It's all about people!

The last few weeks...

We've had the blessing of being able to catch up with lots of friends that we haven't been able to see in around 6 months due to our lives being so busy. So we've rechecked in and lots of relationships. We went to the capital and stayed with friends for the weekend, participating in a birthday party, eating out at the new Jonny Rockets restaurant, and seeing lots of families that are important to us. It was fun. Then we've had lots of people at our place - I've been cooking lots! :) We hosted a missionary dinner at our place in an attempt to encourage each other and build relationships - that was a lot of fun! We had some people over that run a clinic in the area, we had friends from a similar ministry over and compared notes, had a board meeting to check in with the board, Tristan went golfing with a friend and well... the list goes on! One thing Honduras has taught (is teaching) us is that relationships come first and must be the most important.

Last Tuesday was a national holiday here - Children's Day. Thanks to lots of school supplies and toys that teams brought throughout the summer, I was able to make up 12 gift boxes and we bought 12 pinatas and stuffed them with 54 pounds of candy. Then we played Santa and went school to school delivering our boxes and pinatas and saying hello to the kids. The girls had a blast doing it and got way too much candy. Maddy hit quite a few pinatas :). A fellow missionary made a good point - Honduras has Children's day because usually birthdays aren't celebrated - no gifts or cake due to lack of funds...hence why Children's Day is so important here.

Maddy and Ali helped me load 12 pinatas full of candy -without complaining that it wasn't for them and she kept telling people it was for the children at schools. She was thrilled to be a part of breaking them!

in order to hang the pinatas, some guys held the ladder in the middle of the room completely vertical so their friend could climb it... Tristan said he'd never do that :)

Maddy and Ali got lots of love that day as we revisited the schools we worked at this summer.

This last weekend we had our friend Miranda out with her girls. We worked with Miranda way back when we were with Seeds of Change (the other ministry) and Miranda is still hard at work -transforming and loving on orphans that need to transition into life and set up a future. So we love having her here and loving on whomever she brings with. This time she brought Yolanda and Magdalena - they were dolls (literally) and went along with playing dress up and baby with Maddy. Maddy was so sad to see them go. we also went to the river with them and sat around in the cool water which was fun!

                                  


Today is Honduran Independence Day. The big way they celebrate is parades...I think there has been a parade every morning for the last week! The parades are made up of cute kids in costumes, youth marching and hold flags, and lots of drum-heavy bands. Parades start at 7:30 due to the heat. Everyone comes out for them. Yesterday was Sigel's turn to march and we had a fun time seeing him and some other kids that we know. It was 95 degrees by 9:30 when he was done.





No great marching pictures of Sigel - he was hiding behind his flag :(. But he got to carry the flag because he's an honor student!

Tristan's been working on a lot of little projects around EA and our house - things that there is never time for. He's also been finishing up and working on some things out in the community. We agreed to help a family who has been living in a shack, build a house. So they are making their own adobe and building their own house - and we are assisting with the $ intensive part of the roof and header and cement. Tristan went by to check on them and she sat him down and fed him tortillas and talked his ear off for 1 1/2 hours. :) but the tortillas were great - it's not often you find someone who makes good flour tortillas around here - everyone just makes corn tortillas. again...it's all about relationship.

I've been eating, living, and dreaming CLINIC. ((seriously dreaming about the doctors and medicine lists and containers)) As we are trying to open up the clinic in the next few months, someone needed to become the expert...so I'm trying. I've been meeting with doctors and directors of clinics and the health department and looking through pharmacy lists and figuring out what we're missing and where to buy things and......the list has been endless. I have found some wonderful people who want to help and who are full of information and I've learned so much and have a lot more to learn. Crunching the #'s has been the hard part because no matter how I look at it, we just can't do it on our own - and I am really feeling like that's where faith comes in. I believe that it's time to open soon, and that we can't wait any longer for the expert to come along or all the $ in the bank. Taking this step of faith is both scary and exciting for me. Assuming we pay for everything, each patient will cost us $15. 1 doctor can see 400 patients in a month. you do the math.... i need a lot of faith.

um, that's it for now. the kids are good - i could just blog about them and how adorable, and challenging they are... maybe next time :) the short version is, Sigel has off school this week, Maddy sings the ABC's in a loud and off key way, and Ali just figured out how to walk backwards and she loves to dance in a circle until she gets dizzy and falls.





 - Tristan found this on our porch door the other night! :( I guess all this rain is making them come out of their holes! Yikes! Good thing my mom already has her plane ticket so she'll come anyways :).