Monday

We all started the day by driving together to Corazon Creek. The construction crew expected to begin work on the renovation and expansion of a classroom, but in typical Belize fashion, the supplies had not been delivered.  On to Plan B!

Part of the construction crew drove back into Punta Gorda to figure out what the story was on the supplies.  They were able to purchase the materials to work on the library on Otoxha, on to Plan C!

The teaching team in Corazon Creek, Rose, Ann, Christy, Carolyn, and Roberta had a great day.  Ann did art projects with the kids, making pinwheel and a colorful fish using an old CD.  They reviewed the health and hygiene lessons. When discussing teeth, Rose asked what happens when the children lose a tooth. Instead of the tooth fairy, they throw the teeth up into the thatch roof and hope that a rat takes it! The more teeth the rat takes, the better your new teeth will be!  The group was able to walk into the village and see the new Catholic church. The church was started by four or five families in the village and people from the surrounding villages helped to build it.

Mary, Jill, Father Don and Donna worked in San Lucas. They put the new dictionaries, donated by Dictionary Project.org, to good use, looking up words and many  interesting facts. Who knew the population of Belize is 330,000? [for reference,  the population of Missouri is five million!] They also worked on map skills and did Fruit Loop math.  The students practiced spelling out their names in sign language [another great feature in the dictionaries}  Over the lunch hour they took a stroll down to the river and certainly thought about all of you at home who were looking out your window at a pile of snow!

Annette, Denise, Jody and Anita were the teachers at Otoxha.  Because of the crazy construction situation, Rick was able to join them for the day.  They were pretty happy to have him along when there was a stubborn horse blocking the road and someone needed to coax him  to get out of the way.  They also taught the health and hygiene lessons and tried out the Fruit Loop math project. They discovered that even big kids like a project that you can eat when you are finished. The group was invited to the home of Santiago for a home cooked lunch! They got to try their hand at making tortillas, which is much harder than it looks!  The kids could not stop laughing at their attempts. Anita didn't take a turn at tortilla making as she was busy holding a three week old baby boy, Kenny Renaldo.  Rick even got a turn holding the little cutie.

Speaking of babies, we stopped along the road to pick up some ladies who needed a ride to the health clinic.  As one woman was getting in the van she handed a parcel to Annette to hold while she climbed in. Much to Annette's surprise, it was  a baby!  Needless to say, she was delighted.

So it's been a crazy, unpredictable, wonderful day.  And by the way, it was 85 and SUNNY all day!  We miss you all, but we are NOT missing the weather.