Medical team

Friday I got the opportunity to go to Imperio de Amor with a team of medical people. I checked the children in and asked symptoms and then they went on to have height and weight checked and to be looked at by one of the 4 doctors. Then we had 2 pharmacists getting meds together. It was a neat experience and we saw about 40 children/caregivers. I don't know when the last time they had medical care was, but there were lots of huge problems and a few children just wanting attention. I watched one of the caregivers, Patti, as she looked so tired and sick, but told me that she would go after all the kids had gone. She had to collect all the meds and be ready to administer them. It was a grocery bag full. What a job! My heart broke for her and all that she does.

The patients came to me and I would ask name, age, and symptoms. It was good practice for me to work on my spanish. And the name part is not so easy. They usually have 4 names or even 5 in a row.


We also had translators with the doctors to give more details.

The pharmacists had a big job

Dedication of the Medical Clinic

We are blessed once again with the addition of a medical clinic to our community. This week we had a team of doctors here and had a dedication ceremony for this new building. It will be used for the teens on campus and for the childrens' homes to come and have medical care. Right now we don't have a full time doctor but we have some that will come for short periods of time. Inside there is a front waiting room, a small pharmacy, and several patient rooms equipped for different things. Thank the Lord for the monetary donations to make this possible!

Fall Festival '08

We had our annual fall festival last night. The kids have a hay ride on the back of a truck, games, trick-or-treating on our campus, a bonfire, and a movie. It was a lot of fun!

The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles were there

Field trip to Grandfather's Farm

When our school went to the farm I was surprised how many animals these students had never seen, or were excited to see. It was fun seeing them get excited.
We got to feed goats.

Everyone got hats!

Jake looked like an Amish man!!

They had a squirrel in a cage!

Everyone got a turn to milk the cow.

There were lots of rabbits to play with.

The whole group.

Everyone got a ride on the horse.

new twins!

Connie and Edgar of Casa Hogar Manantial had twins 5 days ago. I was able to go visit them and they are all doing well. They have 2 girls already; Damaris age 5 and Hannah age 3. The twins names aren't for sure yet. The one on the right is Andrea. That is not unusual in Mexico not to name them right away.

Imperio de Amor

This past weekend I had Thursday and Friday off of school for Fall Break. I was planning to go to Florida to visit my sister, but that didn't work out because of plane tickets. Instead I joined the group for a day. We took the beautiful kids from Imperio de Amor on a special field trip. They got to go to get ice cream and a movie. It was so fun to watch them as I think most of them had never been to a movie before. Pamela, my partner for the day, kept looking back to see where the movie was coming from. I think they had even more fun in the bathrooms with the automatic toilets and air dryers...!
First the kids sang for us!

The bus ride!

Pamela and I

Tire Repairs

Here is where I took my flat tire to be fixed...it cost $5

more pictures from the wedding

Katey Dowd and Rene Gonzalez wedding

My Birthday

I got serenaded by my friends at 2am on my birthday. This is tradition in Mexico.

I hung out with Lupita and Ashley last weekend and we carved a pumpkin and baked the seeds. They had never done any of this before and were very proud of their pumpkin!

football Americana style

They actually have a football team here and a bunch of us went. It was fun and loud!!

Native American Pow Wow

Miss Hope's class was studying Native Americans and then had a Pow Wow. Our class was invited and the whole campus was invited. It's always fun to put together costumes from what we can find around campus!

The kids shared reports and dioramas.

They taught us games

We had to have some drummers!

Nursery Rhyme show

My class has been learning Nursery Rhymes and so for the finale, we put on a show for the parents.
'Mary Had a Little Lamb'

'Little Boy Blue'

'Humpty Dumpty'

'Twinkle, Twinkle'

Imperio de Amor

Last week I took 2 of the teen girls with me to the Childrens' Home, 'Imperio de Amor'. One of the girls was going to visit her sister but I want to take the teens along to serve others so they can get used to that. We had quite the adventure in my car. There has been so much rain that the roads are rutted out and at one point there was a foot drop off and then I went in a huge puddle and it was very deep! But we made it! It was fun to go at a different time. I usually go with groups. When I pulled up it was the best feeling to have the girls come running out yelling 'Ruby!'. I brought coloring books and crayons so we went to the girls' quarters and hung out. I also helped the little ones do homework.

Estanzuela

Another beautiful hiking day after church Sunday! What a blessing to be so close to such beautiful creation!

Field trip to Chipinque

We had our first field trip!! The students got to hear about the animals at one of the state parks here and then we went hiking and had lunch!

Checking out the 'live' tarantula, foot-long centipede, black widow spider, and huge stink beetle