THANK YOU!

It has been a long time since I have written. Things have been more busy than usual lately, so I haven´t quite had time...but here is a quick update.

The biggest news that we have is not good news. We have lost all of our funding for the orphanage. Our donors (also board members) have told us that they are on the brink of losing their businesses and that they have decided to stop funding. They have also decided to seperate themselves from us completely, which means that we are no longer associated with the board members in any way. When we found out we had lost our funding, we had to let the government know, and they gave us a deadline of June 28th (ONE WEEK after the board had told us they were no longer donating) to fund enough money for the month of July. If we were unable to find funds to cover the month of July by that date, they were going to close the orphanage. Of course, we sent out an emergency email to all of our contacts telling everyone what had happened, and that we were in need of help finding donations for next month. We received an overwhelming amount of help and support, and thankfully we were able to pull together enough donations for the month of July. This will give me enough time to fly home and start looking for more stable donors for future months. THANK YOU so much to everyone who helped us!!

The kids are all doing great. We have had three volunteers here for the last two months- one of which is my cousin Becky- and the kids all love them. It has been great to have them here.

Our oldest girl, Alejandra, who is 15, was able to go home to her aunt and uncle this week. She is happy with them. Also, ony of my babies, José, will be going home to his mom in August, and a family of 4 children (Jimmy, Tania, Mangy, and Oscar), will be reunited with their grandmother in August as well.

Other than the recent news with the board, things are going well. Thanks again to everybody who has helped us through this situation. Without you we wouldn´t have been able to keep our doors open.

Fun kids

This last week has been crazy...

The other day one of Guillermo´s kids, Mangy, drew ALL over Brandon´s and Jose´s faces and bodies with a permanent marker, then drew all over herself. It took me hours to scrub them all clean. At first I was mad, but Brandon and Jose thought it was so funny that I had to laugh too.

Last week someone in the ward here who sells diapers for his job gave us a call and told us that he would donate however many diapers we want or need every month. He also wanted to have a little party for all the kids in the orphanage with a piñata and cake and everything. So on Monday morning we were rushing to get all 15 kids and 6 babies and all the things we needed to bring ready, which was slightly stressful. Well, right as we were ready to leave (a little bit late), Brandon came up to me with a huge wad of gum in his hair. So it took us about another half an hour to get all the gum out and in the end we ended up having to cut all his hair off, poor kid.

Yesterday, we all made ice cream out of coconut and put them in little plastic bags to freeze. When they were done we gave one to each of the kids. Jose ate all of his ice cream...and he also ate the plastic bag.

The house is a little stressful sometimes with so many kids... but they are fun!

Life after the Dentist

Jose has been doing a lot better since the dentist trip. He is all back to normal. I think that his teeth really hurt him before, because he cries a lot less now. We are really thankful for Debbie Clark, who donated the money to have his teeth fixed.

Trip to the Dentist

I took Jose to the dentist the other day. It was such a nightmare. First of all the dentists here are of course a lot different than in the States, since their technology is so behind and everything. They made me hold Jose down and they picked all the plaque and stuff out of his teeth and then they pulled all of his top teeth out and put metal caps in. There was blood EVERYWHERE and he was kicking and screaming his head off and I was trying to hold him down and the dentist was yelling. We were in there for over an hour and at the end I had used so much energy trying to hold Jose down that my hands were shaking. When it was done I finally got to hold him and he just layed on my shoulder and cried and cried. I felt so bad for him.That was really hard for me to see him in so much pain. And also it was REALLY hard for me to watch them pull those teeth out. But he is a lot better now than before, his teeth were so bad before that I´m sure they hurt him alot.
The other kids are doing well, Levi´s teeth broke through his gums and he has been really fussy lately. Alejandrita has been starting to sit up by herself and when she is in her crib she starts to pull herself up on the bars. She is also learning to crawl, and she is so much fun.

Estos Celos

Brandon, who is 2 years old, loves to sing. One of his favorite songs to sing is called ¨Estos Celos,¨ and he is so cute when he does it. I tried to record him singing but he wasn´t being very cooperative and just ended up making a bunch of hilarious faces and singing a couple of words here and there.

Monte Ricco

Yesterday we took all the kids in the orphanage to the beach, Monte Ricco. It was so much fun. The kids loved the the waves. I even took a couple of the babies into the water and they loved it. Levi didn´t have too much fun, it was pretty hot for him and he got sand in his diaper, but I gave him some watermelon and he was pretty content. I spent most of the time in the water with Jose, he loved the waves and he would stand there and hold my hands and wait for the waves, then he would scream and laugh when the wave came in. We gave Alejandra ice cream for the first time, and she loved it. By the time we went home she was covered in ice cream and sand. After we had played in the water for awhile, we all had a big game of soccer and by the end of the day the kids were all so tired that they fell asleep in the back of the car on the way home.