As promised, here is a quick holiday update. Isabel and I have officially moved into the House of Destiny, and the directors have moved into their new home! Praise God that the transition has gone smoothly and please to pray that it will continue to go smoothly. Running one children’s home gets expensive enough, but now Jay and Valerie are paying for the expenses of two homes. If you would like to bless them and financially support these homes, check out their website at giatw.org where they have some history of who they are and a PayPal link to donate.
Christmas
Christmas was awesome! We did most everything on Christmas Eve, since that is when Guatemalans do their biggest celebration. We opened presents, ate a bunch of really delicious food, went to the evening Christmas Eve service, watched movies, watched fireworks and had a great time.
New Years
For the New Year celebration, we were invited to a party with some friends from our local church. This was without any of the children from the home, but with people who volunteer at the home. We played games, ate food, watched fireworks and danced with sparklers in the streets!
The Move
As I mentioned, the move has gone well. We’ve painted, arranged furniture, purchased some home / office things and are almost fully unpacked. The room is isn’t huge, but spacious enough to have some office desks without feeling too cluttered.
Each day looks very different, but we’ve really enjoyed the time that we can spend with the kids. Estiven (the eldest) plays video games and card games with us most days (in addition to playing outside and doing chores with us), we’ve watched movies together, and every night we read to him in the Spanish Action Bible we got him for Christmas. He is a wonderful kid and we are just as blessed to have him as he is to have us.
Josue is almost a year and a half old, and he just recently took his first steps! He has been walking more and more each day, and soon he will be taking off!
We discovered that our dog can jump through the tall gate on our balcony, which is terrifying. We learned that the roof in our bedroom is very termite ridden…we are working on fixing that. (We actually knew that before, but we decided to take a closer look to see how soon it needs to be taken care of. We hope to take care of it by next summer.) We learned that our dog can get into the chicken coop… where he just walks around and hangs out with the chickens. Everyday we learn something new, and whether it is good or bad, we always know that God is good.
Prayers
- The kids have been sick for the past week or so, and it looks like we are at the end of it. Pray for healing and restful sleep.
- Cristofer is close to graduating from the babies room to getting his own room. Pray that he can sleep fully through the night without any accidents.
- There are many babies who still need to be placed in a home, and we are close to welcoming one or two more. Pray for all of the staff as we work hard to process paperwork, prepare bedrooms, and gather the funds required to support more children.
- The weekend Nanny is no longer going to be working with us, and as a result, Isabel and I will be taking the weekend shift until a new staff member is hired. This means we will be with the babies during the night which can be exhausting. Pray that the babies will sleep and so will we.
