Guatlemala - Day 6

Wednesday was our last full day in Guatemala, so sad!  It was a gorgeous sunny morning and I got to take some pictures of our beautiful guest home.

This was the view from the roof.  The scale is off due to it being a panoramic, but I am sure you get the idea.  :)

Seriously, my finger had to ruin the pic!

 This was the upstairs floor.  My room is the one straight ahead.  The walls aren't actually curved, just the panoramic again.

The little eating/courtyard area downstairs.  It was amazing to sit and have breakfast here every day.

Staircase.  I seriously love all the bright colors!

Inside the tiny little chapel

After packing up, we headed back to Love the Child Baby Home.  Sadly, it was bath day, and that meant all the babies were out commission most of the time we were there.  But I still snuck downstairs to see my sweet Antonio one more time... ;)

Waiting for their turn

 Since the babies were busy, we all went outside and played with the toddlers.  So fun.  So cute!!

Shalkar had a blast on the trampoline with these two sweet boys.  They just giggled and giggled!

Cesar and Ranfis

That's a lot of laundry!

Ahhhh, my Antonio, one last time.

Sweet Eric

 Then we headed back to MST for the last time.  We had our lesson and songs and then more fun crafts.

It was important to me the first day I met these girls to know each of their names.  I am terrible with names, but I worked hard and within a couple days of meeting them, had them down pretty well!  I also wanted to get a picture of each of their beautiful faces before we left.  

ODETH

KARLITA

CATTY

DAMARIS

 CELESTE

MARYORI

CLEMENCIA

INGRID

MAYRA

YESSICA

JENNIFER

JOSELIN

LESLI

GERSI

We didn't want to leave, so we stalled as long as we could.

Twinnies!

Timothy taught the girls some hip hop.  They were good!

One last group shot

And one last goodbye

The van was quiet as we pulled away from MST and headed back to Guatemala City.  I know we were all thinking about these amazing girls who had just changed our lives.

Guatemala - Day 5

Tuesday was another exciting day. We got to visit the Love the Child orphanage!  This orphanage was started several years ago by an American couple, Steve and Shyrel Osborn.  This is not a government run orphanage, which means most of their support has to come from outside of Guatemala.  They have over 50 children at Love the Child, most of them under the age of 5.  Last year there were less than 50 adoptions in the ENTIRE country of Guatemala, and about 1/3 of them came from Love the Child.  Adoption is closed outside of the country, so a huge prayer for Guatemalan orphans is that more national families will be moved  to adopt.  The need is overwhelming!

I am a baby lover, always have been.  So I was most excited to hold me some babies!!  We walked in and there they were, the youngest babies all lined up.

The nannies let us take over with some of the babies that were awake. 

Love the Child has a Facebook page, and I had liked it a few months before our trip.  The week before we left, they posted a picture of a new baby they had just gotten.  I fell in love.  I could not wait to meet him and hold him!  So after playing with the babies who were awake for a bit, I finally asked the nanny where Anotnio was.  She showed me and there he was, fast asleep but just as I remmebered him from his picture!  She let me get him up and oh, I was in heaven!!  I held him and even got to feed him a bottle.  It was absolutely amazing!!
Here is a link to the first picture I saw of him on FB.  :)  Baby Antonio

How can you not fall in love with this face??

There were plenty of babies ot go around, so we just held and fed and enjoyed every second!

Yes, I even shared Antonio with Erin!  ;)

Soon, it was time to go.  The toddlers and preschool age kids came in because it was lunch time!  So many beautiful children...

We headed back to Antigua, and after lunch had some time to do a bit of exploring.  I am just in awe of how beautiful Guatemala is!  We started in a park in the middle of the city.  Antigua was the capital of Guatemala until 1773, when it was destroyed by a series of earthquakes.

The Cathedral of San Jose sits on one side of the park.

There are two volcanoes surrounding Antigua, named Fire and Water.  Fire is an active volcano!

The Hill of the Cross

The Arco de Santa Catalina is one of the most famous sights in Antigua.  It was built in the 1600's as the convent grew so that the nuns could cross the street from building to building without being seen.

I just love the colors of the buildings!  The city of Antigua has certain colors that have to be used when buildings are painted.  I can't remember how many, but I love how colorful and beauitful ths city is!

La Merced Church

After our tour around Antigua, we headed back to MST for another devotional, craft, and the best part... water games!!!

Pablito - Such a neat kid  :)

Getting the water balloons ready!!

We played a bunch of water ballon games and ended with a big ole water fight!  It was really fun and the girls had a blast!!

Celeste and I won the first waterballoon toss.  Yahoo!!

Dinner that night was fondue at Le Fromage.  Oh my it was soooo good!!

It was Erin's anniversary, so I was her stand in date, ha!

YUM!!