¿Five weeks from Tuesday?

How is this kid still here? It blows my mind.



American friends, these kids remember you. This picture is of Cristal and Nicole when Cristal still had hair. She´s been carrying it around lately.



Loty and Karla spinning... maybe Lauren´s gotten a little stronger since we´ve been here?



He loves me; he loves me not. In this picture, Kacho loves me not.



Linda and I took a few of the girls with us to run errands in Aldama. Linda went in to make copies of birth certificates (yay!) and I took the girls to a little store to buy crackers and lil´drinks. It is fun to play mom from time to time. The best part was when Jaqueline had a bathroom emergency.. had to pee asap. Mexico isn´t big on public bathrooms so we used a creek-like stream along the road. Good news is we didn´t get arrested for this public act and her pants remained dry.



A video from picking up the kids last week. Seatbelts are apparently optional in Mexico. Tonio was a little grumpy so you miss some of his sweetness. They love to sing worships songs.. hopefully that will eventually translate into something sincere for all of them.



"Quieres hacer cookies?" The girls learned the english word for cookies, so they say it a ton. "Shower", "cookies", "for what?" amd "sleeping" (pronounced "esleeping") are the words they always translate into english. Point is, I made some cookies with Cielo, Brisa, and Rebeca. They are cute.



The girls in kitchen. I have video from this afternoon that I'll try again to get up next week. The twins can dance, dangit.



Gaby didn´t get to make the cookies this time... but I thought she looked really cute in this hat.


She helped Karen do the dishes instead. Awesome trade-off.


Have I put up any pictures with Miriam? Lauren´s been helping her learn to read and she just makes fun of us a lot. ... and Ana Karen snuck in at the corner.


So the American group that visited us this week was a-mazing. Seriously. Wednesday night they made an incredible dinner for all the staff, encouraged us in the word, and concluded with washing our feet. Such servants. Here´s Lauren and I with Mamá and Papá. We had about 5 minutes to change clothes amidst passing out toothbrushes and curing headaches. Mamá said someone donated that furry coat to her but she always feels insecure about wearing it out. This was the perfect opportunity for cheetah.


Me and Loty... its funny how few pictures we have together.


Look at the way he´s looking at her... seriously, Linda came in here and helped revive their marriage. This couple was a big reason I wanted to come down here in the first place. I just wanted to live under their influence.


Brenda and cheesecake. We ate cheesecake for dessert. Yep, cheesecake.


Because of Halloween and Dia de los Muertos, a lot of the kids missed school this week. Second grade stayed home 3 days... I don´t understand why, but I loved their company. They are one of my favorite groups... just to prove it we went and got them burritos one day. Yummy and like 50 cents.


Osmara and Gaby


Because of my insecurity with driving the stick shift in the big city, I took the giant blue van to pick up the two boys and the Americans took the lil´truck to the job site. Sorry, ladies.


I had an empty bottle and offered it to Kachito. Have we mentioned his love for bottles. Its insane really.

Boy meets bottle. Love at first sight.


Compare this pic with the one of the two of us earlier. The kid is moody.


My hair is not usually this red. Don´t know what the deal is. This is a pretty average afternoon... Me in my giant van with Ramón sleeping and Kachito either loving on or throwing around the trash from the car.

Here´s a video of Kachito and Ramón in the van on the way home.



Here´s more proof that they remember you guys... This is Joana and Sylvia´s dresser. Hart Baptist´s pastor is posted on the wall, and they hung that monkey thing up too. Your gifts of love mean more than you know.



I think I mentioned that Lauren and I have been letting the girls sleep with us lately. We draw a toothbrush every night to see who the lucky girl will be. Here I am jamming to some Lily Goodman with Joana.




Hello, my friends.
It has been an insane week. As we mentioned, this incredible group from Michigan came down this week to serve... and man, they served. The men had their hands on nearly everything broken or clogged, fixed it and then added new features (like the fancy new water fountain) while the women ran errands, made-over Brenda´s bedroom and fixed up an insane number of yummy goodies. Linda was in adoption-land getting tons of paperwork and research done. On top of that, they were a huge encouragement to me... so intentional in asking us about our hearts and work here. We were especially sad to see Linda go, but we are praying the Lord has her and Gary down here soon. Anybody looking to buy a house in Michigan?..... I just so happen to have a connection. I pray your group was overwhelmingly blessed by the Lord this week and that you were both encouraged to love Him more while growing in your compassion for His creations. God was generous to share you with us at Lily. **If any of you have pictures or words you´d like to share from your week, we would love to put them up for you.
For those of you who read this from all over, please pray for the adoptions that are going on through this church. Its incredible, really. I´m praying for the Riley´s like crazy and pumped to see a few new adoptions getting started. I can´t wait to see these things come into fruition, and I count on road-tripping it up there when it all works out.

As iron sharpens iron: Lauren and I led devotions Wednesday night instead of our normal slot in the morning... we met with the girls to talk about relationships and girl stuff while the pastor talked with the guys over some similar guy-version things. It´s funny how you start these things out with a goal in mind and those receiving it often get something different from it. Gary was a big encouragement to us as we prepared and helped us sort through our ideas. Such a blessing, my friend. We did get to talk to a few of the girls afterwards about some more specific questions and concerns, and I think the Lord honored our exhausted efforts. One thing that seemed to stick out to the girls that we weren´t planning on was the way Lauren and I interacted as friends. The Lord has been so gracious to us in this area, and we are being broken over our nature´s all the time. These kids know nothing of loyalty or edification or commitment to one another, so it seemed to stun them that we have been so involved in each other´s lives... including who we´ve dated or not dated. In the room that night a few of the girls asked if we ever fought. I told them that we didn´t really, but that God does use our times of frustration for good and that we really loved each other as sisters and friends... they turned to Lauren and said, "Maria Elena loves you!" How humbling to realize that the Lord is allowing them to see that in us. He quickly reminded me of how blessed I´ve been with godly and sincere friendships. I am so thankful that I have an abundance of people that exemplified the truths of God to me, and I hope the girls get a bit of that from Lauren and I.

He who has ears, let him hear: Another highlight was close to the end of the week when Linda, Belem and I ran to Aldama for a couple of things. Thanks to Linda´s observance and intentionality (always! the Holy Spirit was so evident in her while she was down here), the two of us ended up sharing the Gospel with three Mexicans that were in the same little internet café with us. These two guys, late-twneties, and one girl that worked there listened to us as we spoke about Christ´s work in our lives and the potential for theirs. It was amazing. The guys really reminded me of people I knew from the Anthropology Department at my university... cold and apathetic but strangely open to talking. One of the guys was extremely open and said that his mom shares with him all the time.. said he didn´t believe in coincidences and was willing to recognize that there was some purpose in us meeting. I just went in there to print out a picture for "Alberto" and the Lord had something divinely planned. Pray that I have the time and opportunity to meet with the three of them again. I struggle with laziness and follow-through, so pray the Lord would intercede for me in this.

Goodbye: We´re at 5 weeks and counting now. So weird. It looks like the last bit of time here is going to be crazy... more visitors, a huge Christmas outreach to some thousand people (if anyone is interested in donating somehow, let me know!), and lots of last minute jobs. It is going to fly by. I am overwhelmed by the ways God has shown Himself to me in this expereince and fear at times that I´ll lose that somehow when I get home. He will hold me. Loty (that´s Lauren´s nickname by the way.. I say it all the time and never clarified) and I have talked taking a roadtrip when we get back.. maybe a time to process a lttle. We´d wanted to do something here but can´t justify spending the money or the time when its all so limited. Instead, we´re thinking Chicago or Florida... like Miami. We love Chicago and its closeby, but Miami has Spanish and it´d be a change of scenery for sure. And then we have to think about paying bills and finding work. Anybody have any ideas? Golly, this is an awkward stage to be in. We always have the choice of coming back, but neither of us have a clue what the Lord wants for us. One day at a time. I want to plan for all this future stuff, but I don´t want any of my time here to be wasted with worry. I guess I´ll think about it when December 12th rolls around.

That´s all I got. Lauren and I are going to leave early tonight to go run around and maybe play a little handball. Yipee. Quality time with my buddy.
As always, I am sincerely thankful for all you who have spent hours reading and watching through pictures and video what the Lord is doing here. It´s a bit overwhelming. I have learned much about the body of Christ through you.

Peace,
Maria Elena

oh! Update:I never told you all this, but Cristian, the boy who "ran away" a couple of months back... he's okay. I found out a couple of weeks ago that he ended up at a different orphanage. Super sad to see him go, but I'm thrilled to know the kid is alive!