WE MADE IT.

We made it!! We're finally here in Pastores, Guatemala! We had a super smooth day of travel and arrived in our new homes at about 9pm (Guat time). My host mother, Ingrid, is a single mother to a married daughter, 18 yr old daughter, and two adopted daughters, found abandoned by their biological mother on a nearby mountain. Her nephew, Diego, spends most of his time at our house running around with no pants on (he's like 2 so it's not weird yet). Our host family is incredibly sweet and welcoming. Ingrid barely batted an eye when we locked ourselves out of our room and had to break a window to get in (oops). I've kind of been putting off writing about my experience so far, because I haven't found the right words yet. While I'm feeling overwhelmingly blessed to be here, it's also been kind of difficult. To be honest, I wasn't all that excited to be here when I arrived. I'm struggling to miss people in a way that doesn't hinder me from being present with my team, and with the children here. When I brought this up to one of my team members, they reminded me that one of the best ways to stay present is to intentionally serve. So I've been trying to be more intentional about serving and loving people, and I'm realizing it doesn't leave much space for thinking about myself. I've also realized that the Guatemala portion of the program is not the easy portion. Asparagus, honestly, is easier. In Canada, I never woke up wondering if I had running water that day, I didn't have to wash my clothes by hand (or at all ... thanks ma), I could go outside alone, and I could TALK TO PEOPLE. Not being able to communicate is really difficult. Kids are good at charades, but some of the adults, notsomuch. Two hours of Spanish class every day for the past few days has helped, but I still don't know much. When all of the familiarity and comfort of home was taken away, I was really challenged to question WHO I place my comfort in, rather than WHAT I place my comfort in. I'm learning more and more that God is my strength. Having the hope that I can trust in Him is super reassuring and amazinggggg.

So far we've been walking up the hill to the school everyday (it's a mountain. not a hill. shoutout to my quads for not dying yet), and doing a ton of VBS prep, which starts next week. Devotions with the kids in the morning has been incredible. The fact that people might be watching them doesn't hinder them from fully pouring their hearts out.

So this morning, we woke up with a dog in our house. We don't have a dog.

Today we've been exploring the nearby city called Antigua. It's SO so good to be back here. Antigua is one of my favourite places in the world (ruins, cobblestone streets, markets, intense colours, and tons of ice cream stores). We toured several ruin sites, one of which was formerly a convent. Under the convent is a rounded room, which had AMAZING sound. Our team stood in the dark and sang hymns for like 20 minutes. SO COOL.

The first day at the school, a super cute JK student followed me around and took photos of me with my camera. She zoomed in a little far so I now have about 70 photos of various parts of my face.

Overall, I'm (now) really thankful and feeling blessed to be here. I'm excited to see how God moves in me and through me while I'm here.

Please continue to pray for

-health for our team, while we're in a new country, with new food etc

-safety for our team in an unfamiliar town, with unfamiliar culture

-that our team would allow ourselves to be available for God to use

-for Guatemala, as a country