Winter Vacation!

As many of you know, summertime in the states means wintertime here in Paraguay. We have been having a wonderful winter here in Hogar GANAR.

Special youth outing to the Expo (Paraguay's annual national fair)

complete with new sunglasses!

In May, we had a team of three interns from the Lee University Intercultural Studies Program join us for a ten-week internship. They returned to the states this month and were a blessing for our children's home during their stay. They did some of the less-glamorous but much-needed work projects of scraping paint and clearing our garden space and led Bible school on the weekends with our children from the home and many children from the school and community. They taught English to young people and adults from the community and taught our children in the home several dramas and dances. They ate meals in the houses with the children and really became a part of the Hogar GANAR family during their stay. They each stretched themselves out of their comfort zone to communicate with and love on the kids and staff in our home. We want to say "Thank you" to Audra, Erica, and Letitia for your time and efforts during your missions internship!

Letitia cheering on the green team in our school's winter field day competition.

Erica getting ready to begin her English class.

Audra teaching the youngest children during the Saturday Bible class.

We also had the visit of a team from Mufreesboro, TN during July. The team included Dana William's (our school's missionary English teacher) brother and sister and three other young people from their church. They did a variety of painting projects, including completely painting our school auditorium, which is now beautiful! They also held a special VBS program for our children in the home during their two-week winter vacation, with daily lessons and some amazing crafts. Their church, The Carpenter's House, rallied together to send a new pair of tennis shoes to every child in the home! This was a wonderful blessing for us and for every child! Thank you, Austin, Ryan, Tarah, Angie, and Ashley!

Tarah, passing out new tennis shoes to Lysandry.

As our two teams overlapped, we took advantage of their visits to take the children to the Zoo. It was great to have so many adults to help keep an eye on all our little ones and we had a wonderful day. It was unseasonably warm and the weather was beautiful! We had a picnic, Pizza Hut lunch in the shade of the trees inside the zoo. There was literally a monkey hanging in the tree over us while we were eating!

A combination of teams serving pizza to the children on our zoo outing.

We have had a full and busy winter! We are so grateful to the two teams that came and donated their time to touch the lives of the children in our homes. Also, a special thanks to Camille and Caroline Hagerman, our resident missionary kids and translators for these mission teams! If you or your church are interested in coming to Paraguay on a mission team or for an internship, please contact us at servingparaguay@gmail.com. To see more pictures of our children in the school and homes and our wintertime events, please visit our Facebook Page or our website.

In front of the Natural History Museum at the Asuncion zoo.