Saturday: Second day in the village and first day at the orphanage

This morning, we woke up to a beautiful sunrise over the Guatemalan countryside. The weather continued to be absolutely amazing with clear skies and sun all day. We started the day with a delicious breakfast made by our awesome cooks, and then Todd Dammen shared during our devotions about how important it is to keep our priorities straight; our daily life and actions aligned with our faith.

The group split up into two groups; one to the village and one to the orphanage. The group that went to the village continued to work on houses and started pouring concrete, finishing 7 houses! The VBS group had a blast with the kids again today. They played duck duck goose, went over their verse of the week (John 3:16) and the winners who were able to recite it won a special prize. Our team lead story time of Noah and the Ark, played jump rope and futbol, and the kids braided our team's hair. They are not used to seeing blonde hair around here! A couple of our team members were able to tour the church in the village that we are working in, and it is gorgeous. The villagers definitely have their priorities straight; their faith and their church is their first priority above their own houses, kind of like what Todd shared during devotions.

The orphanage is about a 45 minute drive from the mission house, and our drivers did an impeccable job once again maneuvering in the crazy Guatemalan traffic! Once we arrived at the orphanage, we had the opportunity to hold some super cute babies and play with some really fun toddlers. After a while, a group took apart a fence along the drive to the orphanage that was about a football field long. We took a break for lunch, and shortly got whipped back to work by one of the kids, Hannah, because the faster we got our work done the faster we could come and play! In no time, the fence was down, the work was done, and we were able to play more with the kids. The infants were pretty much all asleep, but some of us got to play in the yard with the toddlers... Some playing ball, some playing with the parachute, and others just hanging out.

When we all returned back to the mission house, we prepared all of the supplies for food distribution later this week. Then, we ate dinner. The biggest, most delicious baked potatoes ever.

Matt & Nicole Bouwman