Home Sweet Home.. Back to the Orphanage

Sorry for the lack of posts lately, but last week was pretty uneventful. I was going to school each day with the other teachers for spanish classes in the morning, and then either sightseeing or working in my classroom during the afternoon. So, aside from my first llama sighting, there wasn't too much to write about until this weekend! 

They're actually quite friendly, just extremely dusty, and one sneezed on my friend Claire! I didn't get a picture of it, but you can imagine it was pretty entertaining. 

Peruvian man convinced Eden to kiss it.. kinda cute, huh?

Anyway, the highlight of my weekend was that I got to go down to the orphanage from Saturday to Sunday. It's hard to even describe what it was like to be back there, but it was awesome. Dave Mosemann and Amy (who is interning at the orphanage for the summer) both rode the bus into Lima to meet me so I could learn how to ride the big bus out of the city with them and not by myself. I was SO thankful for this, and for Ricky (one of the Peruvians who works for ChildReach) who came with us to help us get on the right bus, because the bus station was extremely chaotic and we had to get on several different buses since they sold tickets for about 3 times the amount of people than they had seats for. It was pretty entertaining, but I don't know if I could have done it by myself! We finally got to the orphanage at about 4 in the afternoon on Saturday so we had a few hours to do some work. But it was crazy, it almost felt like home when we first arrived. I walked all around the site, and back to the orphanage, through each of the rooms. It was pretty emotional for me. It felt like yesterday that I was there with all my closest friends, and when the whole group laid hands on me to pray for me right before I left to interview with my principal in Lima. It was such a good reminder that this is exactly where God wants me to be. It's still amazing to think about how God took me on that trip not knowing that I would be living here within 7 months. Here are some pictures of the site.. it's really exciting to see how it's coming along and starting to feel like a home for these kids.

This is the first bedroom on the 2nd floor. There will be 8 rooms like this, each which will house 5 kids, so the orphanage will provide a home for 40 children.

You probably can't see it too well here, but the teams who have come down to work have been writing Scripture all over the walls of the building. The kids won't be able to see this once it's complete, but it's pretty awesome that they will be surrounded by God's word at all times.

Ah yes... the lovely hole I dug with about 4 other girls in January. I was sad to see it wasn't being put to use yet, but I was at least happy to see it wasn't completely filled in! We had some good times digging that hole, believe it or not...

It was also really good just to spend time with Dave and Amy, and then to spend time at the orphanage across the street to play with the kids there, who I remembered from January. It really puts things in perspective, that's for sure. Amy shared her room with me for the night, and I was able to get a nice, hot shower Sunday morning because they finished installing all the plumbing to get Hannah's Home set up for the pregnant teens who will be moving in relatively soon. (Hannah's Home is also run by ChildReach, on the same site as the orphanage, and will be a ministry for young pregnant teens who have been kicked out of their homes.) Then, the 3 of us rode back into Lima (much less eventful this time around) to go to church together with one of the translators I knew from January, Diana. It was good to see another familiar face and she invited me to her wedding on August 9th!! I can't wait to experience a Peruvian wedding, which I hear goes until like 3 or 4 in the morning. So now I just need to find a dress! After church, Dave and Amy came to my house for lunch so I could show them where I live and then we hung out in Miraflores for the day, where we got our wonderful Starbucks fix.. which is where I can go when I need to feel like I'm back in America again :) It was hard when they left at night.. we were all kind of dreading having to part ways, but Dave is going to be living here permanently starting in October, so we will see each other pretty often and probably even next Sunday for church. So that's a huge blessing having friends all the way down here in Peru from Penn State. Now we just need to find a way to watch football games in the fall...

You also may be wondering when school is going to start since I seem to just be hanging out and sightseeing all the time! School starts on August 7th, so about a week and a half. School orientation is starting this week and I have been working on getting my class set up and organized, and working on lesson plans for that first week of school. I could definitely use prayer for God to ease my nerves because as a first year teacher, I'm pretty overwhelmed at this point. Also, I'm not sure what it looks like to work in a Christian school, so I don't want to get so caught up in the academics that I forget God has called me to minister to these children spiritually. So please be praying for God to set my priorities within my classroom and show me what it looks like to teach them academically as I show them the love of Christ.