The Twins 3rd Birthday Party

  We had a grand fiesta at the end of February to celebrate the twins third birthday! I think you will enjoy the following pictures. Kaley let me borrow her awesome camera and I had a great time taking pictures! Thanks, Kaley!

A. and K. Ready for action!

Beautiful A.

Beautiful K.

 And, of course, Paula wanted her picture taken also!

Beautiful P.

Happy with Tio Rudi

Look at those eyes!

A few of our illustrious guests

 We ate a delicious dinner first: Lasagna, Homemade French Bread, Coleslaw, and Fruit Salad!  Our guests included Jake and Jen, all of the children from Casa 2 & 3, Richard and Gladys Scoggins with their daughter Gracie, T.J. and Tami Mitchell with their daughter Madison, Javier and Techy with their children Michial and Annabelle, Volunteers Kaley LaPointe, Carlee Van Zyl, and Anna Magee, as well as Tia's Sarin and Karen.

And a few more guests!

Tia Techy with her Husband and two children!(Behind K.)

 I think that Savannah should be happy with the above picture, because Tia Techy is smiling... almost!
Sorry, you can't see the faces of her husband or children... I promise they are quite nice looking!

Rudi, Jennifer, Richard, and Gladys

Volunteers Kaley, Carlee, and Anna

 We have an awesome group of volunteers right now. They helped me out with the babies the whole time, so I didn't have to worry about them! Kaley is from So. Cal, Carlee is from Idaho, and Anna is
from So. Cal as well. They are a hardworking fun group of gals.

Rudi, Myles, and Emily provided some after dinner music!

Waiting for the cake!

 After they blew out the candle twice, once for each twin, Tia Sarin wanted them to "take a bite". Remember that custom from the blog about Rudi's birthday? Well, A. performed perfectly, but K. was not happy at all with the idea. The pictures below show a blow by blow of the event as it happened. I think that their faces are too cute in these. They show their individual personalities quite well!

"Take a bite girls!"

Good Job A.!

K. says "No way"!

Well, how about a pretend bite!

The kids had fun taking turns with Tio Rudi's violin!

 Toward the end of the evening Jen informed me that she and Jake had an announcement to make! I promised not to steal their thunder, so you will have to check out Casa de Amor's blog and/or their Facebook page later in the month to find out the rest of the story!

The Reaction to "The Announcement"!

  Then it was gift time. As you can see they did not lack for gifts! The girls have had a great time over these past few days playing with all of them!

Regalos!

 T.J. and Tami Mitchell had these girls from the time they were 11 months until last November when they came to live with us. It is because of all of the love and attention they were given by them that they are the sweet little girls they are now. We were thankful that T.J. and Tami were able to come and help us celebrate the girls birthday! I thought that this picture of Tami with K. turned out great!

Tia Tami with K.

 Please pray with us that God would send just the right set of parents to adopt these precious girls. Please pray that their paperwork would be finished right away and that the judges would approve their adoption quickly. We will be sad to see them go, but very happy for them to be in a "forever family".

Happy Birthday A. and K. We love you!

Introducing "Abby"...

A Face Anyone Could Love!

Last evening a most precious little girl came to live with us, making our "Casa Kids" number four! She is already stealing our hearts with her easy going, happy ways! "Abby" (Not her real name, but we already have an initial A. with one of the twins!) was found in a trash can with her umbilical cord still attached and covered with signs of being just recently born. Her birthday is toward the end of April, 2012 and is the same day as my parents anniversary and our Aunt Diane's birthday as well! It is hard to believe that a person could throw a baby away, but it happens, Abby is living proof. Praise the Lord that HE saw her and delivered her into safety before it was too late.

Chillin' with Emily!

 Abby has spent the first ten months of her life in the hospital. She has had numerous respiratory infections throughout her life that have kept her from coming any earlier to Casa de Amor. We hope to build up her immune system with good nutrition, lots of love, and attention! Because she has spent most of her life in a hospital crib, just one of the many children there, she is slightly behind with her development. She cannot sit up or crawl yet, but is very close to sitting up! She LOVES to eat and is good sleeper so far; who could ask for anything more? With each baby our love just grows and it really is getting to be addicting seeing who does God have for us to care for next! We are thankful to Jennifer and Casa de Amor for giving us this opportunity to serve here in Bolivia. 

"Elegant Abby" (She sleeps under a mosquito net now!)

Thanks for stopping in and meeting our latest member of the family! I'm sure that you will see lots more of her in the future!

A Day in the Life of Carla!

I was privileged to be able to go to the pediatric hospital one day this week and spend some time with the next to youngest member of Casa 1! Camila is very close in age to our baby L. and a good 10 pounds lighter. She was born premature and was found abandoned in a busy part of the city. Jennifer got the call about taking her in on the day that we arrived here in Cochabamba last October! After the phone call, she spent about two months in the nutrition center and the hospital, before coming to live at Casa 1 towards the end of December. She is a fighter for sure. Very alert and curious about what is going on around her.

This time she was back in the hospital with a respiratory infection. When Jen sent out the e-mail that she needed volunteers to go and spend time with her, I really wanted to go, but with nine children in our house I am usually needed around here! I never said anything to Rudi about it, but when he read Jen's e-mail he volunteered Tia Techy and Emily to go. However, Tia Techy had left her Carnet at home and did not have any other picture I.D. with her, which is required to visit someone in the hospital. This left me to go (yah!), as we had already told Jen that we had the 11-3 time slot covered!

I braved my way in a truffi to the hospital, as I really did not know where it was other than some cross streets. Thankfully, I can finally speak enough Spanish to get around and made it safely to the hospital.
For the next three hours I had the most relaxing time, feeding Camila her bottle at feeding time, holding her up to the window and showing her outside. At one point she was getting a little squirmy, so I thought I would try laying her in her crib. She immediately started crying the moment she was put down. I ended up holding her the whole time I was there! Bummer!:)

I had lots of time to think and pray and just be quiet. What a blessing! I thought of the scripture in Matthew 25, that was one of the reasons that we came to Bolivia to do work with these children.
"Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me. 
Then shall the righteous answer him, saying Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink? When saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me."
What an honor to be able to give my time to spend just a couple of hours with a baby who has been taken in by Casa de Amor, when she was naked, hungry, and sick.

Now to change the subject, I have an adventurous story to tell about my trip home from the hospital.
Carlee Van Zyl from Boise, Idaho is here as Casa de Amor's latest volunteer. She took over at the hospital to be with Camila when I left to go home. She is not as familiar with the transportation and is still not super confident with her Spanish skills, so I told her that I would figure out an easy way home for her to get home. I spent half an hour walking around that part of the city trying to find, by reading their signs, a Trufi or Micro that I knew would easily take her past Casa 1. When I didn't find anything, I decided to go back to the hospital and just ask the Trufi and/or Micro drivers where they were headed, as they passed right in front of the hospital. Well armed with some amazingly delicious ice cream to bolster my confidence, I noticed that the sign on one of the large Micros said that it went within 2 km. of my house and passed Carlee's destination for the evening also! Perfect! After confirming with the driver that this was so, I settled down to enjoy the ride home and savor my ice cream as well. About 3 km. into the journey the heavens opened and it started pouring rain in torrential amounts. The roads were full of water within minutes and looked like small rivers. As nobody has defrosters in their vehicles here, the driver had to wipe the inside of his window every so often, as they got fogged like crazy. At one point he stopped the rig and went out and put laundry detergent on the windshield. He didn't have windshield wipers either, so maybe this helped the rain wash away better.(?) (Maybe one of you would know a reason for this?) I remember thinking that I was glad I was not in a much smaller Trufi. It felt good to be up in a larger vehicle (The Micro handles easily about 30 passengers or more in a pinch!). I really thought that when a Semi-truck went flying past us and sent a HUGE wave of water up and over the front and left side of our Micro. It would have drowned a Trufi! The passengers on the left side (thankfully I was on the right!) got slightly wet when the water splashed through the many cracks around the windows! All was seemingly going well, when the Micro began to sputter and cough and then finally come to a stop on the side of the still busy, very wet road. I wasn't sure what to do. Should I just jump off and hail another Trufi? For 15 cents I could afford to catch another one! However, I had somewhat bonded with the funny, super nice lady I was sitting next to. She was giving me a running commentary of her opinion on all of the turn of events! And it just felt wrong to abandon the ship after all that we had been through together. Besides it isn't everyday that you get to have a grand adventure! (I don't get out much folks!) After the driver checked the engine a couple of times and tried to start it a couple of times, while we all sat patiently waiting to see what would happen next, he finally hailed another Micro of his same type and we all piled off together out into the rain to run to the other Micro for our last leg of the journey. Of course, we didn't have to pay this driver since he was doing the other fella a favor, so I got to go home the rest of the way for FREE! Worth the wait!
Jen warned us that moving to Bolivia we had to be flexible. If you just go with the flow it can actually be kinda fun!!

A Blessed Day

L. with one of his many girlfriends!

 Yesterday we went with our church on an "Excursion". The church had rented a really nice facility that had meeting rooms, lots of grass, places to play games, bar-b-que, and to even go for a pony ride.
We all were supposed to meet at the church at 8 a.m. "en punto" to ride to the facility on a big bus together. Which means that we all got there around 8:30, actually very "en punto" for Bolivians! It was raining and I must admit it did not look like the best day for a picnic! But not being faint of heart all 80 of us loaded on the bus! It was standing room only for sure! The Lord super blessed us because when we got there about 30 minutes later, the sun came out and did not stop shining until EXACTLY when it was time to go at 5 in the afternoon.

Concentrating on the Good Stuff!

 The day flew by with lots of games and activities planned for young and old alike. After creating the blue team and the yellow team they proceeded to play a variety of very active games! Below they are getting ready to play a game where they all are holding the person in front of them in a long chain of people. They then tried to pop the balloon of the other team that was on the last person in the line. You could not let go or you lost a point! Emily is on the yellow team straight ahead in the red shirt. Myles was on the blue team. I think the blue team won when the yellow teams person in back fell on his balloon! (That was hard to explain. I hope I didn't confuse everyone!)

Here it is in action! They were flying all over the place trying to pop the other teams balloon. It reminded me of a dog chasing its tail! It actually looked quite dangerous, but thankfully, no one got hurt!

 There was lots of time to make new friends! These girls built a fort together out of rocks and grass! I wish I had gotten a picture of it... (once again not the best at pictures!)

These two super sweet ladies shared their lunch with our three little girls. When Rudi was putting Paula to bed he asked her what her favorite part of the day was and she said, "Those ladies made a picnic just for us!" This morning she was still telling me what she had eaten...beef and rice! (The pile of rocks behind them is what the girls (above) made their fort out of!)

L.to R. Janeth, K, A, Paula, and Marta

A better picture of Janeth with Paula and K.

 Janeth teaches the small children's Sunday School. She is one of the nicest people I know and a great friend!

Naptime for L.

 When all of his girlfriends finally put him down L. sacked out for a nap in the corner of the meeting room.

 After lunch it was time for Clancy's favorite thing.... WATER FIGHTS! All of the kids had a great time soaking each other in various ways.Thankfully we had brought clothes for them to change into!

"Christo ama cada uno"

The young people at our church love our little kids. Here they are singing some children's choruses with them. I have been very impressed with the quality young people that go to this church. Most of them seem to really love the Lord and are always ready to serve!

It was a very relaxing, fun day! As we rode back to the church in the bus, everyone was singing Spanish praise songs together. It was the perfect ending to a memorable day! Even though we are just beginning to learn the Spanish language, the language of love is very much a part of our Bolivian church family. It is awesome to realize that the body of Christ is everywhere in the world and it always has the love for Jesus and His people at the center.
Ephesians 2:19-22 "Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God; and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone; In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord: In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit."

Lets Boogie!

Hi everybody! This is my first recording project! I hope you all enjoy it! It certainly is not outstanding, but for my first project....it's not too bad! Enjoy the Twelve Bar Blues Boogie!
You may have to wait a bit!

Our Language School

I am going to give you a short tour of our language school that we go to at least twice a week each. This is the apartment building it is held in. You have to go to the "Tienda" first and ask for the key to the gate. Our classes are held on the third floor. It seems that I am always winded by the time I get there. Only when I am climbing stairs does the 8,400+ feet elevation get to me!

Here is the view from the third story window. You are looking out at one of our favorite markets "The Ingavi Market". Myles is going to do a blog about the different markets we go to in the near future.

Rudi looks like a giant next to these Bolivianos!

 Rudi with our three favorite male professors! From left to right Alejandro, Daniel, Rudi, and Jose. They have all been teaching Spanish here for a very long time. Alejandro and Daniel both teach Quechua (a native Bolivian language), as well. We have very much enjoyed getting to know these teachers and really appreciate their patience and encouragement as we climb the mountain of language learning. Emily and Myles have really hit it off with the instructors and really look forward to the days that they have lessons!

Emily goofing off with Alejandro and Daniel!

Myles hard at work with Jose!

 And last, but certainly not least, the only female teacher and director of the language school, Gladys! Gladys is a real bright spot to any day. She is also a dynamite teacher. She speaks Norwegian, English, some French, and I think some Quechua, as well. This language school has been open for over 30 years. The collective teaching experience is awesome! We always have a great time and are learning so much!

Carla studying with Gladys....

We always go for two 45 minute sessions and have a new teacher for each session. This way we get a variety of teachers. The different teaching styles are great for challenging us and for covering all of the bases! We are thankful to Jennifer for letting us know about this language school. It has been a lot of fun!

We also have enjoyed meeting people from Norway, Finland, and Switzerland. We look forward to having some fellow American volunteers from Casa de Amor joining us at the language school soon!

Learning Through Trials...

 When I left you last blog it was with optimism that it would be a better week ahead... Well it wasn't... It was actually worse. Thursday afternoon I came home from Spanish class and went straight to bed with the worst achy flu I can remember having in six years. It was a long and sore weekend. One by one all the rest have gotten sick with the exception of A. and baby L. Thankfully, Rudi waited to get sick until after I was back on my feet, in a wobbly sort of way, Monday! He wasn't hit as hard thankfully and is recovering faster. I think it has to do with my amazing concoctions I have been giving him.

 Below Emily took a picture of me giving out some of my narly health tonics! The one below has lots of fresh crushed garlic, crushed onion, ginger, apple cider vinegar, and honey. It is sure to cure what ails you... if you live through eating it!!!

 In the blue cup is the "potion" and in the little cups water and peach yogurt. First you eat a spoonful of the potion, followed by a water rinse, and then the spoonful of sugar that makes the medicine go down, yummy yogurt. Want some?

A now for a series of reactions from Emily!

Primero!

Segundo!

Finalmente! Not so bad!

I think this face says it best!!

 And as if being terribly sick was not enough our water system failed this past week also. This means that we did not have water Monday through this morning. (With the exception of Tuesday afternoon!) We figured out that we could pull water up out of our tank to flush toilets, wash dishes, and even take a "camping bath"! It was not the most convenient, but we were thankful to have any water at all. Our laundry has stacked up nicely and boy did a shower feel great today!

Ruth and Paula on "Bucket Brigade" duty!

Myles our main water gatherer!

 We are so thankful that Tia Techy was here all week to make food for us and clean, and clean, and clean! She is such a blessing to us everyday! Don't let the serious face fool you, this gal has a great sense of humor!

Our favorite Tia!

 Our little girls on loan and little boy continue to grow and do super well! We have lots of fun with them and are thankful to be here to serve them. Baby L. is always commented as being "gordito" and is sleeping through the nights like a champ! Now that he has begun to smile we are given lots of these every day! A. and K. love to sing songs and play with puzzles and are generally busy little girls all day long! I still love to hear them laugh!

Happy Baby L.

This past week two different women, who I appreciate very much, sent me these verses as an encouragement... I really felt that this is what the Lord wanted me to think about and attempt to learn through these trials.
2 Corinthians 4:16-18 " For which cause we faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory; While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal."
I know that I am beginning to learn just a little to lean on the never ending resources in Christ Jesus. I am thankful for the "stretching weeks", especially when they are behind me!!!!