San Jorge

Collecting information for sponsors. Don and Julio showing the teachers how to put the water filters together.

Carlos and Titi "teaching". A classroom that needs paint and electricity.

The school's kitchen.

On our second day in Panajachel we went to San Jorge, the other community that Mayan Families help. It is much closer than Tierra Linda and the school is larger and they have better classrooms and materials but they still need a lot of help. Mayan Families brought one water filter for each classroom so now the kids will be able to drink clean water. Don helped the teacher put the filters together and I took information to update the student's sponsorship page. We can't get over how cute the children are. The traditional dresses are so beautiful. I gave some materials to the teachers and Carlos and Titi had fun "teaching".

We are planning on painting a classroom. It is a new addition to the school so it is not painted at all. The problem is that water is leaking from the roof so we are hoping to have that fixed too. They also don't have electricity inside and only a small window. Don is going to bring electricity inside and put a couple of light bulbs on the roof. It is a very small classroom but the kids don't mind at all.

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Tierra Linda

School ended and the kids started walking home. We visited one house that Mayan Families is building for a mother and her children. It is only a one room house but they are extremely happy and cannot wait to move in.

Carlos showing school materials to the children.
The kindergarten classroom

Tierra Linda, at the bottom of the mountain

We left Guatemala City on Monday at 11 and got to Panajachel around 2:30. It is a beautiful place, you need to see it in person because no picture can capture the beauty of the lake, the volcanos and the mountains.

On Tuesday morning we went with Sharon and her staff to the school in Tierra Linda, a very remote and poor village in the mountains. It was so amazing. The kids are so beautiful. They were having a festival to inagurate a new classroom and t thank Sharon for everything that she has done for the school.

Carlos was very happy to be there. He played with the kids and had a blast "teaching" the kids with some of the materials we brought for the school. Titi was a little afraid at the beginning but she was fine after a while. All the girls wear traditional clothing and the looks so colorful and pretty.

Visit with birthfamilies

Titi's foster family

Carlos' birthfamily

Titi's birthfamily

We had a very nice time at the Aurora Zoo in Guatemala City. It is a very nice zoo!!

Yesterday we visited Titi's birthgrandmother in her house and we had a very nice day. We went to a park near the house and Carlos and Titi had a blast playing with Eduardo, Titi's brother, who is 8 years old.

Today Carlos' birthmother and birthsisters came to visit. Aracely had problems with her knee and she had to get a cast on her leg so she could not walk a lot. Vera and her sons came too so we had a full house at the hotel. The kids had fun playing on the computer center and the adults had time to talk and take pictures. We had dinner at Pasteleria Patsy's and we got a cake to celebrate Father's Day. It is incredible how alike Carlos and his little birthsister are. She is also a leftie and is so cute.

Tomorrow we leave for Panajachel and I need to go to sleep. I am exhausted, I can hardly keep my eyes opened.

Happy Birthday Grandpa!

We hope you are having a great birthday Grandpa. We had fun celebrating with you last Sunday!

We arrived in Guatemala City without a problem. We spent the day with Titi's birthmother and brothers and we had a nice time. We are planning on going to the zoo tomorrow. We will keep in touch.

Love,
Carlos and Titi

Little doves

An update on the little doves. They are not that small anymore. Yesterday they left the nest but they have been staying close by, on the ground, right next to the mother. They are almost her size. I guess they don't know how to fly because if we go outside they just walk and hide under the plants. After a while they go back to the same spot.

It was so much fun seeing them grow. At first the mother never left the nest and then she started leaving them by themselves for longer periods of time. The last couple of days she was almost never there but she was watching them from the roof. I guess she was encouraging them to leave the nest and once they did, she joined them again on the ground. They are the cutest thing!

Another drama in the garden

We have some mourning doves that make their nests in the garden but they are terrible at making them. They always choose the leaves of the self pruning palm trees and they have fallen a couple of times. The first time we didn't put the nest back on a tree, we just put it in a bush and the dove didn't come back. The second time I picked the eggs with a spoon and put back the nest in another leaf and the mommy dove came back but we never saw if the baby doves survived or not.

Well, this year they made a nest in the worst place, in the front, where it is very windy and in a lower leaf, almost ready to fall. We have been watching them for days, hoping the nest will stay in its place. The leaf is almost brown so I put some tape to secure it to the trunk and tried to tie the leaf to a trellis so it would not move so much with the wind. It still looked very dangerous for the nest so Don put something under the nest to protect it but the mommy dove was too scared and it was unble to come back to the nest so I took it off. It was supposed to rain a lot and it was very windy so I had to make a decision yesterday. I decided to move the nest to a hanging wire basket and see if the dove would come back to the nest. When I moved it, I saw there were two little birds there!! They don't look at all like a dove, they are so dark. I was able to take a picture. The mommy dove made many attemps to land on the nest any it looked like it was not going to work but after many tries she got it. It rained all night and it has been windy but they look more secure now. We can't wait to see if the babies grow up.

Their new home

Titi's 6th Birthday Party

Titi's birthday is going to be on Monday but we had her party yesterday. It was at Chuck E. Cheese and she had a wonderful time.

She had been planning her party for more than 6 months. It was only for little kids, most of them her classmates, cousins Hailey and Andie and her friends Nico and Ally from Guatemala. This time we only had 16 kids but it was still a lot of people. Last year there were 31 kids! We will celebrate with the family tomorrow since it is Memorial Day.

Titi and Carlos were very happy and they are now busy planning Carlos' party! They spent the night at Luke and Mimi's so Don and I got to go out by ourselves. We had a nice diner.

Mother's Day

I had a very nice Mother's Day weekend. On Friday Titi had a small play at school and Don and I went to see her. She was very proud of being on stage and then she gave me some beautiful things she made for me. A nice box to store hugs and kisses, a book about me, a card and a drawing. She also served me milk and cookies.

Carlos also made some nice presents at school. A really nice flower pot and cards.

On Sunday I did not feel like doing anything. I just wanted to relax. The truth is that I wanted to just sit and read a new book and not be bothered with cleaning or cooking. I had to do some things but I tried to do as little as possible. Don took the kids to the store for a while so I could have some quiet time and then brought good food and a cake. They also gave me a beautiful necklace and an electronic picture frame. Very nice!!

Don wanted to invite his family over but I didn't feel like doing anything. I thought we were going to go to a restaurant later in the day but we didn't do anything and we didn't see anybody. I guess I was still tired from working in the garden and then driving to Homestead the day before.

A party in Homestead

Casta and her daughter Aleeya.

This is Roque and his little daughter. He was so little when we met him!

On Saturday, the kids and I went to a party in Homestead. Don went to a concert with a friend. It was a party for Casta's daughter. She is the girl we met after Hurricane Andrew in 1993 (?). She is married now and has 2 daughters and we have stayed in touch with her and her family. Her daughter was turning 3 years old and it was a really big deal. Her family is from another part of Mexico so I am not sure of their customs. It was a mini "quinceanera" or wedding. The people in Homestead and I guess in the small towns in Mexico share the costs of all their parties so there is people -mainly relatives- that pay for each part of the party, cake, pictures, drinks, food, etc. The family having the party is expected to contribute when the other people have parties in the future.

Anyways, it was a fancy party, in a party place with lots of guests. The theme was Cinderella and the birthday girl was wearing a beautiful dress and they took hundreds of pictures of her and all the guests. There was a clown and then a D.J. Casta's mom made some of the food and it was great. She gave me some to bring to Don. Carlos and Titi were intimidated at first because everybody was speaking Spanish but later they had fun playing with all the kids since most of them speak English among them.

Titi loved the music they were playing. When she saw that some people were going to dance she asked me to dance with her. We danced "cumbias" and she loved them. We got home at 10:30 but it was worth it.

Getting ready for our trip to Guatemala.

Our trip is only one month away! I am very excited and I can't wait to be there.

We are going to Guatemala City for some days to see Carlos and Titi's birthfamilies and then we will go to Panajachel, in Lake Atitlan, to vacation and volunteer with Mayan Families (http://www.mayanfamilies.org/), a wonderful small organization that works within the Indigenous Mayan Communities on projects ranging from enrolling and keeping kids, especially girls, in school, helping single parent families deal with HIV/AIDS, Malnutrition, Basic Health Care, Organizing Medical and Dental Clinics, Animal Rescue and so much more.

We will be working with them to improve the conditions of the school in a town called Tierra Linda. I am making a blog with information but I haven't finished it. http://www.mayanfamiliestierralinda.blogspot.com/

This rural school is located in a small town up in the mountains, near Panajachel and the Lake Atitlan. It is an agricultural town at the end of the road where most of the population speak a Mayan dialect and do not know how to read or write. The school has 250 students and Spanish is their second language. The majority of the students suffer from malnutrition.

We are collecting donations of pencils, pens, paper, crayons, pencil sharpeners, erasers, chalk, three-ring binders, glue, scissors, paint sets, pocket charts, shoes, children's clothing, puzzles and raincoats to bring to the school. Don and I will paint a classroom or two and we have funded the repairs of the roof in some of the classrooms.

Another member of Mayan Families Connection (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MayanFamiliesConnection/) might be able to join us there. That would be great since I only know her through email. I also hope to do some tutoring so I am making and buying Spanish educational materials. Hopefully Carlos and Titi will learn some Spanish too.

We will also investigate the possibility of opening a library in the town of Tierra Linda. Mayan Families has bought a piece of land that will be used to build a junior high school and they will have room to build a small community center. It would be a very simple library, just a room with some bookcases, tables, chairs and books, puzzles, board games and crafts. Hopefully we would be able to hire somebody to help the children with school homework and when the school is on vacation. The school year in Guatemala runs from the end of January to the end of October and the kids don't have anything to do when there is no school.

Well, I have lots of ideas and want to do a lot but probably will do just a little. It doesn't matter because I hope to do this for a long time.

AIR SHOW

Don and Carlos went to the Air Show in Ft. Lauderdale and they had a good time. Carlos said it was too loud but he had fun in the water. I think Don has gone every year since they started the show there.

I haven't posted much lately but here are some pictures of things we have been doing lately.

Don and Mema took Carlos and Titi to the Loxahatchee Natural Reserve in the Everglades and they saw some cool animals and insects. Carlos loved the grasshoppers (lubbers). I am glad they didn't bring one home. They are the worst insects. They can eat some plants to nothing and they reproduce like crazy.

Epcot Flower and Garden Show

This past weekend we went to Disney and I got to see the Flower and Garden Show at Epcot. It was wonderful, like it always is. I was not able to take many pictures but these are some of my favorite ones. Titi and I walked around the park while Don and Carlos rode the Test Track ride lots of times. It is Carlos' favorite ride and he doesn't mind waiting in line for hours.

Titi loved Tinkerbell's garden. There were fairy houses and Titi loved every single one. I told her we were going to make one so I need to gather all the materials.