Birthday Cake

Every month we have a birthday celebration for all the boys/staff that celebrate for that month. This past Thursday afternoon we celebrated a few special birthday boys from the pink and yellow houses.

We start by all walking over to Tio Ronald's (the director's) house. He literally lives next door and has a beautiful outdoor area fit for nothing more perfect than a birthday party. The house has an entire wrap-around, tiled area with swings, benches, rocking chairs, and tons and tons of plants. The trees and plants make it the perfect place to relax late afternoon with a great breeze and a stereo system to PUMP THE JAMS.

This time, we had a special visit from two clowns (family of one of our employees) who came dressed to the nine's to play the part. We played enough musical chairs, hot potato, and races to tire anyone. Especially this little 5 year old.

After playing games and listening to "Party Rock" on repeat (the boys favorite song), it was time for the pinata. This is by far the boys favorite part. I mean, what little boy doesn't like to pick up a bat and hit something? The fact that candy falls out is only a bonus. We always let the birthday boys go first, and then if it still hasn't busted, we go from smallest to largest. This is always so fun and a mystery as to who is going to break it first! This month, it was Jimmy who broke it!

Post pinata usually means time for cake! We sing happy birthday (one of the 7 million spanish versions), cut cake, and then the birthday boys get a special little gift. This is usually something like a puzzle, a squirt gun, or something small (we don't need any more jealousy around here with 55 little boys). I was lucky enough to dance with several of the boys (they think I'm the best dancer) and even share a piece of cake with Norman. It's the little moments that make me, oh so happy.

This month we celebrated Jose Alexander (7), Daniel (8), and Hector (12). All but Hector are pictured above on the swing-set. We had two more boys from the green house who celebrated this month, too. They are planning on celebrating this week. I'm sure it will include playstation, cake, and being smart alecks. Just kidding (kind of)... teenage boys... *sigh*.

On another note, Poppy had a great time on Thursday. She may have even been the life of the party :)

Learning

Sometimes life is tough.

Who am I kidding...? Life is usually pretty tough. I don’t think its meant to be easy, because if there is one thing worth fighting for - it’s your life. You only get one (enter cliche here), so why waste it by giving up when the going gets tough. Found this image on Pinterest, and I think this is the story of my current life.

Enough preaching. Life here at Jovenes has been, in my spoiled-little-American opinion, really tough for a lot of these boys. They are still dealing with lots of emotional issues - especially the older boys. They are the ones who remember more of their past, including some who remember just how much their parents didn’t want them. Some are luckier, meaning their parents come and visit when they have the money to afford the bus fare, but this is maybe once a month. These parents are the ones who realized they weren’t able to financially provide for their boys - a life with an education, 3 meals a day, and dreams of college.

Unfortunately some of these older boys come with serious attitudes. All are trying to decide who they are/want to be as they approach manhood, and sometimes there are ugly side effects. Some rebel in the home - bad attitudes, refusing to do chores, bullying, etc. Some rebel at school - bullying, skipping class, or making poor grades. And then there are those who are indifferent - who care less how their time is spent. The “indifferents” are the worst in my opinion. These are the ones who don't realize their potential and don't take advantage of their opportunities. These just want to eat, sleep, and walk around as if life is worthless. The lack of ambition or dreams is painful for us here at JEC. We want these boys to realize their worth. Realize that anything is possible with people who believe in them and want to help them financially, so they can take chances and learn from their mistakes.

I try to give them the benefit of the doubt in the sense that these boys haven’t had these options even laid out for them in the past, meaning their minds haven’t even started to process the endless possibilities they have.

This past week the boys grades came back from the second quarter (just now getting these as we’re finishing 3rd quarter - this is Honduras, baby). Some of the boys did amazing - all the younger boys (3 of the 5 pictured above). They are the ones who just started high school this year, and they have really gone above and beyond to excel this school year. The older ones are where the indifferents lie. First quarter was a complete and total disaster. Most just really fell apart, therefore punishments were put in place (no soccer, tv, playstation, etc), and the majority really came back second semester. Unfortunately about 5 failed several classes again.

This is where things get difficult. This is where I am learning to be a parent without having given birth to my own child. How do you punish someone who is indifferent? I have learned, even though it sounds vicious, you must take away what they love most. If this is their bicycle they purchased with their own money, so be it. If this means they have to clean yucky, pee-stenched bathrooms, so be it. This “giving of punishment” isn’t pretty, especially when 16 and 17 year-olds start crying in front of you. So here come the magic questions...

How do you explain to someone they are wasting their potential?

How do you tell someone you love they can be so much more without insulting them?

How do you reveal to a teenage boy he has been blessed to be given an education and a home when so many in Honduras (and other countries) aren’t so lucky?

How do you explain that punishment isn’t given to make them mad, and that this punishment hurts us just as bad (if not worse) than them?

I left the meeting feeling drained. We congratulated those who had exceeded our expectations, and then met with the others. While telling all the boys who passed all their classes, my heart was bursting with joy. I am so proud of these boys. I know this must be some type of parental love. When I sit back I look at each boy and see how far they’ve come, actual tears come to my eyes. For those who know me, you get how big this is considering I hardly ever cry. It takes something really sad or extremely beautiful to moisten these “ojos”. Some of these boys I’ve been lucky to know well for a while now, others I’ve just gotten to know in the past year. I cannot wait continuing watching them grow, find themselves, and become great men.

Today I am praising God for these moments - when my heart is bursting with overflowing joy and hope for the futures of these guys. I am also praising Him for teaching me the lesson of punishing a child - only when there is a lesson to be learned. I look back and understand I was punished only for the purpose of being a better person .

So thank you, Lord, for these lessons you teach me. Thanks, mom and dad, for not saying “I told you so”. And thanks friends and family, for your prayers for these boys and their futures!

Here is a funny picture for all to enjoy. I found this on my camera this morning. One of the boys took this of me doing laundry last night. I am grateful and proud of our washing machine and dryer!! It saves me a lot of arm work.

Cheers to One year!

This week marks my first full year in Honduras. I can (and cannot) believe it has truly been a year. I have learned so much about the world, myself and Jesus this year. I would like to share a list with all you of what I have learned in honor of my one year anniversary here.

1. I constantly underestimate God.

2. I constantly underestimate myself.

3. Jesus loved ALL the little children... black, white, brown, etc. THERE ARE NO EXCEPTIONS!

4. It is possible that my heart can be in two (or five) places at once.

5. I have learned I can get by and live off of much, MUCH less than I am accustomed to.

6. People, not just orphans, constantly need to feel loved.

7. Giving everything of yourself may be exhausting, but there aren't many feelings like it.

8. I have learned to appreciate work. Some adults I know make $5 a day doing hard manual labor. I'm so grateful I get to do what I love every day.

9. (Referring to above) Do whatever it is that you do with all of your might and all of your heart.

10. God has a pretty overwhelming tendency of taking something ugly and making it a masterpiece (ie: our hearts, our lives, a country stricken by poverty and crime)

11. Sometimes you have to be the bad guy and take the blame, even if you don't think you're wrong.

12. I have learned that I cannot do it all by myself. This meaning I have to stop trying to fix every problem, let go, and let God.

13. Sometimes when I lose my patience with these kids, I remember how patient God is with me.

14. Showering in a bucket is very "green", and I never realized how much water (and other things) we really waste each day.

15. I want the people around me here to know the ONLY reason anything I do is possible is because God has given me the strength to be the person I am.

16. There are so many good people here on this earth - I am so privileged to work with and know so many of them.

17. The mission field is not for everyone - but I do believe everyone is called to give something of themselves each day.

18. A dog really can be a man's (woman's) best friend.

19. I have to constantly remind myself not to hate some of the parents who deserted their boys here. Jesus even died for them! He loves them as much as me.

20. While working at JEC I have learned I am no where near ready to be a real mother. With the immense challenges motherhood brings, one must be ready to sacrifice your life to raise another. I imagine this may be a large reason many of the boys are here. Their moms simply weren't ready. But I do know this - its an honor to be a stand-in mother and older sister for these boys. They teach me daily about patience, unconditional love, and forgiveness.

These boys teach me about Jesus, and I am so thankful for them.

Cheers to one year in Honduras!

My Story

The 23rd celebrated my 10th month here in Honduras. I can’t believe in 2 months I would have been here for a year (with two trips home over that past year)! It has been a journey I could never have imagined. I figured in honor of this time, I would share my story with those who may not have heard how God led me to this place and to these people.

To move through the boring stuff quickly, I moved to Nashville in 2000, and this meant new school, new church, new home, and new friends. As a dramatic 12 year old, I thought my life was ruined. I can clearly see now it was the best for my entire family. I believe it made us all become better people, and now we call Nashville our home proudly.

Anyway - as I mentioned, I started a new church. We had some friends who attended a church in Brentwood called Harpeth Hills, and so we tried it out. Needless to say, we never left. Here we are 12 years later, and I could not be more blessed to have a church family like this one. The majority of my best friends go to this church, and we are still best friends today. I believe with all my heart God put me in this church so I could be in that youth group and learn to develop my own relationship with Jesus. I cannot begin to say how much I appreciate my youth ministers, teachers, and friends for encouraging me to get to know Jesus in my own way, and not just the way I “should”.

Three years after moving I found myself starting high school, and one of my girlfriends (who attended my school and was a friend in the youth group) really encouraged me to go on a mission trip to Honduras. She said her sister had gone the past 2 years, and we should really try and raise the money to go. I had never been out of the country, only flown on a plane twice, and didn’t even know where to locate Honduras on a map. I was in my first year of spanish in high school, and pretty much only knew how to ask where the bathroom was.

Either way I felt God moving me towards this decision, so I committed to go. I set out working, babysitting, and doing anything I could to make/save money to go. The trip was about $1000 at the time, and I didn’t send one letter asking for money. This was something I wanted, and I wanted to work for it. Looking back this made me appreciate the trip so much more, because it wasn’t something I was given, but something I worked hard to be able to do and enjoyed that much more. The time came, I packed my bag wearily - not having a clue what to bring- and set off at 5 in the morning to Central America.

I still remember the smell the first time I got off that plane. This was of course after the moment when I thought I was going to die on the runway (one of the shortest landing strips in the world). The airport at this time was two rooms, no air conditioner, and practically all outside. It had one rotating luggage claim, and the floors were dirt. But what most set in and will never leave my memory were the hundreds of people waiting outside the only exit begging. Being a freshman in a private high school, I had never seen ANYTHING like this. The people looked... dirty. I didn’t understand how even the babies looked dirty, with unbrushed hair, and clothes with visible holes in them. I stood there, mouth ajar, with my initialed LL Bean backpack just looking at these women and children. Here I was, with my portable CD player, big, chunky camera, and other items all shoved in my backpack - and these items were probably worth more than these people had in their entire home.

Fast forward to the end of the trip, and I was a wreck. Life as I knew it had been turned upside down. On that one trip, I met my best, best friend for the first time, I saw things with my eyes I had only seen on National Geographic, and I made a decision that would impact my entire life. At the time I didn’t know it would, but I decided to study spanish... and I mean really study spanish. I went home, and from that moment forward, all I thought about for my next 3 years of school was to be better at spanish and save my money for this annual summer trip to Honduras.

Fast forward again to December my senior year of college, and I had been on a total of 10 trips to Honduras. I started going at Christmas time, spring break, and any other chance I could afford it. I went on that trip in December 2010 thinking it would be my last. At the time I was getting ready to graduate college, preparing my resume, and even having phone interviews for job positions/internships in Argentina and Chile. While I had done nothing less than fall in love with Honduras and its people, as a business major, I didn’t see much of a future working in Honduras. I had prayed about it, but decided I should really take advantage of this last trip and enjoy it for what it was worth.

After many tears and feelings of “unsettled business”, I went back home to Nashville “depressed” as me and my friends always joked (how we felt after coming back to our lives so richly blessed). Well as many always say, God truly finds a way to show you His plans in His own time, and that’s exactly what He did for me that Christmas. By January I had somehow managed to make around enough money through Christmas gifts, overnight babysitting, housesitting, etc - and so I decided to talk to my mentor about getting a trip together. A few days later I purchased a round trip ticket to Honduras for spring break.

Without writing a novel about that spring break, it really put a lot into perspective. God opened a lot of doors, and He helped me line up my future. Here I am today, almost one year in Honduras, and my life has been thoroughly, utterly, and perfectly changed. I can never, ever give proper thanks to those who have helped me along the way, but I do want you all to know you have played a huge part in my life. From my parents and youth ministers to my friends and those who hired me, I have you to owe for leading, encouraging, and allowing me to this dream of mine - to live my life serving others. For that, I am forever in your debt.

All I ask now is that you pray for my life here. Pray that I can somehow, in however small the way, show people Jesus.

Photo Update

"if you're brave enough to leave behind everything familiar and comforting, and set out on a truth seeking journey, and you are prepared to face and forgive some very difficult realities about yourself, then the truth will not be withheld from you" -eat, pray, love

Hands and Feet

This may sound like a typical missionary cliche, but I am so immensely blessed by living here in this country, working with this team, and having 55 little brothers. I am also incredibly blessed by the support we receive here at Jovenes by our brothers and sisters from home. Compared to most centers like ours, we receive MUCH more help from the US, including financial gifts, physical gifts, and just being present.

As any young child or adult, the boys can easily get carried away by gifts or “material things”, especially since most of them grew up without. But from what I’ve observed by being here almost 1 year is that what matters most to them is that one simply “shows up”. I recently wrote an e-mail to some friends who came down to visit, and my biggest point in the e-mail was that they are heroes to these boys because they showed up. A lot of the parents of these boys (those who are still alive) have failed to do simply that - be present in the lives of their children.

Some, unfortunately, have no option. They simply cannot make enough money to sustain their children, and they have taken what they believe is a better life for their son. Another unfortunate matter is that this parent is few and far between in the case of our boys. Every Saturday parents are encouraged to come visit and spend the day with their boy(s). The usual few families come, but its not more than 3 or 4 on a good day.

So now maybe you can see why simply being present in these boys’ lives is extremely important. I mean, isn’t that what Jesus does in our lives? He shows up. Every day. He’s there for us. He is the only one who will never ever let us down. And why is that? Because he is “omnipresent”. He is always there for you. That is the beauty of one’s relationship with God. We can ignore him for days on end, and when we “need him”, he’s still there- just waiting for us to come home. This is why we love visitors here at JEC. The boys love to feel loved. They want to feel wanted. With almost 20 boys in each house, that sometimes becomes difficult. We want the best for them, but sometimes we cannot fulfill that constant need for attention which all children have. So when one of you comes to visit these boys, you are just that - Jesus. For one moment, one hour, or one day, you become Jesus to them. You sit with them. You share a snack with them. Perhaps you don’t have a single clue what they said, but you are THERE. That is what matters. Just like Jesus, you show up.

So thank you. Thank you to all our visitors for being here. We love you, we cherish you, and we can’t wait to see you again someday.

Back in Action

Here I find myself again in Honduras, "living la vida loca" as the great, Ricky Martin, once sang about. Some things have changed since 2011, but 2012 seems to be heading off to a more positive start (if that is even possible). I still have 3000 plus ants living in my room with me, so maybe one day I'll have the room all to myself. My furniture for my room did however take a huge upgrade, which will come with pictures in a later post. For now - the boys. The reason I am actually living in a foreign country, sweating my butt off every day, eating LOTS AND LOTS of rice and beans, constantly walking everywhere I go, dealing with people being late all the time, etc etc. It all becomes worth it because I get to spend every day with 55 brothers. I also get the added bonus of working with an incredibly Godly staff who work here for the same reason as me - not because of the money or the image, but because we get to actively participate in the enrichment of these little boys' lives.

We're currently at 55, with two new ones that have come since the beginning of the year. We're hoping to reach 60 (full capacity) shortly, but until then... God bless our souls. It's exhausting every day, but like I said - I am so blessed by their lives and their love.

These 5 pictured here (plus one more - Daniel - who was being a pouty face and wouldn't get in the picture this day) are the 6 total that I have the joy of basically being their mother during the day. I take care of all their school needs, taking their lunch, going to parent-teacher conferences, participating in school activities, picking them up from school, monitoring them for after-school activities, doing homework each night with each boy, & sometimes reading a book with them as they fall asleep (if I'm lucky). They attend the Alison Bixby Bilingual School - which has been mentioned in many of my blogs from last year. We at JEC (Jovenes en Camino) feel extremely blessed to have this partnership with this school. They are so supportive and patient with us, even their classmates' parents help us out on occasion. At Christmas the entire school organized an event where each student was paired with a name of one of our boys at JEC. This way, each of our 55 got one present extra from their friends at Alison Bixby. I can't say again how grateful I am for this community/school and their support. This is as much as I can update for now - got to go finish being a mom for the day. Tomorrow 2nd grade has a "Honduran Breakfast" so the students can learn about what a typical breakfast was like many years ago before electricity, ovens, etc. I am in charge of the table decorations. Wish me luck! Now that I have finally been able to open my blog and write, I am hoping to update more regularly. Fortunately (for me) and unfortunately (for my blog) I have a group of friends from Nashville coming this Friday! It's the same group that I always came with on spring breaks and Christmas trips. Pictured here was last year's spring break trip. Pray for us as we spend a week in the city, the slums, the orphanages, the dump, and at Jovenes (my home) trying to show Jesus to others.

God bless!