life in january

this month has been very exciting because we were blessed with 5 new children that came to live with us! their transition to the country life has been really positive, they love helping out with the animals and spending time playing in the basketball court. it's been fun to have some new faces and be able to spend extra time getting to know them. for the two older ones we've been working on some math and reading lessons to get them ready for school. below are just a few photos of them hanging out with us. if you'd like to learn more about the kids or are interested in sponsoring some of them, check out the givehopekids page here. 

in other news...we bought a monkey for $15 named lola.

she's actually a "miko de noche" or a kikachu so it's mostly active at night, although we've noticed she usually is up around lunchtime to munch on something and say hello. 

a few weeks ago we celebrated Areli's 15th birthday and had a few friends over for a party. 

sarah also made this incredible strawberry cake for her party.

some photos of life in honduras...

above is the first english class we had during library time. we're just teaching vocabulary so it will be a supplement or a head start for those who are studying it in school. we give out lists and have quizzes every week. it's cool to see how motivated some of the kids are to learn and how quickly they pick it up. with perfect scores on their quizzes they have a chance to "buy" school supplies they will need with library money.

catching all the chickens to put back in the coop. if you can't tell by my face, this would be my first time doing that. these laying hens were a great success for egg production. we plan to get 30 more in the near future. doesn't get any fresher than that!

Josiah is going to be 1 year old next month and he's learning how to get around quick. He loves to practice his walking!

a few construction pictures -- the main projects for this that we've got going on are for Sarah and Jason's house and also the library addition. once this is all finished, there will be a whole lot of shuffling around and more place to spread out and organize the library. if you can see in the picture below, some of the guys are working on putting up a repeater so we can get some reliable cell phone service {eventually}.

some time spent with the girls in the house -- sucking on limes and salt. whatever gets a funny face outta ya!

this is our latest form of showering down at the creek on the property. the water feels so wonderful and it's a blast to take some of the kids down and hang out. {did i mention this is january? yeah? okay just checking.}

lots of projects going on, lots of spending time with kids, lots of trusting that the Lord is in all of it, working things out just the way he wants. 

thanks again to those of you who are praying for us and supporting me financially. the impact on these kids and the community as a whole up here is eternal!