Remembering me....

Last night I came home and had the intention of going down stairs and working on my scrap book for about 2-4 hours, but I never made it down there. We all know how intentions go, they are not really priorities they are just something at one time we thought that we would like to do, but other things quickly get in the way. Before I started to make my way down stairs I thought that I would look for this poem I had written in high school so that I could post it on my blog..just for fun. Well, I started reading some of the stuff I had written and it really got me thinking. I discovered things about who I was back then...and who I am now. I was surprised how many things I had written had almost a gloomy feel to it. All through my life people have told me what a happy bright personality I have, and I think that is true. People have told me that I'm just so bright and happy that I just light up their day when they see me. As I read some of my stuff from high school I don't think that it really matched up with that. Some of my stuff did, other pieces not so much. I started thinking why I would have that type of writing, then it struck me. Everyone has good day and bad days. Everyone goes through hard times, and no one can be happy all the time. I don't think that I was or am fake when I'm happy, I think that is really who I am, but I deal with things that are hard for me too. As I was reading my stuff I began to realize on a new level that the reason I can be happy when I'm with people is because I deal with the bad stuff. I don't just leave it inside of me to eat me away. I express myself, not always out loud. As my friends know I do express myself out loud a lot, but some of the other things...that I don't know how to say out loud, or don't really know how I feel about those things I deal with those in other ways. Of course the first way is just thinking about them and praying about it. After that though I find that my feelings come out in my journal, even when I'm not "keeping" a journal sometimes I find myself just pulling out paper and writing. Also, my whole life I have danced, I loved dancing because it takes me to this world where I can just let out my tension and frustrations, I can just let it all go while I dance...it was so freeing. Now that I live in Honduras and I can't dance on the same level, I find myself running. It's a great way to started the morning to let out all that extra energy and gain a new kind. It's a great time to just think, because it's just you and the road....and it feels like your doing something about your feelings. Now do I only run, dance and write when I'm upset or dealing with something...NO those are also great times to think about or express good feelings. I found myself laughing at lots of my journal entries last night too. Sometimes when I run I think about funny thinks and will start laughing out loud. When I dance I almost always have a smile on my face. I love life and I love to soak it all in, but in order to do that I have to go through hard times just like everyone else, I find comfort in the fact that when we are dealing with something, not only is God there with us but that he is teaching us something through that. What a wonderful thing to know! Even though I didn't get to work on my scrapbook last nigh I was glad that I read back through my old Journal. It was fun remembering who I was...and finding out who I'm becoming.

The Storm

The next few entries will be things I pulled out of my journal from high school...some of them I wrote as projects for a creative writing class I took. The first one I call "The Storm"

One dreary day dripped on after the other.
Fog sitting on the horizon,
The tapping of rain never ceasing.
Pounding, pouring, mourning
To land on something dry
To quench someones thirst.
Drenching rain seeped through water and muck
Adding something fresh, yet never thought of as new.
Running and washing, never stopping
Always going forever flowing.
Peace it knew not, only continuing to break
The silence of the parting clouds
And the clashing of stars,
Sending shadows of sparkling hope.
Shadows drained out by the pouring rain
Covered by the cries of heaven.
Blowing cold, breaking the daisies
Rolling cold washing the water;
Water never parting
Days never ending, always forgetting.

Just for fun.

Play Time?

Little Sally went to ask her mom a question.
"Mom," said Sally "can I go out and play?"
"Sure," said her mom "anytime you want, except from June-May."

M&M

There once was a short little man
That lived in a very hard shell
He could not break free from this man he had to be.
He had one job to do-
Make people smile and never melt in their hand
I guess that's two.

Breathe

This paragraph is very much me. Often times at night I would go sit outside by myself. I enjoyed looking at the stars and breathing in the fresh cool air...I still do.

Outside it's a blanket of darkness, and the breeze gently wraps it's self around me. The water trickles as the crickets chime in to the orchestra of sounds. The ground proves a restful spot, with leafs as a canopy and the stars are my silent song. The night air calls for me to remember old friends. It gently pulls out old stories with the mellifluous sounds, and the water brings dancing images from my head. The smell of fresh cut grass makes my heart burn for childhood, the time it was easy..before you had things to worry with. My mind wanders like the cat down the street and soon the warmth of the ground had lulled me to sleep.

A little Japaneses fun!

Tonight I got to enjoy a wonderful night with my brother and sister. My parents were gone so we decided to go out. We got our stuff together...I grabbed the camera and the keys to my mom's car. (We took her car so that we wouldn't waste Carli's gas....THANKS MOM!) We headed out to a Japaneses steak house located in Cool Springs called Shogun's. It is one of my favorite restaurants, but I hadn't been yet since being back in the states for Christmas. As we waited to be seated, much to my sisters annoyance, we took pictures. We laughed a lot, and I was instantly glad that we had gone out together. Once seated we were delighted with a good server and the best cook I have ever had at Shogun's. For those of you who have never been to Shogun's, you have a big cook top in the middle of you table and they cook your food right in front of you. The cook we had tonight joked around with all of us (you are often times at a table with other people that you don't know.) Our cook flipped rice towards different people at the table to see if we could catch it in our mouths, and was over all just entertaining! On top of that he was a great cook and I enjoyed EVERY morsel of that dinner. It was a great evening and I was so glad that I was able to share it with Carli and Lawson!

Tis the season!

As I look at these precious pictures of my kids decorating Christmas cookies I long so much to wrap my arms around them. Just hold them for a second, (I say a second because they would never stay in a hug for longer than that, if they're not crying that is...I mean come on they are only 3 and 4 they have to much energy for that!) They had such a great time making Christmas cookies. The past two years I have made sure that the preschool makes Christmas cookies before I come home for the holidays. It was always a tradition in my house growing up to make "beautifully" decorated cookies. So I guess now I feel like my kids would not truly be experiencing the Christmas holiday if it wasn't topped off with some yummy cookies. This year after the cookies were all baked and the kids had tasted their handy work we wrapped the rest up and gave them to other people in the school. Jennifer and Marlon really loved getting to go room to room and give away something they had made. It was a great way to start of the Christmas season!

Suitcase Surprise

Today at about 4:00 I decided that I should probably start packing since I have to leave in the morning. Well, Diasira and Jhoselyn came over for the event, and to help me. OK OK mostly they came over because I told them that I had caramel brownies. Jhoselyn was a big help with packing though, and 'D' helped a lot with Christmas decorations. They came into my room and being the fun person she is 'D' climbed into my suitcase right away and told me that she was ready. Well, Jhoselyn zipped up the suitcase and started rolling the bag to the living room. I called to my roommate Jennifer to tell me if she thought the suitcase weighed too much or not. Jennifer lifted the bag up and said "yeah, I think that it weighs too much...at least 70 pounds." I said "Really?" I knew 'D' was in there and even though she is small I knew that it had to weigh a lot more than 70 pounds. I was like "what should I do?" Jen then went to get her scale saying that she could be wrong. Well her scale is in KG, so we figured out how much I weighed then I stood on the scale with the bag that I could barely lift and then Jen did all the math...her mouth dropped and she exclaimed, "This bag weighs 110 pounds!!!!" I replied "well, can you help me decided what to take out?" We unzipped the bad and 'D' jumped out and screamed. Everyone jumped and started laughing hysterically. It was so funny. Diasira was please with herself and the laughter she caused.

Tractor Fun

One night I coerced Mr. William, one of the men that oversees construction at the Ranch, to let me drive one of the big construction tractors. I had been wanting to drive it for a long time, and just waiting for the right moment to ask. Being the nice man Mr. William is, he let me. I was so excited! He gave me a little run down on how it works, then he let me drive it around this little circle. I took it around a tree and I was surprised how well it handles. He also let me back it up and lift and drop the buckets. After I was done Tammy, the Ranch nurse and good friend, asked if she could drive it. I think that she got to drive it further, maybe she is Mr. William's favorite. Tammy and I both agreed that it made for an exciting night and something to do on an otherwise uneventful night. It was really fun and I hope that I get to do it again.

Classic Shots

It has been a while since I've written a blog. My excuse is that we have had little to no internet over the last three weeks. Things in Honduras have been going well. We are wrapping school up for this semester. It has just flown by! Days seem to go at a normal speed, but months go by in the speed of a week. My kids are keeping me on my toes while I'm trying to keep them on their bottoms. Marlon is my little kangaroo, monkey and parrot all wrapped into one. He jumps around all the time, has more than a healthy amount of curiosity (as in can't keep his hands out of EVERYTHING) and on top of that repeats EVERYTHING that I say. While it can be very frustrating I have fun with it sometime. It's fun to make little random sound and hear him imitate it. Also, it's a great self-esteem boost...all I have to do is say "your beautiful" and Marlon says "Your beautiful." It's great. Outside of school there's not that much going on. I'm working on a dance with some of the girls here. They are doing very well with it and seem to really be enjoying it...despite the fact that they say they don't like ballet:) We have been playing a lot of soccer like always, but besides that there have been quite a few game of American Football, and Baseball being played. Some of the boys have started running in the mornings, which has been fun. I just have to say that I finished first today...not that I care or anything. We had a cold front come through last week and it was FREEZING! It was in the high 50 several days last week. The sun decided to come back out this week and it has warmed up some, but left most of us with colds. Being a preschool teacher I just love when my kids have colds and walk around all day with runny noses, and sneeze all over me. Anyways life has been fun like always and I will try to put some more detailed blogs up later this week. I hope yall are all just pluggin away and loving life. I would love to hear from all of you, so please drop me a note!

Flour child?

One week for preschool everyday we focused on a different texture. We played with rice, shaving cream, water, sand and flour. The preschoolers sat down and played with whatever that days texture was for about an hour. ONE HOUR! They really seemed to love this I have never seen them quite so focused. I think that of all the different textures the four was their favorite. Maybe really it was just my favorite because they really seemed to like them all. I really liked the flour just because they looked so cute coated in the white powder. Plus I have always liked playing with flour myself because I think that it's cool how it kind of holds the shape of whatever you press into it. I remember when I was younger helping my grandmother cook. Whenever I would get out her four jar and scoop flour out I would press my spoon into the sided of the flour to make an imprint that reminded me of an egg. It was very entertaining. I was glad to see that I'm not the only one that can be entertained by flour. When the kids were playing with the flour we got out some of the "cooking toys" and let them fill those and "cook." Jennifer continued to pack the flour into a dish then flip it over and say it was a cake, Marlon would respond by knocking it down. I think that he was satisfied every time to hear scream. It was a fun week playing with all the textures, learning how the different one feel, shape, pour, move, and how quickly one is able to get his or her neighbor dirty or wet!

I'm very happy!

You might be wondering why I'm so happy on this obscure Tuesday. I woke up today and it was bright and sunny outside. For most people that might not mean that much, but to me it meant everything. It was the second morning in a row that I woke up without rain! Hallelujah!!! When I sat down to write this blog it seemed like it had been even more days than just yesterday without rain. I'm sitting in detention right now with two other teacher and asked them, "has it been 5 days without rain?" They kind of laughed at me and said "no." So I asked them, "but it didn't rain yesterday?" "Correct." I didn't think that it rained Sunday, but apparently it did. Although, I didn't think that it rained on Saturday, I was quickly reminded that it poured bucks for a couple of hours...You might wonder how I could forget it raining bucks for hours, but if you lived here I think that you would understand. That kind of rain is not out of the ordinary. Anyways, we have had some sun this last week which was SO needed. Our poor dirt road is just washing away. Most everyday here recently we have had to go pull someone out of the mud. Mr. Ed has worked very hard to keep the road in some kind of shape. Rain, or no rain I have been thankful for even the small amount of sun that we have had, it has helped dry out the road a little. Also the creeks have gone down a lot and don't pose near the threat that they did there for awhile. There have been many days in the last month or two when we have questioned weather or not it was a good idea to travel down the VERY muddy mountain. As I walk out to feed my dog or go really anywhere I can hear the ground squishing beneath me. I never go through the grass without changing first, because I will have mud splattered on me when I come out. On Sunday I went out to watch the boys play soccer, my friend Tammy joined me. We hadn't been there long when she let out and exasperated sigh and pointed at her dirty pants. She said she could not believe that they were dirty already. Apparently she had washed them right before coming to the soccer field. I looked at her mud splattered pants and felt her pain. It's hard to keep your house and clothes clean when everything around you is wet and muddy. I'm thankful though for my nice DRY house with a good tin roof on it, for my sturdy walls that can withstand the rain. So many people on the mountain have houses made with mud bricks or wood with holes in it. Often times the roofs have holes in the tin and so many live on dirt floors. I'm blessed with where I live. Well, here comes the rain again. The dark clouds quickly fill the once beautiful blue skies and the the rain beats against the roof like it's angry at something, it's pounding makes it hard to hear the people in the same room as you. Hopefully it will pass as quickly as it came. Either way I'm so thankful that the sun was shining bright and hot most of the day today. It brought a smile to my face!

Memories from long ago...

It's funny to me what brings back memories. It's like finding a buried treasure when your trying to plant something. Your going along trying to create something new, and low and behold you come across something that you had forgotten about. Tonight I found myself in my childhood. I was in my house with Tammy cutting up potatoes for French fries when surprise surprise the power went out. At first it was just annoying, me and Tammy just took a big sigh and said there goes the power again. It's truly the worst when you are trying to cook. The ranch does have a generator for back up, but they decided not to turn it on for a while, hoping that the power would come back, so that they wouldn't have to spend the money to run the generator. I was making the French fries for one of the boy's houses close to the soccer field. They were having hamburger and it was my contribution to bring the fries. So, in the dusk I took my already cut potatoes and cooking oil up to their house to get them started. Since we have gas stoves I wasn't hindered from getting them cooking, just hindered from being able to see very well. We had one small candle burning, so it was pretty dark. Since it was so dark most of the houses just lingered outside waiting to be able to get dinner going once the lights came back. So, as the fries fried I went outside to hang out with everyone. It reminded me so much my childhood summers. No one in any kind of hurry to get inside, dinner could always wait a little longer. As long as there was still a soft light to see what was going on then people (or at least me and my siblings) would stay out to get a little more fresh air. I remember coming home late from swimming and riding bikes and my mom making some kind of comment about how late we were sitting down to dinner. I think maybe she felt like a bad mom for getting dinner on the table late, but really I loved when we would stay out late playing and eating later into the night. It also reminded me of going outside after dark during the summers to play flash light tag. I'm sure me and Joseph weren't really out that late but I remember feeling like we played half the night away. I miss those childhood summer nights. All of those memories came rushing back at me like it happened yesterday, as I stood outside in the crisp air and watched kids running around yelling at each other in Spanish and laughing, and as the teenagers stood around talking and enjoying getting an extra 30 minutes outside just to hang out. When the lights finally did come back on everyone slowly made their way back to their houses to get dinner going. I got to enjoy some homemade hamburger off the grill and some really good fries. The American style meal only served to keep me in my childhood memories longer, I savored all the memories that quickly rushed toward me on this beautiful evening.

Boys, Balloons, and Birthdays

Today is Junior's birthday! We celebrated Junior's birthday at his house. His house parents got a Piñata and the kids had a blast trying to hit the moving man full of candy. They were thrilled when they beat that little man to death and his insides started spilling out. Sergio, Juniors house dad, had also bought some of those long balloons that clowns have to make things out of, like little animals, swords ect. Sergio made a sad attempt to make something..anything, but it wasn't really working out. I knew how to make a few things just from watching people do it over the years, so, I started making little dogs, then a flower, but the big hit was when I made a sword, then EVERYONE wanted a sword. While the kids ran around and laughed I "mass produced" balloon swords. The sad part was Junior's family recently got a puppy, and the puppy popped the balloons as fast as I could make them! Junior also had a cake. First, he blew out the candles and added a nice layer of spit to the top of the cake. Then, as tradition goes, stuck his face in the cake for the first bite. By the time Junior was done with his part I highly doubt it was sanitary, but it was still really good. Junior is such a sweet little boy, and I'm so glad that I have been able to celebrate his past two birthdays with him.

Patterns of life

Being a preschool teacher I encounter lots of interesting things along the way. The kids are always coming up with funny things to say and do. One that got me laughing really hard lately was with Jennifer (4.) I was trying to teach my kids about patterns and getting them to follow some simple patterns made out of some pattern blocks we have in the preschool. I was working mainly with Jennifer, we had a pattern all laid out...blue, green, blue, green, blue, green. I told Jennifer to keep adding to the pattern. I turned around to help Marlon with his pattern when I heard Jennifer's cute little girl voice saying "Mi Jetti (That means Miss Jessi, in 4 year old lingo) Mi Jetti- Where are the blue? Dey (they are) gone!" Jennifer, my mischievous little girl, had taken all the blues out of the pattern and hidden them under the table! At a very rapid rate I might add. My hands flew to my mouth and I exclaimed "Oh my! What happened to all the blues?" This produced a very large smile. You know the kind I'm talking about... the kind of smile that say "yes, I got just what I wanted." I continued on..."Someone must have eaten them! Who do you think ate them?" She quickly pointed to Marlon "Jea she eat dem..it dwas him" (Yeah, he ate them, it was him.) She giggled as I asked Marlon if he ate the blue pattern blocks. Marlon just smiled oblivious to what I as saying since we were speaking in English...were still working on that. It was a funny moment, one that brightened my day and kept the hop in my step!

Toilet paper

I don't think many people would understand the joy I find when I walk into a bathroom and there is toilet paper in every stall! Here in Honduras it more common to find one roll of toilet paper mounted on the wall when you walk into a bathroom, than to find toilet paper in the individual stalls. When you come into a public bathroom you have to look for where the toilet paper is mounted. If you are lucky enough to find toilet paper in the bathroom, you have to grab the "appropriate" amount before proceeding on to use the bathroom. The bathrooms are often dirty and squatting verses sitting is never a bad idea. Also, in Honduras you do not flush your toilet paper, so in the stall there is a large trash can to put the toilet paper. I was ecstatic the other day when I entered a public bathroom and not only found it to be delightfully clean, but found rolls of toilet paper in each stall. I walked out of the bathroom feeling refreshed and cheerful, all on the account of having my very own roll of toilet paper in the stall with me!

Recess!

Here are some pictures snapped at a recent recess. I hope you enjoy the picture as much as the kids enjoyed being outside on this beautiful day!

One Rainy Day...

Theses pictures pretty much speak for themselves! Right now Honduras is in rainy season and we have had plenty of rain. One day this week we had a HUGE downpour. The kind that just invites you outside, because it wasn't a storm, simply buckets of water being poured from the sky. Since we have already had so much rain the water just sat on top of the ground making great puddles. Some of the girls and me decided to make a play day out of it. We came to the top of a slippery hill and enjoyed sliding down it on our stomaches and bottoms. It was a messy delight. Our smiles shone enough for the sun that rainy afternoon.

Show me the Love

I often feel that more than anything people want to love and be loved. I can't think of a single person who has said to me, "Jessi, I just don't want to be loved" or "I don't want people to like me." It's just not part of our nature. We want to feel cared about, loved for, and appreciated. It's also natural that we show those things to other people in return. I think often we are even afraid of not being loved...or being alone in the world. It doesn't matter how much someone has, if they don't feel loved they will feel worthless. Recently, I read the book "The Love Languages of God" By Gary Chapman, the same author who wrote "The Five Love Languages." I would recommend the book to anyone. In his book "The Love Languages of God" Gary Chapman talks about how we all give and receive love in different ways. We feel the most loved when we are spoken to in our own love language. That seems natural, right? Well, he continues on to say that God knows our love language and that he speaks to us most clearly through our own love language. I enjoyed his book and felt that it was very insightful, but I didn't feel like it really impacted my life. At least not right away. It wasn't until this week that something from his book really sank in. In his book he explains that there are five main ways people give and receive love: through gifts, physical touch, quality time, acts of service and words of affirmation. One of the five love languages speaks to you most deeply, but it is different from person to person. For me I'm definitely quality time. Anyways, I was praying on my steps outside earlier this week, and I started thinking about the verse in Jeremiah where God is talking to Israel and in Jeremiah 31:3b He says "...I have loved you with an everlasting love;.." I love that! We are loved with an everlasting love. All the way to my core I believe that. I started thinking about that...why was it that I never question God's love for me? I question people's love for me often enough. Something from Mr. Chapman's book came back to me, God speaks to us in our love language. I feel most loved when someone spends time with me. Well, God is omnipresent, He is always there. I never question if God loves me because He is always there to spend time with me. I don't have to call Him to decide where we are going to meet up, or when. He never calls me to cancel an appointment. He wants to spend time with me. He is always available. He is able to show me a love that no one in the world will ever be able to show me. That is why God's love is so much stronger than a human love. It surpasses time, depth, height, length, and width. There is nowhere that God's love cannot reach. What a comfort! If quality time is not your love language, don't lose heart, God speaks all the love languages fluently! What a great God we serve.

The Tongue Stage

I'm sure anyone who has kids or has worked with kids a lot can identify the tongue stage. This is the stage where kids concentrate so hard that their tongue comes just outside of there mouth and usually scoots over to the side. Often times the mouth hang open slightly as they work. Oh, and "The tongue stage" is definitely the technical term. Anyhow, my preschoolers are 100% at this stage right now. I love to come up with task that cause their tongues to come out because I think that it's so cute. As I pull a pair of scissors out for them to practice cutting, I'm over come with giddy anticipation. Their fingers slip through the finger holes and automatically their tongues stick out. It only becomes more dramatic as they try to cut on a straight line. They are so cute and I feel privileged to get to work with them.

School makes me tired!

We are well into our 3rd week of school at Ebenezer Academy. All is going well, I'm starting to work through the adjustment of having new kids in the class. I have my preschool class in the mornings from 8:20-12:00 just like last year. I currently have 3 students, Jennifer (4,) Cristian (3,) and Marlon (3.) They are a delight. In the afternoons I have an assortment of class, P.E., home ec., English as a second language, and reading time with the kindergarten. Today my last class was reading, after which I had a planning time. As I was reading today one of my students got droopy eyed and fell asleep. He leaned his head on my shoulder and took a little nap. As time went on I started to feel a little sleepy too. I stayed past time to read, while the kindergarten teacher was working with a student one on one. Enmanuel started looking at books and I got cozy with Junior curled up next to me. Before I knew it I had dozed off. Apparently, the other teachers were laughing at me, and took a picture. I woke up to Junior poking me asking why I didn't read to him. I explained that he had slept through the stories...he didn't believe me and wanted me to read to him. I didn't get much planning done this afternoon, but I read some pretty awesome books and got a little nap time.

Road Trip!

Last Monday-Wednesday me and 5 others from the Ranch took a little road trip to Copan. It was 4 single adults (Tammy, Sara, Steve, and myself) and 2 boys from the Ranch (Brayan and Obed.) Copan is 7 miles from the Guatemala boarder. It is also the town that hold the Maya ruins. It was a great three days and was awesome to have the chance to visit other parts of Honduras.

Lake Yajoa

On the way to Copan we took a short pit stop at Lake Yajoa. Lake Yajoa is the largest lake in Honduras. We had time to stretch our legs and enjoy the scenery. Across from Lake Yajoa is a little rest area with a HUGE tree house and a playground. We climbed the tree house and had an awesome view from up there. I finally convinced Sara and Brayan to play on the teeter-toter with me. It was fun!




Copan

So we got to Copan after a 7 hour car ride. The ride didn't take to long and it was really gorgeous view. We stayed in a cute little town nestled in the mountains. Our hotel had a pool and we were able to swim and play tag in the pool at night. We ate at a local restaurant that served Mexican food. It was the best meal I have had since Christmas. It had great service and fantastic food. We also got to shop around the town.


Waterfall

Shortly after arriving in Copan we set out for more adventures. We heard that there was a waterfall close by, so we set out to find it. We drove around a little and felt kind of lost but finally came to the path that lead to the waterfall. We hiked down the mountain a little and came to a "bridge" we had to cross it to get to the falls. It looked pretty old and shaky but we made it across alive. The falls were really pretty and covered by a canopy of trees. I was fun because the water was really deep by the falls and we could swim. We also found a really cool spider. Brayan, Obed, and myself also climbed a really cool tree.




The Ruins

On Tuesday morning we started out to see the Maya ruins. We had a tour guide and she was able to tells us about what the different statues and stuff represented. It was a really cool experience, and I felt like it was something not many people could say they've done. In a lot of ways the ruins reminded me of Egypt. They had all kinds of cool statues, buildings, houses and tunnels there. The tunnels were under or in the structures and often time a burial place. Everything there was carved in such intricate detail. Our guide told us that everything use to be colored but over time all the color faded out of the stone. On a few things you could still see the color. It was very beautiful and I enjoyed seeing everything.




Horseback Ride

After the ruins we all took a 3 hour horse ride up into the mountains. I was really fun because we were allowed to run them or do whatever, which was really cool. I love to ride horses. It was a really fun experience to have in Honduras. Our whole trip was a blast, and I'm so glad I went.

Swimming with Spiders

This beauty was part of the scenery that captured our attention as we swam in Copan. We saw the spider near the bottom of a waterfall we visited. The spider was bigger than my hand, making it the largest spider I've seen up close. While I don't know what type of spider it is we all agreed that is had to be some kind of poisonous spider. It may be something in the tarantula family but was much skinnier than the other tarantulas I've seen in Honduras. Your guess is as good as mine.

South Beach

Last Friday I went to the south coast of Honduras with a bus load of people from the Ranch. We had a sewing team at the Ranch and the team treated all the kids that completed their sewing projects to a day to the beach! It was a really great idea and we all had a lot of fun. It took us about 4 hours to get to the beach. We spent the afternoon swimming in the ocean and catching the rays. I think that it goes without saying that the boys brought a soccer ball and played soccer on the beach. We also brought a frisbee, and others enjoyed a game of frisbee with sand between their toes. While the south coast doesn't compare with the north coast (the islands) it was still really pretty. One thing that I really liked about the beach we went to was that there were large trees right on the shore. The beach had these gigantic trees just sitting right there, the trees were dressed with hammocks, making for a very relaxing resting place. When you looked to the sky you were graced with a beautiful canopy of leafs. I think there is something so romantic about big old trees. We returned to the ranch last that night. It was a really fun day. It was great to get off the Ranch for the day and enjoy the kids with different scenery.