Casa de Sion

We are so busy. But I know everyone wants to know what is happening. So here goes. One let me catch you up on the kids. We have had several teens leave and go home to parents. They were the kids from Xela who came to us when the orphanage they were in closed due to the owner being accused of sexual abuse. They have now gone to live with their parents. But we have had the government add to our orphanage a 5 and 12 year old. A mother brought her 1 month old and 1 year old to us as she could not take care of them. The courts want us to take a sib group. The mother is starting to use the 9 year old girl in prostitution and they want us to take her as well as her 7 and 2 year old sibs. And finally another orphanage has closed and is looking for places for their 20 children ages 8 months to 4 years. Don't know if we will take any of them. Our new building is almost done. They are stuccoing it now. The middle of this month we have a couple of ladies who are going to go and paint murals on the walls of the kids rooms.
We had a team that got about 1/3 of the septic dug and the builder is working on getting the electric in.
A couple of pieces of news. Good first. Edwin, or Josue as the staff calls him, has a family. A Guatemalan mom and dad who can't have children of their own are in the adoption process and come to visit him. He is the baby who was found on the side of the road in the bushes.
Now the bad. The same group who brought us the 5 and 12 year old decided to do a surprise visit at 10pm on a Fri. night. Their wanted to hassle us. One of their wants was that we have white sheets and blue bedspreads for all the beds. The judges that use us to send children too told them they were crazy that we had a good place and to leave us alone. Just one of the crazy things we have to deal with.
I forgot. The ones of you who know Alicia, well she is back. She left at age 18 with a woman who was going to train her in the craft business. Apparently it did work out, so she is now a new employee of ours and will live at the orphanage.
Have I told everyone of all the marvelous things that the work team of 32 did back in July. Beautiful tables, tons of shelving for the storage room and cubbies and shelves for all the rooms at the new orphanage. Plus they totally organized our storage room and worked with the children.
We alos just had another grop down here who helped some more with the storage room and got the septic 1/3 done.
Our biggest need now is CAsh to build more. I have brought back a lot of jewelry and craft items and if you are close to me can do an in home party where your guests can hear about what we are doing in Guate and what the needs are. Then they will be given the opportunity to buy any of the items I have or special order items, I can pick up when I go again in Oct. If you know of any grants or just want to do something esle, contact me and we will brainstorm.
We have an American couple who has made a year long commitment to help with the orphanage starting in Jan. We are very excited about this. He is Guatemalan and has family there.