Juliana

Our little girl is 2!  And she's growing!  At her last couple checkups, she's gained a pound at each (about 1 pound every 2 months--which for her is fantastic!).  She's so active and has loved the warm sunny weather we've been having--a little too much as the clothes and diaper come off at every opportunity.  She's very loving, loves to give kisses and tell people "lu-lue" (love you), and will show off for anyone (even strangers!) who give her the slightest amount of attention.  She starting to learn some colors (can usually get green and blue correct--everything else is black) and numbers (she only counts two and three) and can match some shapes, and when asked how old she is the response is always "nine".  She loves to talk about/list body parts, steal and eat people's noses and eyes, and dance.  Lately I've been letting her paint with watercolors, homemade finger paints, and Color Wonder paints (looks like clear gel and only paints on the special paper) and every few days we go to the school library to check out more books for her and look at the turtles.  Her favorite books are ones with animals (she knows MANY animal names and noises), Dr Seusse, and anything with Dora, Elmo, and Curious George.  She has a list of people who's names she knows (pretty much all people she sees all the time).  She likes to "call" those people on the phone and has conversations, and goes through her entire list several times a day (listing every single person).  Sometimes its asking to play with them or if we will see them, other times its asking if they have a bum-bum :)  Overall, she's a pretty good, little cutie.

For her birthday party I originally intended to only invite a few of her favorite people from church and school.  But once I started making the list it got very large.  It still ended up being pretty big (I think we had 35 people in our house) even after I cut the list down A LOT.  She just has too many friends :)  Overall it was a great day.  We had lunch (all of Juliana's favorite foods--nuggets, mac & cheese, apples, beans and chips, etc), scavenger hunt, lots of prizes, a pinata, and let Juliana open her gifts.  It was so fun to see her with each of her gifts because she actually played with them and liked them so much she didn't want to go on to the next!  So much more fun than a first birthday party.

I decided to experiment with marshmallow fondant and do a cake with pastel bugs (she LOVES bugs).  It took many hours but was a fun experience.  I'd definitely use marshmallow fondant again.

I wanted to give her a play kitchen for her birthday.  Buying one in Honduras was just too expensive, shipping one would've taken too long.  We tried to have one made but discovered it would cost more than buying one.  So the week before her birthday Kyle and I stayed up late at night building her a kitchen out of cardboard.  Kyle then planned a scavenger hunt for the big kids to help her find her present. 

Most of the kids and teens at her party

I got her a Uniqua (from the Backyardigans cartoon) pinata.  She actually hit it!  She never knew what to do with a pinata at the other parties she's attended.

Knowledge Bowl

I've asked Kyle a few times to write this post, but since life never seems to slow down I don't think he will get to it.  Once one big even is completed its immediately onto the next big event.  Kyle's two biggest events since Christmas have been Alumni Soccer Day and hosting the Knowledge Bowl.

Alumni Soccer Day was the last Saturday in January.  Its a day where former students, teachers, and parents come and form teams to play against the current soccer teams.  The games are set in advance and the alumni and parents know when to come and play.  They're given uniforms to wear for the day.  And each of the current soccer teams play one game.  There is also a futbolito (a small soccer game on a basketball court) tournament going throughout the day for the elementary students.  And several food vendors come to the school so there's lots of snacks, drinks, and food available throughout the day.  All of the soccer games are free, but the food is used as a fund raiser for the Athletic Department.  I was sick that weekend, but did bring Juliana up for a little while to watch.  She had a great time having a picnic on the bleachers and then hanging out with daddy for a little while.  Because I wasn't feeling well I forgot to bring our camera.  There is a picture floating around facebook of Juliana riding on Kyle's shoulders, but its slightly scandalous so didn't know if everyone reading this would want to see it :)

As soon as Alumni Soccer was over, Kyle (and I to a smaller extent) jumped right into planning for the Knowledge Bowl.  Actually, he'd been working on it for several months, but at this point it pretty much consumed all of our time.  Every year, at the end of the school year, the heads of all the schools in the Association of Bilingual Schools of Honduras get together and plan the events for the following year, including the dates and which schools will host them.  In the past we have hosted the Track Meet, Music Festival, Teacher's Conventions...things like that.  The the schools are able to work into their budgets the funding needed for each event that they are responsible for.  This year we ended up not being assigned to host any events.  But in August it was discovered that the school which had volunteered to host the Knowledge Bowl would be unable to (they had not participated in the event during the 3 prior years which is required) and perhaps just didn't want to.  And really, no school wanted to host it because its so expensive, time consuming, and complicated to plan.  It ended up that our school superintendent volunteered our school, and since Kyle is the Athletics and Activities Coordinator it was up to him to do the majority of the planning.  So over several months he purchased buzzer sets (at $500 each) and questions, arranged food to be available, communicated with schools, got advise on how to run the games well and prevent cheating, and coerced the staff and friends to be Readers/Judges, Room Monitors, Time Keepers, and Hallway supervisors (and spend many hours training them to do their jobs well).  There were many late nights and a couple all nighters that went into the planning.  I helped out with whatever computer work I could do for him as well as provided snacks for all of the workers and coaches of every school (went and spent about $275 on various snacks and drinks and kept them available for the entire time).  Throughout the weekend there were MANY compliments from the other schools on the way that it was run.  Much to my dismay there are many people who want our school to host it again next year.  I know that it won't be as much work, but it's still not something I want to think about doing quite yet. (We do have pictures of the Knowledge Bowl, but its just pictures of each team.  Since no electronic devices are allowed in the rooms, we couldn't take pictures of the actual games.)

New turf

Last week the elementary inaugurated a brand new soccer field.  If you've ever seen the old field (I don't have any pictures right now), you'll know it was terrible.  It was a rock/dirt field, and when it would rain it would leave "canyons" throughout.  Every once in a while the school would add some more rocks or sand to try and even it out, but kids would still fall and get hurt ALL THE TIME.  They've been talking for awhile about putting a small turf field there and over Christmas they started putting in the drainage, foundation, and walls.  And it was finally completed last week.  On Thursday they had an inauguration with the entire elementary giving thanks to the workers, several families, and God for the new field.  The school board came and several awards were handed out, so it was a pretty big deal.  I think my favorite part was how loud the kids cheered for the school's maintenance men who did all the work.

The new field complete with nets the whole way around

The whole elementary waiting for the inauguration to begin

WAY TOO LONG

So as always, its been way too long since I've blogged...  Since Christmas we've had Juliana's 2nd birthday party, Alumni Soccer Day at school, hosted the Knowledge Bowl for the bilingual schools in Honduras, inaugurated a new nursery at church, and today inaugurated a new futbolito court in the elementary school.  All exciting news and I plan to write (or have been trying to get Kyle to write) a post about each in the next few days.

But for today, just some sad news.  Last night there was a fire in one of the prisons in the country (about 2 1/2 hours from where we live).  Apparently one of the inmates set fire to his bedding, yelling "We will all die here!".  And because the guards couldn't find the keys, or as rumors have it, were ordered not to let the inmates out, about 350 are missing and assumed dead.  Here http://news.yahoo.com/more-300-killed-honduras-prison-fire-134813093.html is a link to an article on yahoo, beneficial because 1. It's in English and 2. It has less graphic pictures than the Honduran newspapers.  (Honduran newspapers don't censor any pictures--the more graphic the better).  The article gives some pretty good insite into what Honduras is like.  The poverty, conditions inside government run institutions, inability/unwillingness to make improvements, government stepping in after a major tragedy and saying things will change (but usually don't), and protests followed by tear gas.

Our Christmas Newsletter

Hope it's not too hard to read!  If it is, just let us know and we can email it to you!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Well the last few weeks have been very not fun.  It all started when Juliana got sick  on November 3rd with a fever that just wouldn't go away and then a somewhat unrelated cough.  I believe it was the flu, or if not, then just some other virus that's been going around both the school and all our friends at church.  Then I got it 3 days later, and we were both completely miserable for a few days.  Just as I was starting to feel better, the fever came back and I ended up at the doctor, this time with a sinus infection.  Then after a couple days on an antibiotic, I was just starting to feel better, and then Kyle got it and missed most of last week at school.  I think we're all feeling mostly better now, but still pretty tired.  Juliana's been taking some GREAT naps (some days close to 3 hours) which has been great, since by lunch time I'm usually completely exhausted and in need of a nap myself!

The other sad thing that made the week not fun is that we attended our first funeral of the year :(  One of the young guys at our church is also an alumni of Academia Los Pinares (as is his 2 younger sisters who are both in college in Minnesota).  Their mother is a well known lawyer here in Honduras, who is known for being just and fighting corruption, when MANY other lawyers and judges in the country are corrupt.  In 2008 she was in an SUV, being driven to her home, when the car was attacked and she was shot (I think 8 times) but survived.  Then on the 7th we received word that she had been attacked again, in an SUV being driven to her home, in the exact same area.  This time she was killed immediately.  The thing is that this area is one of the most wealthy areas in the city, very heavily guarded, and during the beginning of rush hours (around 4 in the afternoon).  It's not known who attacked her, but they were very bold, and it was probably someone that she went against in court.  Funerals here are different than in the States, and most often take place within 24 hours of the death.  She was killed at 4 pm on Monday, and the viewing started at 6 am the next morning.  Because her daughters were in the States, they had to be flown in as quickly as possible.  We were at the viewing around 2pm that day when they arrived, and it was very sad.  I can't imagine how hard it would be to receive word that your mom was shot, get on a plane within a few hours, and arrive just in time for the burial.  Many of their friends and teachers from high school were able to be there as well, but it has to be a very hard time for the family.

This weekend we're not planning on going anywhere but Kyle has almost 2 1/2 days off work.  We do have 3 thanksgiving dinners: one at church this past sunday, one at school tomorrow, and a real Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday with the Mattica's!  Then on Friday I think we'll go downtown and do some Christmas shopping.  Thanksgiving isn't a Honduran holiday, and most don't celebrate it, so no big sales on Friday, but also not a crazy day in the stores either.  Juliana also has a birthday party to go to tomorrow afternoon...a friend of hers is turning 2, and the mom is throwing a party for around 10 little girls all around the same age....she's one brave mommy.

Sorry, no good pictures of Juliana this time...haven't done much recently except lay on the couch :(  I'll have to make a better effort for next time.

Basketball, basketball, and more basketball

Not too much going on around here except for a lot of BASKETBALL!  Kyle has been right in the middle of basketball season for awhile (actually, I THINK we might be near the end...at least, that's what I'm hoping).  This year Pinares has had a number of games take place at the school, plus they were invited to participate in another tournament that they haven't done before.  This weekend was the big tournament of all the bilingual schools of Honduras...thankfully in Tegucigalpa this year!  All that to say,  Kyle has spent a number of early mornings and late nights at school.  Yesterday he left at 6:30 am and returned at 9:45 pm, with work to do before he left at 6:30 this morning.  But, several of the teams are playing very well and they've won a few games.  

A couple weeks ago our school hosted a Family Game Day and Kyle was in charge of a good part of it (its a fund raiser for the Athletic Department).  There were several carnival type games that the kids could play as well as indoor soccer, volleyball, and basketball.  During the last 2 basketball games, Kyle had planned a a Balls and Dolls Toss.  During the first free-throw of each game, the audience threw balls or dolls onto the gym floor (balls during the boys game, dolls during the girls game).  All the balls and dolls were (or will be?) donated, but I don't remember where he said they would be donated to.  

Kyle will also be starting a bible study with a few guys who graduated from Pinares 2 or 3 years ago.  They are in college here, and he will be doing the Truth Project with them on Saturday afternoons.  

Juliana and I have been busy here reading books, playing dolls, coloring, and blowing bubbles!  I guess there's a lot more than that, but that's the fun part.  I have a women's bible study that I attend; we're currently going through 1 Samuel.  We also attend an evening home group every other Tuesday evening.    In the past we have always gone through a book (that usually correlates with a book of the bible).  However, because of things that are going on politically in Honduras, it was decided that we would go chapter by chapter through Nehemiah.  For each chapter we make a list of observations (characters, setting, history, reoccuring ideas, things that stick out, etc), write down questions that we have about the chapter, find the answers to as many of those questions as we can, and then finally write down life applications from the chapter.  This last Tuesday was our first week doing this, and it was very interesting.

I haven't gotten very many pictures taken lately.  But a few weeks ago she was the only child in the nursery, and Christa said she was pulling some funny faces, so they had a little photo shoot.  Thanks, Christa for passing on the photos.

Fun in the nursery

Currently Juliana is a little bit sick.  Not too bad, but she's running a fever, has a cough, and some congestion in her bronchiols.  She's now on a decongestant and nasal saline spray and hopefully she'll improve soon!  It was just disappointing, because she has a friend in town for the weekend and they LOVE playing together.  Hopefully she'll get better fast so we can fit a couple play dates in before Maddy leaves.  She is still pretty happy, plays a lot, and eating pretty well...we just don't want to get Maddy sick.  Today the sun actually came out and the weather warmed up, so we went outside for awhile.  It wore her out pretty fast, but she had fun at the time!