Grandma's Big Adventure

Can you guess what we are about to do? We went to Mindo, a small mountain town about half way down the mountain from Quito. This little town has turned itself into a tourist destination and we were ready to ride the "Zipline through the Cloud Forest at the Canopy Level". That is what they advertised and we loved it! Above I am with Sister Dresen.

Here I am at the beginning of my journey. Grandpa is safely on the ground taking the photos which is a very important job and provides evidence of our adventure.

There I go. I thought it was very fun. You are moving too fast to really see if there are birds in the trees or animals down below but it is a thrill. The first leg is across a valley. When you get to the other side you have to walk up to the top of the mountain so you can slide down to where you came from. That was the hard part. It had been raining and it was a bit slippery and in my elderly mind it was very steep and a long way up. But then we got to slide down again and the second leg was faster. We were supposed to hold the cable (behind the pulley!) and slow ourselves down if necessary. There is a block of wood sewed into the palm of the gloves. I guess I came in too fast, the guy had to catch me. But we both stayed on the platform just fine.

Come and visit us in Ecuador and you too can fly over Mindo...

Pettingill birthdays this year

Bright orange envelopes from Shutterfly will arrive at Hannah's and Jeffrey's house soon. Their birthdays are up next. Nancy and Bryce are near the end of the month. I thought I would share birthday photos with you so you can remember how wonderful all of our family members are. I won't share the Ecuador photos here because we don't go many places except home and church and the office and the Institute building so my variety of photos is still very limited. I'll build up a collection and send a few along with your birthday photos. Hopefully you will all get to see all of them as time goes by.

In January we have Rosario and Sean:



February brings David P, Andrew and Colby:



Watch for your family members each month. Sometime this year, it will be your turn. I sure have fun making photos for each of you. Feel free to email special requests.
Love, Grandma

Random things to share

The most recent Young Single Adult to move into our ward is Carolina. She is from Guayaquil which is the other big city in Ecuador. It is where the temple is located and is on the coast way down south. She is a returned missionary and wonderful. She had lots of friends come up to Quito to visit her and five of them came to church with her. We had a great class with lots of students and lots of great participation. They wanted a photo after church and I am so glad they brought it up. I wasn't bright enough to think of it. Here we all are with Carolina on the right next to me:



I read a quote that made me laugh. You guys are way too young to remember George Burns. He was a stand up comedy guy back in the days of when I was young and so was TV. He had a wife named Gracie who was the original (for me anyway) less bright blonde. At the end of their performance he would say, "Say good night Gracie" and she would say, "Good night Gracie".

Anyway here is his quote: "Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city."

You can quote me as saying: "Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family even if they are in another country - which is not my preference."



Here is a photo of the senior sisters in Quito. We are in the kitchen of the Mission home at the Hermana Conference. Sister Sloan on the far right is the wife of the Mission President. The rest of us all live in the same building.


We got a call from the senior missionaries last night and they said, "Where are you? Are you going?" We forgot that we were all taking the four office missionaries out to eat at Rusty's because Elder Hakes is getting a transfer back out to the field. He has been an Assistant to the President for longer than we have been here. Rusty's is a hamburger place that was started by an American who married an Ecuadorian. It has a very nice building and they even have root beer! The missionaries love it and we enjoyed it too. You can get a simple (SEEM-ple), doble (DOHB-le) or a triple (TREEP-le) - one, two or three meat patties. I had a simple and couldn't eat it all. You can choose from four types of fries, the usual kind, the thicker potato wedges, a mita, mita (mitad = half you get 1/2 onion rings and 1/2 french fries...and I've forgotten the fourth choice. We all got mita, mita. The onion rings are great. They were not all rings but they use fresh onions and fry them right in front of you. They say the owner is often there. He is a very old man now. He opened his first hamburger restaurant here in 1979. Mayonnaise a big deal here. It seems they put it on most everything (along with aji). (Did you know that they do not sell mayonnaise in jars here but in a bag with a small round opening with a screw cap. Seemed strange to me but it is much easier than trying to scrape out the last of it in a big jar.) So when you get a little cup of mayo and ketchup too you can make fry sauce. The slice of cheese they put on our burgers was orange the color of Kraft macaroni. That worried me but the bun was like the big ones you get in the states, the meat tasted good and it had fresh lettuce and onion and tomato and it was all good. Not as good as In-and-Out but good.

The Hermana's Conference

The Mission provided a wonderful day for the Hermanas. We all met at the Mission Home with President and Sister Sloan and the wife of the first counselor and the wife of the secretary of the Mission Presidency on February 8th 2011. Sister Sloan is at the far right below. You will be able to tell President Sloan. He is the only male.

We started with bread and cream cheese and jam and hot chocolate. The young missionaries were so thrilled to have time to be together. They talked and talked and took hundreds of photos. There is no more than one companionship of sisters in a zone so they rarely get to see one another.

These two sweet women below each taught us. The one on the left talked about the importance of future goals but emphasized that a mission is a special time that requires all of our focus and attention. Serving the Lord on a mission is a unique way of preparing ourselves for whatever the future will bring and also allows the Lord to bless us always if we learn to depend on Him. Putting all of our energy into a mission now will allow us to reap benefits throughout our lives. The one on the right spoke about the importance of small daily acts of service given freely whenever we have the opportunity. It is good to plan ahead and allot time and energy for service but even better is to be aware of when the Spirit prompts us to do something right now for whoever is in our path at the moment. They shared inspiration and concrete examples of how to apply the principles they taught us.
Lunch was enchiladas. We all made them a bit differently. We had chicken and beef, flour or corn tortillas and red or while sauce. We North Americans loved it. It looked like the South Americans ate plenty also. There was also lots of cut up fruit and taco soup and garlic bread. We all enjoyed it. Afterward Sister Sloan and President spoke to us.
Sister Sloan talked about how much they appreciated the Hermanas and how every stake president always requests to have Hermanas sent to their stake. They are not enough to go around! She gave all of us scarves as a gift and said that whenever you have a bad day, wrap the scarp around you and feel the love of your Heavenly Father. It was very sweet and the scarves are brightly colored and beautiful. Mine is blue and yellow. The girl on the right below is wearing her new scarf.

We didn't go home until after we had cake and took a few more photos.

And here are the more mature Hermanas:

Our One Day Vacation

We enjoyed a fun Saturday with the visitors who came to teach neo-natal resuscitation to doctors and midwives in Ecuador with the Yosts. Lots of us went to the Teleferico and also to La Mitad del Mundo. Both are in the city of Quito. First the Teleferico:





We headed up the mountain. The trip took about 20 minutes and since the day was clear (rare for this time of year - we are usually in the clouds) the view was amazing. Quito is at 10,000 ft and we went up to 14,000 feet. We were still in the city when we got into our gondolas and this is the view from above:



We watched this guy head down the mountain on his bike. Wow! I thought he was brave. It looked very steep to me. We did see him almost an hour later as we were coming down the mountain in the gondola and he was still descending on his bike. It is a long way down.

From the top of the mountain, Grandpa got a photo of the building where we live on my camera. Look here:

The arrow points to our window except we live on the opposite side of the building. We face away from the teleferico.

This is most of the group that enjoyed our Saturday outing:
Our next stop was El Mitad del Mundo. This is the center of the earth! If you look at the globe we are on the equator - the middle of the ball. My seventh grade teacher told us to remember that latitude rhymes with slat - the horizontal slats in your mini blinds. (Trivia - When I was in junior high we didn't have mini blinds. There were only venetian blinds which are wider.) Here in Quito we live right on the middle horizontal line of the globe. We are closer to the sun but so high in altitude that our climate in Quito is not as hot as other places near the equator.

This is a very fun place with lots of displays and interesting things to see and ways to learn about the early cultures in addition to explanations about the geographic location. Our time was very limited so we will definitely return. Here is our brief overview:

This man is weaving wall hangings on a hand made loom.

This big dish reflects the rays of the sun on the water in the bowl which is steaming.


This is a sundial and at noon on the Summer Solstice (which is Susan's birthday) there is no shadow because the sun is directly overhead.

The equator is the widest part of the globe and divides the northern hemisphere from the southern hemisphere.


We are standing on the equator and a GPS at this point has this reading:

Next we learned about the Coriolis effect -

On the equator (see the painted red line) water pours directly out of the open drain.

Then we moved (with this portable sink and bucket) about 10 feet to the south and did it again. The water swirled clockwise as it flowed out of the drain in the bottom.



Then we moved the same distance to the north of the equator and tried it again. The water really did swirl counterclockwise. I was impressed!


There was an explanation about how only on the equator can you balance a fresh egg on the head of a nail. The young doctor in our group did it.


Also our guide had several try to walk the equator with their eyes closed. They couldn't do it for more than two steps or so. I did not understand why you can balance an egg but you can't walk straight. Extra credit for anyone who comes up with a good...or at least a plausible explanation!



A fun day and now I know more about the Coriolis effect and why there is no need for daylight savings time in Ecuador. The sun comes up about 6:00 AM and goes down about 6:00 PM every day of the year. Early morning seminary students can't complain about going to class in the dark or trudging through the snow but they do have to climb a lot of hills.