Preparations and First Day of School!!!

First day of school!!! The kids have been so excited and today was the big day :)! We had a wonderful first day and were beyond thrilled to have two beautiful new school rooms.

After arriving last Monday, we've spent the majority of our waking hours working on the new school rooms-touching up paint, helping with grout, assembling bookshelves, decorating, lesson planning. We had amazing help from all of the people on site-anything from building doors to mopping floors. It would have been impossible to start on time without all their help! I've attached mostly pictures, as they will tell the story better than I can in words!

Thank you to all who are reading this for your part in making this possible!

Painting the K-2 table!

Painting the K-2 room!

Working on the baseboards in the K-2 room

3-6 grade room

Assembling bookshelves!

Unpacking School Supplies

Getting closer...

Excited kids! 

Our beautiful new reading corner

3rd-6th grade room!

K-2nd grade room!

Computer corner

Excited teachers on the first day of school!

Starting the day...

Discovering the items in their pencil boxes

New class t-shirts

Presenting an "All About Me" activity to the class 

A first day "snowball" fight!

Skyping with "Mommy" and family

The wonderful couple stepping into Amy and Chuy's shoes for the month!

Arrival!

JOY...that's the overwhelming feeling that overcame me as I returned this week to Camichines and all my wonderful students! They were so excited to see us and chattered our ears off until we went to unpack! I can't wait to update more, but for now I just want to say thank you for your prayers! We had a safe arrival and are in the process of finishing and setting up our new school rooms to hopefully start school this coming Monday. I'll post some before and after pictures soon!

Preparing to Return

It’s hard to believe my time in the U.S. is winding down! My summer has been a wonderful combination of reuniting with friends and family, resting, working, and preparing for the upcoming school year. My heart is definitely in two places! While I’ve been so blessed to reconnect with everyone here, I’m also getting very excited to return and see my “Mexican family.”

Jenny and I will be flying back August 19th and will plan to start school the following week. The Acosta family (the family that runs the shelter) will actually be in the U.S. for the months of August and September so we would appreciate prayer that the general day-to-day happenings in the shelter would run smoothly in their absence.

At this point, Jenny and I do not have an additional intern signed up to help us for the first semester. However, we are still praying that the Lord would provide someone for us. I am also still in the process of raising finances for the upcoming year.

Prayer requests:

• Safe flights back on August 19th
• Raising the remaining finances needed for the school year
• That God would provide an intern to help in the classroom for the fall semester
• Smooth start to the school year in the Acosta family's absence

 Thank you so much for your continuing prayers and support!