Finally a Blog

Well we have been in the country for almost 2 weeks and what a hectic two weeks it has been. Joel has gone back to the states for a while. And gosh we all miss his blogs. We have had some great teams in the last week and a half. American teachers from a fancy school in Guatemala City put a ton of time and love into two Saturdays of parties for over 300 children. They had pinatas and homemade cookies and presents for everyone. The presents were all donated by the parents of the Guate City children. The first Sat. the party was in Los Robles for all the children we serve. The next Sat. it was in Nueva victoria for the children we do a lunch program for. The teachers commented of how much better behaved the Los Robles children were in terms of orderliness and gratitutde. I realized the difference was we have worked the last year to teach the Los Robles children to respect the people who are giving them something and to have an attitude of gratitude. Realizing this we want to start a tutorial program for the Nueva Victoria children to help them understand gratitude and respect.
We had a wonderful team of nurses Monday of last week that saw over 200 people. We almost delivered a baby at that clinic. We did not have alot of medicines but did discover alot of need for medicine. One is an older man with diabetes who can not afford the $25 a month his medicine cost. I bought it this month. Does anyone esle want to buy it next month? We also have a child with many cognitive disabilities who needs $35 a month for seizure meds. Any takers?
Then we had a great team from the St. George, Utah/Las Vegas, Nevada area that provided much service and much needed supplies to several communities and families. They bought two energy efficient stoves for Nahuala, the community we helped in Aug. after they were totally displaced by Hurricane Agatha. If you remember, we set up 8 Shelter box tents in this area. They bought $1000.00 worth of much needed food as the people were basically starving. They bought 30 pairs of school shoes for the community of Chutinimit here in San Andres. They were another community we did Shelter Box tents for. They bought supplies for a very poor family in Los Robles who needed things for their newborn and milk for their 3 year old. And at Los Robles they paid for the typing classes and materials for 11 middle school students we are sponsoring in school which is allowing us to cover the school expenses for a couple of more kids who needed help to continue in their schooling.
On a personal note, we have enrolled our oldest two here in a private school in Pana. Jody and I are homeschooling our youngest 5 with him taking most of the responsibility for it. Two of our boys are great gymnasts and we have never been in a position to give them lessons. We found out yesterday that there is a Olympic gymnast in Panajachel who will teach our two boys. He also is a piano teacher and will teach our two girls.
We have the computer working with a cellular stick but I can not upload pictures with it so I will go tomorrow to a better location for uploading pictures and try and get some pictures of what we are doing.
Vicki
20.vicki@gmail.com