Working Weekends...Bring it On!

            So I’ve officially decided I love working weekends here! Weeks in the office and evenings with my casa are nice, but on weekends, I get to hang out with ALL of the kids and just relax and play with a bunch of them. This past week was a little frustrating with my girls—as many people keep telling me, they are at a tough age, which is true, so their tempers can get the best of them sometimes, but today was a blast!

            We started off with misa at 9:00 in honor of La Virgen de Altagracia. And then I played with the kids literally ALL day until 8:00pm. We played a little soccer, made chichiguas (kites) for decorations for the International Meeting coming in February (this is a week-long meeting of ALL NPH with the directors from all 9 countries, big donors, basically anymore important—it’s a BIG deal….more on this some other time), and basically just hung out in the park for hours. Of course, the girls (and a couple boys even) did my hair multiple times and I also spent awhile with Santa Lucía, the baby house reading books and playing at the playground (yes, I was the bruja while we played tag to their great delight!)

            Other than that, I’m really starting to feel like I fit in here….with the kids, in my casa, with the other volunteers, with the language. I’m starting to take more of a role in the casa. Both of my tías said they mainly want help with teaching the girls respect, so I’m working on that.

            This coming Sunday, a week from tomorrow, is Family/Visitors Day. According to some of the volunteers, these days (they happen every 3 months) have been their hardest days here. The kids that get visitors are absolutely thrilled, but it’s really tough on the kids that don’t. My tía mentioned today that there is one of my girls who never gets any visitors, which pretty much breaks my heart…

            Some random photos from today…

 LOVE her :)

 Probs the CUTEST kid here :) Soooooo adorable!

 One of the photos the kids took, which I really like for some reason.

 Another photo taken by the kids while we were reading.

 Doing my hair....AGAIN.

Another one of today's adventures: a volunteer from Canada brought a few bikes here. Literally 50+ kids were all trying to get a chance to ride cause for now, the bikes only come out on weekends. (Feel guilty about that bike that pretty much gathers dust year-round in the garage??)

 Playground time!

A shot I snapped while walking away...

Making chichiguas!