Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Hola! I know it has been a long time since I posted anything. I had to move over to another location to get sufficient internet. We had an awesome Christmas this year. We had so much local support that wanted to help so we had four different Christmas parties for the kids. All of them had hot chocolate and paneton (fruit bread). They also received a lot of great presents. We had some volunteers come from the U.S. that brought money with them to buy enough specific gifts for each kid.

We had a great time buying the gifts in Trujillo. We took a house mom with us who knew all the kids clothes and shoe sizes. We also had a list of requests from the kids themselves. It took all day, 8 AM - 10 PM, but we got every kid some gifts. The house mom Gina was like a kid in a candy store when we got to a clothes store. She had so much fun picking out outfits for all her kids. Aaron, Emma and Thomas wrapped all the gifts the next day, which was another full day of work.

The actual Christmas party started at the regular Peruvian hour. That regular hour I found out is 12AM Christmas eve night/Christmas morning. We had a huge turkey feast provided by a local Peruvian. Then we opened all the presents that were bought by Aaron, Emma, and Thomas. I apologize for not having pictures of all that. My mom was taking the pictures on her camera and when they were getting ready to go I went to get the pictures off of her card and realized that her card was a different size than what I could put in my computer and we didn't have any of the cables.

The New Year's celebration was similar as well. Except no hot chocolate. We did not burn a big straw doll this year, but we did shoot off some fire works. They have a version of snaps, you know the things you throw on the ground and they go 'pop'. Except that their version is home made dynamite that blows up when you throw it. They are louder than a gun shot when they explode. So...carrying and throwing those things is quite nerve racking...and awesome.

Joel headlining for his grade at the school celebration

Mom passing out some traditional yellow lays(spelling) for the New Years celebration

Kids with the local bank that hosted one of their Chocolotadas.

Internet problems

Sorry about the lack of updates. We are just having a lot of major internet issues that hopefully we can get resolved soon. While I have a little bit of connection I'll just give you some quick updates, and I'll post some pictures later.

My parents got here safe and sound last Sunday and we've been having a great time together. This is the last week of school for the kids, last day is tomorrow, so we have been trying to let them study for the tests as much as possible. My mom has been working a lot with the younger kids. Doing little puzzles and coloring and water painting with them. My dad knocked out about what I thought was going to be 3-4 days of fix up work in the kids houses in one day.

Other unrelated news, we got a ping pong table donated to us, which I think I love way more than the kids. But I'll be giving them lessons non-stop until they can catch up to me so I can have some one to hit around with. We should be getting a pool table donated to us very soon as well! I'm really stoked about that.

Sad story of the week. As my parents and I were walking back from dinner one night (about 8:00) we ran into 2 little girls one the street corner. One was about 4 years old and was holding what I presume to be her little sister of about 1 year old in her lap. They were both hysterically crying and all by themselves. So I knocked on the neighbors door whose house they were sitting in front of and asked them if they knew the girls. They said no but went out to talk to them. I also called Maribel (the orphanage director) to come and check out the situation. The neighbors figured out that the kids were from someone who lived in the next town over. They said "the mom always leaves these kids here by themselves, so that it was no big deal"...ya right. So Maribel said that we should take them down to the police station, but the neighbors would not let us. They told us that they would stay with the girls until the parents came to pick them up. So because we were out numbered and the neighbors were starting to get a little testy, I think because they didn't like seeing white people worried about some peruvian's kids, we decided to just let them stay there with the kids until the parents got back. But we decided that if we see those 2 girls at the corner like that again, we are just going to take them to the police station without knocking on the neighbors door. Because no little girls deserve to be left alone on an ally corner in the bad part of town at night.

I'm Back

Well I got back about a week ago, however I just now got internet access again so thats the reason for the delay in posting. I was incredibly happy to see all the kids again and they were all happy to see me again. I got there about 8:00 and a couple of them had started sleeping at around 7:00 for some reason but they woke up to come to talk to me. Yhonson and Tito were two of them that were asleep and so they were kind of sleepwalking and it was hillarious trying to talk to them. Tito was so out of it that he just stood there and started crying when I tried to talk to him. I got a good laugh out of that.

I went straight to work the next day and cut about 10 heads of hair with my brand new clippers that Laci Thurn gave to me. Thanks Laci! Then I broke out some baseball gloves and played catch for awhile with Gerson and Yhonson. The gloves were donated by Dana Rothaus. The kids are so good at catching yet but they have surprisingly good arms.

The next day we had a Cholotada. Which is a party with hot chocolate and cake, usually held during the holiday seasons. We had some people from the bank BCP come and donate all the stuff and throw the party for the kids. The people from the bank also donated 1 toy per kid and wrapped them all up and called them by name to come get it and everything. The kids all had a great time.

And today, I just got done meeting with David Meyers, the son of Joyce Meyers, who leads up all their international ministry and humanitarian work. Also along on the meeting was Rob Barringer who leads up a huge ministry in Peru. They came to meet with Avis to see what they can do to help. They are both really great guys and had a lot of wisdom that they shared with Avis.

I'm all caught up and I just finished getting my room in order. That's about everything for now.

Carving the first pumpkin

The only pumpkin I could find in Pacasmayo was this white one. It cost me 2 soles or $0.65. Anyway here is the pumpkin before they all went crazy.

Rolling up the sleves

Getting slimy

Pulling out the snot.

Jose has a handful

Carving the pumpkin was a lot of fun, I'll have to take some pictures of the final product when it's all lit up tonight. No one here ever carves pumpkins or does anything on Halloween because they all believe it is and evil day, and that if you have any fun you are pretty much worshiping demons or whatever. I'm trying to break that dogma.