Mis Hermanitos

Our mosquito net here serves two purposes. It protects us from mosquitos [more or less] and it protects us from projectiles such as bottle caps and paper airplanes flying over the wall from our brother's room.

Junior. What a great kid. I love his voice, he always sounds like he has a cold or something because he has athsma or some kind of breathing thing. Flaquito [that's his nickname] wants to work with computers when he gets older, aka, he's super smart. Plus, he's always nice to me [unlike the other two]. The other day he and I played balloon volleyball against the younger ones, and we smoked them :)

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Jansys. I've always like the middle brothers. Now that I'm his sister instead of just a guest in the house, he can definitely be a punk, but deep down he is super sweet. He always helps me out, i.e. when I had to prepare a lesson for preschool he ran around the house looking for things I could use. Gordito [we all have nicknames for each other, all the boys are skinny, but he was a fat baby apparently, so we call him Gordito] wants to be a carpenter someday and build his house on the roof of his mom's house. Precious.

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Jeuris. What a little stud. He wants to be a singer when he grows up and he can dance SO well. I love it. Especially his Michael Jackson impressions. And, he is the scrawniest little kid, but he [actually all of them] can eat like there's no tomorrow. Chi-Chi. I love it when he gets all excited during the Aguilas games or when we get back from an excursion.

My little bros are the best. I love watching Drake and Josh with them in Spanish, and watching them break dance and laugh and be crazy.

I'm going to miss them like crazy when I leave.

Mogote

Wepa. 

[I spelled wow incorrectly the first time. And Mogote. My apologies. But I don't feel too bad because this is a verbal culture much more than a written one, so its whatever. Haha, Dad, I can already see your face cringing at my spelling when I get back :]

That was an unnecessarily long and irrelevant intro, but Mogote. Wepa.

First of all, lets face the facts. I'm outta shape. So, it was slightly ambitious of me to attempt this mountain in the first place, but I'm SO glad I went. That night and the next day my legs and back hated me, but I felt so accomplished at the top and after coming back down. I started out hiking with Corrie, but after a while I told her to leave me behind [she is in ridiculously good shape so there's no way I could have kept that up.] But, as fun as it would have been to hike with her, it was actually a huge blessing because I had one of, if not the most incredible God-encounters since I've been here, there by myself on the side of the mountain. One of those God moments that I won't be able to describe to you. Just know that God is good at what He does and if you all are ever in the Dominican Republic, you should hike Mogote.

It was ridiculously steep on the way up almost without breaks of flatness. For such a long time. Looking back I have no clue how I did it. It was God carrying me through parts of the way for sure. I would pick a landmark a little ways ahead of me and then will my legs to move to get me there. One of the most physically exerting things I've done in my life, but so rewarding. The view at the top. And just the hike itself. Amazing. The peanut butter and pineapple jelly sandwich I packed tasted SO good. And then on the way back down I had a wonderful chat with Corrie as we had to spider-crawl down through the mud and steepness.

I love me some mountain-climbing.

I wish this picture could actually show you how beautiful it was.

Haha, I should explain this picture to you, but I don't feel like being made fun of at the moment. So maybe another time :)

It got ridiculously muddy on the way back down. Ridiculously.

This picture is far away so you can't really tell how big the mountain is. But it was big. Trust me :)

I have SO much to say about Magote but more pics will have to come Tuesday because I'm being kicked off the Internet as we speak 

Lo siento

Jordan Hohm.

So, here's the thing.

I miss you.

Lots.

AND, you know how much I wish I could be there to celebrate your birthday with you, but I just wanted to let you know, that I'll probably never actually be able to let you know, how much I appreciate you and especially your support and encouragement now while I'm so far away.

Hope your birthday is AMAZING.

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Joyful Exhaustion.

These two words seem pretty characteristically true of my life right now. If I told you how much sleep I'm getting, you would probably laugh at me for being exhausted, but its true. I'm physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted right now. But God is good.

{I would change your human frailties to My strength. I would take your resentments, and give you My grace. I would take your natural inclination to anger and give you My unerring tendency to LOVE and to FORGIVE.}

I got this from Come Away My Beloved [really good devotional book if you're interested]

So, Saturday was a great chill with the team, play games, watch a movie day. We got Pizza Pepperoni [that's the name of the restaurant, I actually had Hawaiin :] and Vicki made us chocolate chip cookies. Yes please.

Then, we had the craziest Sunday here so far, sin duda. It started out wonderfully. Eliana [whom I haven't seen since our first day here when she was scared of me] came up to me and I held her and she wrapped her arms around me during worship and then sat on my lap and drew in my notebook during the service, [so I didn't pay attention really at all because halfway paying attention is impossible here] but she was SO precious and kept looking up at me after she drew something to see if it was ok still. 

THEN, after the service Kati had major MAJOR back pain. The pastor could hardly even carry her to the truck she hurt so bad. It was scary. Alberto [our pastor] and Jen went with her and I stayed with my bros. I was super anxious while she was gone not knowing what was happening, but they got her taken care of. And I love how Dominican community works because she can just go to the hospital and know that her kids are fine staying with the neighbors.

Monday. Exhaustion. Fortunately it was a holiday which meant laundry and nap day.

Enmanuel. He is SO precious. He is one of the kids in my class.

Here's my brothers. On the roof. No big deal. 

Can't go wrong with a four-day weekend...

Jueves: Thursday, I got to teach my own little lesson to my three and four-year-olds. I still don't want to be a teacher, but it was a lot of fun! I had them close their eyes and try to guess certain noises, but I had to hold everything behind my back because they kept peeking! But they were laughing and actually paying attention and seemed to enjoy it. And, in the evening we had some deliciously warm and wonderful asopao [rice, salami, and ramen-ish flavored broth] which was SO good. Our pastor just got back from Haiti so we had a little chat with him. I'm still in awe of how much heart is stored up in our little tiny church.


Viernes: On Friday school was cancelled because we were supposed to get tons of rain from the hurricane. And, we already don't have school on Monday because its a the independence day here. It rained some, not a ton, but I'll take a rainy day at home with my little brothers any day. :) Everybody [except Junior who always gets up at 6 {12-year-old version of Jace??}] slept in til almost 10. [que bueno] Jen and I helped some with lunch. [I'm trying to learn how to make some of this deliciousness] After that I sat around and talked with Kati and a couple of her friends over a little cafecito. [I should say listened rather than talked, although I did input a little here and there. They just talked SUPER fast] In the afternoon I worked on friendship bracelets with my bros. Then we had a little macaroni, yucca, and salad for dinner and watched Madagascar 2 with the fam and some neighbors. I love these rainy lazy days.


Alright, I've been a slacker to the max so its time to get to work on some papers/skype with people instead of being productive :) hopefully I'll have pictures for my next post...

Noviembre llegó

Tomorrow night is Without Ceasing.
I'll be there in spirit, 
and I'm pumped to hear about the ways God moves.


Sunday night we had a little party at our house during the beisbol game. [Not that every night isn't a party at our house...our doors are always open and we usually have at least five or six people over...but, such is life in the Dominican Republic :) and even though I'm socially exhausted at the end of each day, I will always love and admire Dominican hospitality]. Anyway, this time it was an extra lot of people so Kati made a bunch of hotdogs and tostones [fried plantains] and pasta salad. Delicious.


Monday was really great as well. Katie and Alberto had some forms to fill out, so I got to lead our class on my own for the last part of the day. Besides the fact that Angel [who is normally super sweet] was unnecessarily hyper, it went really well. So, Mondays are normally longer school days, but since we were out of food we had to send the kids home at noon again. But then, we got to go with Katie and Alberto to La Vega to buy more food and we stopped at Burger King for lunch. Now, I normally don't get all that excited about Burger King in the States, and I actually get a little annoyed with the people who come for a week and think they need that kind of fast food, but after being here for two months [which I realized is still not that long in the grand scheme of things] that burger and fries tasted real good. Then we bought our groceries and I got another jar of honey roasted Peter Pan peanut butter to last me the rest of the semester [Praise the Lord, that peanut butter {especially with Oreos} is the best snack known to mankind] That evening we ate avena de maiz, I did dishes with Chi-Chi [my littlest bro] and we watched Drake and Josh together.


I've been impacted lately by the creative genius of people here. 
Since we don't have running water out here in the campo, we have a nifty little draining system to collect rain water. 
Everyone here has perfected the art of opening cans with knives because then, who needs to buy a can-opener?
The boys figured out a way to play war with the community UNO deck.
Gotta love it.

This is my new house

And the view of the mountains from my porch :)

And this is Jordany. One of my favorite kids out here. And not just because he has a super sweet name :)