Maria Elena otra vez (again)...

Lauren and I had Dairy Queen Blizzards on our day off. Delicious.

We took like 40 of these. Its Brisa (one of the twins), Ana, and me.

Every night I say, "snug as a bug in a rug... don't let the bedbugs bite!" to Ana as I tuck her blankets around her...

That's a little shout out to the McEvy family. :)

She loves it. When she tries to repeat it she pronounces bug as "boog".

Ana nearly suffocated me.

This is always so funny to me. Gabi got squished by a giant hand.

and then it picked her nose.

Yo y Flor. I call her, "mi mono"... aka my monkey.

¡Estoy feliz aqui!
I am happy here. It has only been four days since our last day off, but it was a very difficult few days. I´ve had quite a bit of drama with one of the teenage girls that sleeps in our room. I relate to her tendency to rebel and manipulative ways with people in authority over her... I was tempted (and still am from time to time) in the same ways as a teenager. Apparently, because I talked to Mama about some of the things she´s been doing, I am now a gossip. Please pray for her and I. The last thing I want to see is a bunch of behavior change in these kids and for them never to understand why.

Right now Lauren and I are staying with the our new Mexican family. They are so wonderful. Last night we went and ordered pizza and ate it as a family. The oldest son had Lauren and I ride with him to pick it up and insisted we practiced speaking Spanish. Golly, I´m terrible. Because they´re all so fluent in English, I feel like an idiot. I can play games and sports with the kids, but it is dang hard to have adult conversations. The whole family is pretty comical, so as we were all informally standing and sitting in the kitchen with pizza in our hands, I just kept looking around and smiling. It felt really familiar- like a night at my parent´s house when random people just stop by and we´re all laughing and teasing one another... the only difference is they´re all darker complected.. and smaller... and speaking Spanish. If I have to be so far away from familiarity, I´m just glad I get to escape here once a week. We´re getting in the habit of making cookies or other baked goods as a thanks for their hospitality. Kit Kat- we made your Devil´s food cookies last week and they were a hit!

Please play for Lauren and I concerning our health. Nothing major, but its all a little uncomfortable. I was convinced that a itchy, dry patch I have on my arm is from a spider bite (though everyone else told me otherwise)... now, as I have two more similar patches on me, I´m submitting to the fact that it could be a fungus. SICK. I don´t like saying that I have a fungus-- in Spanish or in English. In addition to that, I think I might have lice and the lice shampoo is way too expensive here. For those of you who have asked to send stuff, lice shampoo would be grrrreat. Lastly, please pray for out tummies. Our diet is way different here. I´ll leave it at that.

We have an American group from Texas visiting since Friday. The group is made up of mostly high-schoolers, a couple college guys and a dad. Pray we´d be a blessing to them and help them to serve the orphanage. I like having groups here because we get to joke around in English (many of my awesome jokes don´t translate well), and we get to keep our drinks cold in their fridge. I do miss the occasional ice cube.

Thanks for all the emails and notes. They make me smile.
I miss my nephew and bear hugs from the people I love.

Peace be with you,
Maria Elena
(Ñ- they have that symbol here on the computer! It reminds me of Isaac)

PS For those who have mentioned wanting an address... please email me at moodyme@gmail.com and I will give you one.

Also- a shout out to Sadie and Shy. No kid we ever meet will compare to you two. You are both so dang special and Lauren and I miss you like crazy. We're hoping ot get a calling card so we can call you next week! LOVE YOU!