Merry Christmas!

Today, I got to play Santa and visit all of the different houses at the orphanage to deliver gifts! The kids were adorable, all dressed up in their Christmas outfits. It was so much fun to see their expressions, and to be part of their Christmas.

Christmas Cookies

This past Tuesday we had a major bake-a-thon. About 70 kids came to take part in making Christmas cookies. I baked with them for over four hours. We made candy cane cookies, sugar cookies, peanut butter cookies, and chocolate chip cookies. The kids were very creative and they loved making and decorating all the cookies. The night of baking ended with the kids delivering the cookies house to house while singing "Feliz Navidad."

Rolling out shapes

Icing the cookies

Delivering the cookies (spontaneous caroling)

The Nativity Competition!

Things here have been busy with getting ready for Christmas. We have Christmas parties, a Christmas program at school, and amigo secreto (secret friend) exchanges going on. Each year at the orphanage each of the houses competes in a Christmas tree and nativity competition. The house that I am currently at decided to do a gingerbread/candy type nativity scene. So for the last couple nights we have been working full force since we would like to win the competition. Things were looking good last night, until one of the kids ate Mary and the Star of Bethlehem crashed to the floor in the middle of the night. I'm proud to say that baby Jesus has survived in his Milky Way wrapper. I will let you know the outcome of the competition next week. I think we could place a solid 11 out of 12.

The Star of Bethlehem made out of gumdrops



In the beginning process of construction - materials: candy, candy, and more candy!

Christmas in Ecuador!

Well since Thanksgiving isn't celebrated here, Christmas is in full swing in Ecuador. The stores started decorating and putting out Christmas items about a month ago. It doesn't seem right, since it is about 80 degrees out. Well today we took two babies to the mall on a field trip. The mall had a huge Christmas tree up, a little train that kids could ride around in, and a mini ice skating rink. The girls loved all of the lights and stimulation. One of the highlights was riding up and down in the glass elevator.

Checking out the ornaments

In front of a very large bear

Two Worlds Collide

On Saturday, I took a group of 11 teenagers from the orphanage where I live, to the other orphanage I work at on the weekends. It was so great watching them interact with the kids at FHC. They played, made bracelets, did a puppet show, and helped feed babies. They did an awesome job interacting with the special needs children. It was an all day excursion since it takes two hours by bus each way to get there. I am proud to say we did not lose anyone and no one got hurt...a soccer ball that one of the teenagers kicked nearly missed an old Ecuadorian lady, but other than that a very successful day! I am excited to hopefully bring another group from my foundation in the future to volunteer.

Finger Painting!

Last weekend, we had an awesome time doing some artwork with the kids. They were quite the artists, painting on top of canvasses with baby Mozart playing in the background. It was very relaxing! They also all put their hand prints on a large canvas that we put in their house.

English Clubs

Mask Making - this week we started to get into the Halloween festivities by making masks. The elementary aged students decorated and proudly wore the masks they made.


Taped to the wall - the high school students did an activity where they had to tape a person (who was standing on a chair) to the wall. After five minutes of taping, we removed the chair and the first person to fall was the loser. Thanks, Tim, for this idea - it was a lot of fun!

Ice Skating in Ecuador

Who would have thought that there would be ice skating in Ecuador? On Saturday we took a brother and sister to a local mall that had an ice skating rink. They were so cute trying to skate. We had a few minor falls but it was definitely a big hit with them. They were talking about it for the rest of the weekend.

Ice skating with Fabian

Jessica taking a break

Wax Museum

Today my seventh graders put on a wax museum. They had to choose a famous person and tell details about that person's life in English. They dressed up as their person and brought in some props to go along with the presentation. My fifth and sixth graders will also be doing this later on this week.

Simon Bolivar and Miley Cyrus

Making Bread

One of the men that lives here at the orphanage, makes bread every Monday at the little panaderia that is here on site. Every week he makes 1200 loaves of bread. This lasts the whole week for the entire orphanage. Yesterday I went to help out and learn how to make the bread. So here are some pictures from that experience.

A weekend of field trips, cooking class, and futbol!

This weekend I had a great time with the kids at the orphanage. We took two boys to the reptile museum and the park. We ended up riding around Quito with them in this little caterpillar bus that plays music. We were quite a sight - three white girls and two Ecuadorian kids on the caterpillar. On Friday night we made monster cookies (which if you've never tried, I would strongly recommend) with the cooking class. The kids all helped measuring out ingredients, mixing, drooling into the batter, etc. On Saturday we had another field trip with the two two-year olds to the mall. They have a little book shop where we planned on doing some reading. The reading didn't last very long but they loved riding around in these little cars and then having their first hamburger/fast food experience at McDonalds. Finally, my friends and I got tickets to go to the World Cup qualifying game - Ecuador v. Uruguay. We got into the festivities by buying jerseys, hats, and face paint. Sadly they lost last night, but a very cool experience!

At the entrace to the reptile musem

Flying an airplane at the park

Cooking class - making the monster cookies

Driving a car in the mall

At the Ecuador-Uruguay game

Scavenger Hunt

This week in English club for the high schoolers, I had them do a massive scavenger hunt all over the foundation. All of the clues were in English, and one team member had to be blindfolded. They got really into it, and had a lot of laughs.

Quinceanera!

Last Sunday we celebrated one of the girl's 15th birthday. I learned all of the different traditions that happen for a Quinceanera. The girl always wears a pink dress and is given high heel shoes as a symbol of moving into adulthood. We had a huge BBQ and lots of cake and goodies. Majori looked beautiful!

Going to the zoo!

Last weekend we took three children with special needs to the zoo. The zoo is about 45 minutes outside of Quito, so some Ecuadorian friends came with us, and were nice enough to drive everyone. We saw giant tortoises, bears, kangaroos, monkeys, and much more! The kids had fun getting up close to the animals at the petting zoo area.

At the entrance to the zoo


At the petting zoo

the giant tortoises

English Clubs

This week I started an English club with my students who live at the orphanage. On Tuesday I had all of the elementary school students, and on Thursday it was all of the high schoolers. It was a pretty chaotic experience with kids running everywhere. So I will be making some changes for this coming week, and limiting the amount of kids who are involved. On Tuesday, we made puppets and on Thursday we did an activity with peanut butter and jelly. It was the first time that the kids had tried PB & J. I'm pretty sure no English was learned, but they had a good time.

Making Puppets

Experiencing PB & J

Pizza Making and Play Time

On Saturday our original plan was to go to McDonalds and play in the indoor playground. When we arrived we realized we were crashing a birthday party and that they weren't serving lunch yet. A quick backup plan was made, when we discovered a pizza place next door where the kids could make their own pizzas. They were adorable in their chef hats and aprons.

Playing on the see-saw

Making pizza

Concentrating on spreading the sauce

S'mores

Last night some of the other volunteers from the orphanage and I had a taco dinner and made s'mores. This is the first time my Norwegian friend and Ecuadorian friend had ever tried s'more before - so I figured this should be documented.

Cara's s'more went up in flames

Isaac turns two!

We had a birthday party for one of the boys at the orphanage who turned two yesterday. Each of the kids had a decorated visor to wear with their name, and everyone enjoyed a delicious cake.

Isaac blowing out his candle

CocinArte

We are doing a cooking/art class with some of the older kids and special needs kids at the orphanage. This past week we made the all time favorite cup of dirt. I started the class by asking the kids if anybody had eaten worms before, and they were all grossed out. We proceeded to mix dirt (pudding), rocks (crushed oreos), and worms (gummy worms), to make our fabulous creation.

The kids with their cups of dirt

One of the tias joining in on the fun

Snakes and Spiders and Frogs, Oh My!

We took two boys to the vivarium on Friday where we saw all kinds of exciting creatures. We even pet a boa! Then we played at a park for a little while, and finished the day with going on some paddleboats. The four year old wanted to paddle, and the six year old wanted to steer - result? we went in circles for quite some time. At the end of the trip, the four year old said "I'm going to behave really well tomorrow, so that I can go on another field trip."

Checking out some reptiles

Some more friends

Playing on the play structure

On our way to the paddle boats

Making Ice Cream

Last week we had an ice cream making party with the kids at the foundation. I had done this in high school chemistry class and it is so much fun! You put milk, vanilla, and sugar in a small bag. In a large bag you put a lot of ice and salt. Then the kids mix these two together, and you get vanilla ice cream. You have to shake the mixture for about 5 minutes!

Yum Yum

Shaking up the mixture to make ice cream

Water Park!

Today was the first day of our weekly paseos (mini-fieldtrips). We take two kids from the orphanage and go on a little adventure. Today we went to Quito's Yaku water museum. The kids had a great time sliding down slides, crawling through tunnels, and learning about how water is filtered (it was very educational)! The highlight though was the bubble room where you could create huge bubbles. The day wouldn't have been complete without a trip to the heladeria to eat some ice cream. The girls playing in a huge tub of bubbles


Getting some speed on the slide