50 cents

What would you guess that a 7 year old would buy with 50 cents? I'll bet you didn't guess fireworks. And I'll bet you didn't guess that he could buy them at school. Well me neither. But my 7 year old brought them to my house this weekend and insisted that we light them off as soon as it was dark. So after bath time, complete with Toy Story PJs, I did what any respectable parent would do. I let him blow stuff up, in front of his little brothers.

David held his ears.

And boy was it fun.

Happy 5th Birthday Oziel

"How old are you?!" - I'm 5

So much could be said about this little man. He's spent half of his childhood in 3 different orphanages. He's had more turnover in orphanage caregiver who was responsible for him in these past few years than I probably had with babysitters. But for some reason, God has caused our paths to connect and Oziel has spent almost half of his birthdays by coming to my apartment for the weekend. Actually, last year on his 4th birthday was the first time he asked if he could spend the night at my house and not go back to the orphanage after a play date. It was the first time I ever asked permission and the first time he ever stayed over. This year for his 5th birthday - of course we kept that record going. In the past year, I've spent more time with these boys than I ever could have imagined - Oziel's sibling set actually spends almost every single weekend at my house at this point but we specifically celebrated Oziel's 5th birthday on that particular weekend with ice cream, pizza, swimming, the trampoline, and of course - Monster trucks for his bday.

In the past year, Oziel has learned to count, in kindergarten Oziel knows more letters of the alphabet than some of the first graders at Douglas, knows his colors and is learning to write his name. He has memorized at least 20 books and is a wizard when it comes to puzzles.

One of my proudest moments this past year was the afternoon that he learned to swim in the big pool with his water wings. He's like a little fish these days.

"No eye has seen, no ear has heard, no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those who love him." ~ Isaiah 64:4

Prerequisites to Success

I'm sure that you've heard a million times that reading is FUNDAMENTAL to learning. Imagine a 3rd or 5th grader trying to tackle his math word problems for homework but has no idea what the problem is because he can't read so he waits for you to read it to him and help him set up the math. This scene is far too common place for me to stomach sometimes. But orphans in orphanages don't always get the amount of individualized attention they need to succeed academically. This is a HUGE deal when you consider that the ticket out for these kids is their education.

When I was little, my mom took me to the public library every single week to pick out all my favorite books. I recently tried to find my original copies of all my favorite childhood stories and realized that we never actually owned most of them but rather we just checked them out of the library over and over again. My mom read to me before bed. As I got older, she required that me and my siblings read for one hour every summer afternoon - like it or not. She was onto something here...

Day after day here at the institution I work at, seeing the night and day difference between my academic upbringing and the snip its of time orphans receive for reading instruction - if at all - got me thinking. Add to the situation the fact that public libraries in Mexico are a foreign concept for the kids.

I am in charge of different dorms of kids on different days so I decided about a year ago to start incorporating reading into my day with the boys. It was easy with the little guys because they LOVE sitting in your lap and hearing a story read out loud but I was nervous about the 9 to 12 year old bunch. They have surprised me because they actually love it. They laugh as they comprehend funny parts of the stories. They smile. They don't hate reading like I thought they would. We read out loud for 20 minutes and then they are allowed to play my N64. These 20 minutes which can sometimes go on for an hour when certain boys want to take their 20 minutes of reading individually by reading out loud to me is honestly my favorite part of my entire day with this dorm.

Many of the books that we read on a weekly basis have been donated my several of you readers I'm sure. Thank you for shopping online or in bookstores for children's books in spanish. Thank you for donating to these kids' futures.

Conduit

Days like yesterday, when I get to be with my 10 boys from sun up to sun down, have a way of surprising me at times. I'm not sure why I'm not "used to it" by now or why I sometimes have to metaphorically step back to gain a better perspective. But God is doing something through me. And what He is doing through me is doing something in me. I've never really been a kid person. If someone asked me to do some kids ministry to help them out, I'd probably giggle and say, "Me!? Are you serious? No, I'm not good with kids. Ask someone else." But when it comes to the least of these, I don't think whatever box we have chosen to put ourselves in seems to matter much to God. Yesterday I was reminded of exactly why I live here.

Twice a week, I take over all the caregiving for a dorm of 10 boys so that those caregivers can have a true day off to rest. It's a lot of work, but at the end of the day, the joy these kids give me far outweighs my physical exhaustion. These precious children have a way of blessing me in and amongst all the craziness.

Their smiles, giggles, behavioral outbursts, when one tells me that he loves me as much as from here to the sky, their psychological conditions that they carry as a result of abuse or their abandonment, their tiny little hands, the 7 year old who is learning to read, my pre-schoolers who can almost write their names, the way they misbehave if I'm not paying enough attention to them, my 4 year old who is weirdly obsessed with ears all of a sudden, when all 10 of them try to hide from me all at once in the church and another 4 year old tries to tell on them saying, "they were up there hiding in that place where we worship God," because he doesn't know that it's called a church, their cranky fits at dinner.....

I could go on and on.

But God has something going on here. I don't need to understand it.

I feel like some kind of conduit . God is passionately loving these precious children and he's doing it through me. It's a feeling that can probably only be described by a parent with their toddler- The way they love them.

I'm so thankful that I serve a God who is passionate about the least of these. The world might try to ignore them or classify them as a charity but not God. He knows them each by name. He has promised to never leave them or forsake them and to be their father.

He made them.

He made them beautiful.

Happy 4th Birthday David

She knows it's coming up. But she can't do anything about it. She can't be there for him. It's her turn this month to work the night shift all week. Her youngest is about to turn 4 years old this weekend but she'll be at the factory. So when I called to ask if I could take her boys for the weekend again, she was thrilled and relieved and thankful that someone could be with her kids and celebrate them when she couldn't be there to do it herself.

She's thankful.

Just hearing that crushed me. I'm not sure that would be my reaction to the hand of cards life has thrown at her right now. And on top of that, she's thankful for me.

I've been given the most beautiful responsibility here. Her children.

She'll probably never know what an impact that whole conversation had on me.

We had a super fun birthday weekend with presents, ice cream, pizza, pool time, his new slip n slide, reading stories, watching scooby doo.

When life hands me lemons, I want to find ways to be thankful. I want to find ways to be grateful in my heart for what God has done for me by sending his Son to be my sacrificial lamb so that I could inherit Christ's righteousness. I want to keep my eyes focused on the things above and not just my circumstances.