Advent and Christmas spirit
Our volunteer Fabienne introduced the Swiss tradition of having an Advent calendar to Honduras. The children did not really understand the sense behind it and why they were not allowed to open all the Christmas presents on the same day. Every child was allowed to open one present and they all were very happy with what they got. Another tradition is baking cookies. As we all love sweets, we increased the recipe ingredients eightfold and baked six different types of cookies. In spite of the huge amount of cookies, they were all gone very quickly.
Festive season
We spent the festive season in the children’s home in a quiet atmosphere. Every child received new clothes and shoes for Christmas, which is a tradition here in Honduras. On December 24, we received a delicious dinner including the famous Tamales. We watched a Christmas movie together and then we went to church. Christ Child was born at midnight, which we celebrated with the matching Bible passage.
On New Year’s Eve, we had a celebration similar to the one on Christmas Eve, except that we had fireworks to puff out bad behavior and start the new year with a pure soul.
Holidays
Even we managed to take an “official” holiday, which means that we relaxed a lot more than usually and, for example, got up only at 8:00 a.m. to have a cozy breakfast. Then we usually went somewhere: we went to the beach, walked up the Coca Cola hill, went to the playground, went to Ticamaya to see a lagoon, played soccer, etc.
On the last day of her stay here in the children’s home, the volunteer Fabienne invited us to go to the waterpark. The children spent the whole day in the water and came back tired but happy in the evening.
Second floor
Our area is quite big, but our family and our needs have grown over time. Thus, we decided to build a second floor onto the existing workshop. Edwing is the architect and he, together with Darling and the elder boys, will build it in the next few weeks. I am often surprised at what Edwing can do… he can do anything! Thanks to him, we do not need to employ someone for repairs, as he does everything. I hope that the boys learn a lot from him so that they will have all these talents later in life, too.