One last glamor shot

I thought this picture was way too adorable not to put up. This is Transito and she kind of came out of the woodwork during the second half of the summer. We rarely saw her the first month or so but we spent quite a bit of time with her near the end. This photo doesn't quite do her cuteness justice because you can't tell that she is only about 4'6". Isn't she sweet?

Happy Birthday Harry!

Just as any true Harry Potter fan would do, we celebrated July 31st at the Hogar by having a birthday party for Harry. We started off by sorting the kids into houses. We brought them up one at a time and another volunteer, hiding under the table of course, acted as the hat and decided where they belonged. That was the funniest part of the evening in my opinion. Here is Martiza who was lucky enough to get put in Gryffindor.

We then dressed up by making silly pipe cleaner glasses, drawing lightening scars on their foreheads, and giving them all chopsticks as wands. Carlitos Alonso was the absolute cutest one in his glasses.

But Roberto would have to be runner-up.

Our friend Marielos, who is the psycholgist at the Hogar, dressed up as Professor Trelawney and told fortunes.

We ended off by having a candy walk and then singing and eating birthday cake.

Carlitos Alonso certainly enjoyed the cake (although I am convinced that almost none made it into his mouth)!

Our quidditch game got ruined because of the dark, so Sam never got to make his appearance as the Golden Snitch. Maybe next time . . .

Sam and Antonia

One thing Sam has really enjoyed doing during our stay here is helping Maria Antonia with her reading. She goes to the community school but is very behind her classmates. The adminstration asked Sam to read with her one-on-one for practice, and they have done it together almost every morning for thirty minutes during our three months. Needless to say, she has developed quite the crush on Sam.

Detective Day!

Last week we continued our professions theme for class and started it off by“studying” detectives. We made magnifying glasses and cut out ridiculous paper moustaches as disguises for the kids.

Xiomara looked the funniest.

But I think little Xiomara and Roberto gave her a run for her money.

Then we looked for the puzzle pieces that Sam and I had hidden around the room and when the puzzle was put together, it turned out to be a cryptic note. It said something like, “You need to solve this crime before the class is finished or someone special is going to die.” So we played a life sized game of Clue. We made people from the class be the suspects. The named suspect would come to the front and wield the guessed weapon.

Here is Xiomara looking fierce with her water gun.


It ended up being Roberto with a water balloon.