Canadian Craziness!

Look at...it says NPH!

The Canadians have descended upon the DR again! Each year around this time, our branch in Canada, FOTO CAN, brings down a couple groups. They usually work on projects on site or in the surrounding communities and spend a fair amount of time hanging out with the kids. Last week, a group of older people was here and this week there is a group of dads and daughters on site (cool, huh?) Their project this time around has been building a sand volleyball court between the girls’ housing and the church. The kids have been involved in every step of the process as well and it has been cool to see it go up! We initiate it tonight with a big volleyball game and BBQ for everyone on site! Thanks so much to all the Canadians!

Even Big Blue got in on the action...

Josi was working away (and requesting that I take a photo of her...how odd...)

Carmencita is always willing to help out...

Everyone from the youngest to the oldest pitched in!

Brito working hard at "delegating"...

The whole crew...

Of course, the sand delivery was quite exciting...

The Kings! Los Reyes!

Step 1!

Step 2!

Step 3-Complete!

Naturally, with these wonderful groups here, we like to hit them up for sponsors! So last night, I did a big presentation for the group along with two kids here who gave their testimonies. One was Anderson, a 15-year old who has been at the home for nearly 6 months. And the other one who spoke was Yoselin, an 18-year old who has been at the home for nearly 10 years. So the group really got to hear both ends of the spectrum. I was really proud of both of them! Can you imagine telling your tragic life story to a group of complete strangers that don’t even speak the same language as you? They did a fabulous job…both of them are very brave!

In other news, we have now had four volunteers leave and three new volunteers arrive. Two of the new volunteers are girls from Germany, one being my new roommate. They are both very nice and one of them is an occupational therapist while the other is a nurse and will be working in the clinic. A new volunteer from Peru also arrived and he’s working on information technology computer stuff! So it’s nice to have our numbers up again and we’re happy to have some new faces around!

Finally, the big news around site is a trip that will be happening to MN this coming October. The Friends of the Orphans office in St. Paul has invited four of our children to come and spend a week there. So we have just announced this awesome opportunity to the kids. There will be two sets of auditions to determine which four will make the cut. I’m super excited, because I get to be a part of the planning on this end AND doubly, since I will be coming home this summer, I will be able to help out from the MN end as well. PLUS I will get to see some familiar NPH faces within weeks of leaving the DR, which I’m sure will be really REALLY nice.

Here’s a bunch of photos from the past week! Avriel, my partner in crime gets back Thursday from vacations, and I am so excited!