Yes I am in Honduras

I have not posted since returning last month, but I have returned to the casa in San Pedro Sula. Quite a change from my extended vacation in the U.S. A little more than 3 weeks ago I was shovelling 2 feet of snow out of the drive way and today the thermometer busted through the top and it is currently 105 degrees here, 41C. The first week I was back here was actually quite mild and cool in the night, but it is officially summer now. They always say March and April are the hottest months of the year because it is the dry time with no clouds nor rain.

There have been some changes here. First of all, the boys and I have moved to a different house. The original casa has two subsequent house additions next to it where we used to live in one and the oldest girls in the other. The next group of girls was ready to move on from the younger kids house so the boys moved over to another house where the sisters used to live. They still own the house and it was renovated before the boys moved over. We now live about 2 blocks away from the main compound. That is good and bad. Good in that we don't have the constant pass through traffic of people going from the main casa to the office which was right behind us in the former location. Our house is much more peaceful now that we are isolated. The downside is that it is not as convient for me to get to the office to use the computer which is okay, but that is my excuse for not updating my blog. I keep my computer in our house now whereas in the past I kept it in the office since I lived right next door.

In the former house, I had my roommate the gecko, but now our new house is the Hokie House San Pedro Sula. Our neighbors have a turkey family who wonder the neighboring area and always come up to our fence for food. I hear the gobble gobble of the turkey 5-10 times a day and it always sounds like the recorded gobler at the Tech football games.

The positive thing that I had for the past 3 weeks was that all 4 boys in my house went to school in the afternoons. Last year some were in the morning and some in the afternoon so I had my hands full all day with homework and supervision with literally never a minute alone in the house. Now I have (had) the afternoons quiet. I was not spending my afternoons in the house alone; I usually went to spend time with the younger kids in the other house, but it was nice to have the quiet house to come back to for a rest occasionally. I say had because that all ended today when Jaime got expelled from yet another school, his 4th I think. So now he will be home schooled again in the mornings and stay in our house in the afternoons doing homework.

I just made a quick trip down to Tegucigalpa area to visit Maynor Galván at NPH. I went to make plans for him to come and spend Semana Santa (the week before Easter) with us here. I will go back there in 2 weeks to pick him up on Friday and bring him back. His brother Carlos will be coming along also. They will be here 9 days and then I take them back on Easter Sunday. It will be their first trip out of NPH overnight since they moved there 5 years ago. Maynor just had a 2nd operation on his his ears. He has had really bad ear infections for years and they operated on each ear to open the ear canal wider hoping it will help.

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All the kids were very happy to have me back, especially Juan and David. One of the first things Juan asked is when are we going to the supermarket, his favorite thing to do with me. We have been a few times since and he is very happy to be back in our routine. I did not give him the shirt in the photo, someone else here did, but I like it. Roberto started school because his birth certificate says he is 5 but there is no way that is accurate, he just started talking and quit using diapers the later part of last year. I have seen so many birth certificates with errors and it is amazing how those typing errors effect the kids lives. At least he is starting early rather than late, but he will probably not be able to pass pre-school at his early stage of development.

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Sister Eva came back for a visit and is here for a little less than a month.