Thanksgiving in Magdalena

Over Thanksgiving week I enjoyed a trip to Magdalena, Mexico at CVE. It’s been two years since I’ve been there and while so much has changed, there is still something special to me about that place. Although it was sad to miss my family’s Thanksgiving celebration here, I got to spend the holidays with some California relatives and also meet new friends who were on the work team.

God’s provision was abundant from the beginning of the trip and while it’s not fun to be reminded of how human I am, I had a good faith-building experience. About fifteen minutes from arriving at the airport Friday night I realized that I had forgot to pack my passport. During my packing process on Friday it never even crossed my mind which is strange for how many times I’ve traveled internationally. At first it seemed like I’d just have to stay behind or catch a later flight, but with the way the Friday night hotel and ride to Magdalena was set up, it wouldn’t really work well if Kayla Bahler, my travel buddy, went on without me. Mom sprouted a few more gray hairs while we tried to figure out what to do. When I called Aunt Jody to ask her advice she informed me that I can get into Mexico no problem without a passport, it’s just getting out that would be the problem. But she said we could mail it to Joe and Heather who were coming down on Wednesday and they could bring it, so Kayla and I made it through security and onto the plane (whew!) and arrived in Tucson as planned. I turned off airplane mode as we landed and got a text from my aunt saying that while I was blissfully flying through the air there was some scrambling back home as my parents realized that my passport was expired. Dad (bless his heart) called the border and found out that my license and birth certificate would be needed to cross back into the U.S from Mexico so those documents would be sent to Joe and Heather along with my passport. As you can see, it was a rocky start, but it reminded me that God is so in control and that He cares.

Saturday we got into Mexico with smooth sailing while listening to some of my favorite worship songs and driving through the beautiful desert scape. We stopped in Magdalena for Las Chicas’ tacos before arriving at CVE. Oh, Mexican food, you are always the best in Mexico.

Fish tacos and horchata.

The week was a combination of construction work and hours upon hours of kitchen work to prep a Thanksgiving meal for hundreds of guests on Thursday evening. Of course there was a lot of singing, playing, stargazing, and relationship building mixed in.

Some highlights of the week:

• Early morning food prep in the kitchen. I was on for three days with a young lady I had met two years ago. I also got to work with Kendra N. and hear her testimony of how she was led to serve in Mexico. Watching people straggle into the comador and spend time in the Word before the day starts is a good reminder of what these trips (and life) are really about.

Jake builds a fire in the comador

• Being reunited with old friends and making new ones. Some churches represented for the team this year were Denver, Morris, Altadena, Elgin, and Wolcott.
• Monday night dinner at the Lemans. It was fun to hang out with the kids that live there and listen to my uncle tell stories about his dog Raffles.
• The stars. One morning I woke up at 3 and couldn’t get back to sleep so I spent several hours under the open sky in awe at my Creator.
• One of the team members gave his heart to Christ on Wednesday!
• Pie night. The Mexicans prefer cake for dessert so that’s what’s served on Thursday. The Americans at CVE, on the other hand, still love pie so Wednesday night after church, people meet in the comador for pie sampling and the new addition of soft serve

Tollhouse, pecan, and apple. Wishing I didn’t know how much I like pecan pie.

• Visiting a real-life ranch on Thanksgiving Day. Hiking through briers and thistles, climbing on rocks and living on the edge. Quiet time with God. And this view:

• Later that day we got to sample some turkey on the job. Food is usually a highlight.

A pleasant distraction from our rock digging and mining songs.

• Doing trash duty on Thanksgiving Day was quite the experience and I’m glad we did it cause the road to the dump offers a pretty great view:

• The Thanksgiving meal was a huge highlight as hundreds of people from the Magdalena community came together for a meal. Duane Wulf made the best ever smoked turkeys and the rest of the meal was scrumptious too. Throughout the evening there were a few glitches here and there but I doubt any of the guests noticed and the people who made it happen seemed pleased with the event.

I served camote and elote, otherwise known as sweet potatoes and corn.

The Feuchtenberger girls did lots of meal prep and served the cakes Thursday evening.

Duane’s good at what he does

So glad to see Fernanda again! She’s quite the spunky but sweet young lady.

The week flew by and I enjoyed it immensely, but by the end of the trip I was ready to go home because there were family celebrations to look forward to. We headed to the border late Friday morning, not sure how long it would take for me to cross with an expired passport. It was mentioned that the wait at the border was an hour but when we got there the lines were moving quite well and from the time we first started waiting to cross until we were over it only took twenty-five minutes! Including the passport check. The man who inspected them didn’t even mentioned that mine was expired and our interaction with him was less than five minutes. I don’t plan to go around with an expired passport and see how many people don’t notice, but it’s really good to be reminded that my God isn’t bound by dates and regulations. We all breathed a prayer of thanks after crossing the border and later that night I crawled back into my own bed at home. Safe and sound.