a Mango tree growing at the orphanage, yo can see the sugar cane behind it

I can't wait to visit them when the mangoes are ripe!

Kiss me sweet, and we'll go flying high in birdland, high in the sky up above... all because we're in love - Ella Fitzgerald

A girl sang this song on American Idol.... and I love it.
and I love Lee.

Yesterday we celebrated Valentine's Day together by spending some time at the beach together (finally!)
Lee had his unified exams in the morning and as soon as he finished (he finished first btw... hopefully that's a good sign!) we headed to Grand Anse!
We spent some time laying in the sun because Lee is as pale as he would be living in Canada in the winter.... playing in the water, although there weren't waves today like there were Saturday!

Did I talk about Saturday?? at the OSO Beach Day with the kid's from Queen Elizabeth's Home the waves were intense!  We were all getting knocked down and drug out to sea.... and covered in sand! my bathing suit was FULL of sand. but it was a fun time of course :)

Anyway, yesterday.... we ate lunch on the beach - peanut butter and jelly, dorito-ish chips, and apples and then started the journey over the mountain at the end of Grand Anse beach to get to Morne Rouge beach... we had never been, but I had heard it was more secluded than Grand Anse (and because all the first term med students had the day off after their exams, they were all at the beach!)
It was a tough walk.... up, up, up a big hill and then down, down, down... but worth it! it was beautiful! and very secluded. 
But then we started to get hot! so we took the walk back up over the hill and down the other side to the Spiceland Mall to get SMOOTHIES! Lee had fruit punch and I had cantaloupe.  Cantaloupe doesn't sound that good... but it is! it's the flavor intensified and lots of sugar :) and they use sweetened condensed milk in their smoothies. they are heaven.

Afterwards we headed home to get the sand and salt washed off and I went to the Queen Elizabeth's Home to play with the kids, like we do every Monday!  It was a fun day.... I was pretty worn out though and thankfully the kids weren't too active.  Amber brought them all sunglasses!  A friend of her's from home bought them for the kids at Walmart... and they loved them!!! It was so sweet to see them so excited.

 

 

Once I got home Lee and I planned to go out to eat... but instead we went and watched the sunset on the cliffs on the end of campus and ordered pizza from Glover's and watched a movie.
I must say it was one of the best Valentine's Day's ever.

 

Lee relaxing for the first time in a month! 

♥ yum 

On the hill overlooking Grand Anse Beach
it's so pretty!
we must have said 10 times "I can't believe we live here"

The other side of the hill, over looking Morne Rouge Beach (or aka BBC Beach)

There was hardly anyone there, but we spotted our friends and RA's Glenn and Michelle out in the water!
Grenada is a small world :) 

Happy First Married Valentine's Day!

Beach day with kids from the orphanage...

Every Saturday from 10-12 the SOs and some students go down to the beach to play with the kids from a local orphanage... this Saturday was Lee and I's first time and we are so glad we went!
I have to admit that we almost didn't.... we were just gonna go to the beach and relax b/c Lee has been studying soooo much & hasn't had time to just lay at the beach, but on Friday night we were doing our devotional and it has all these 'this week why don't you..." like last week it said "this week plan a date night" and Friday it said "do something kind for someone else" so we both felt a little like..... duh go play with the kids tomorrow morning. :)

The kids playing in the water, and check out all the sail boats in the background... beautiful!

a few of the kids we got to meet and play with

 

This little girl on the right was my buddy.  She didn't talk much, but we gathered "treasures" and drew pictures in the sand and ran from the waves... and she got such a big smile when she saw the camera :) 

 

 

Lee's little friend... he wanted Lee to take him to the bathroom.

So we will definitely be going back next Saturday.
afterward we took a walk down the beach towards St. George's as far as the beach went.  There is 2 miles of beach at Grand Anse, so we walked atleast a mile down and a mile back.  It's so beautiful there... someone told me today that the Travel Channel named Grand Anse in it's top 10 beaches in the world. I believe it.  It's the best beach I've ever been on.