Last Saturday morning Morgan was at a 5K run that some of the school kids were running in. I went with Mathew and Jane to Coconut Divers where Mathew is starting to do odd jobs in exchange for free dives. He is 13 and starting his open water certification so I thought I’d go along and maybe dive in the morning since I haven’t yet. I talked to the owner, Gaye, and she stuck me with Mathew so the next 3 Saturdays I’m going to be diving in the Caribbean baby! I’ll be Open Water Certified then which means I can dive anywhere in the world without an instructor. I’m really excited to be doing it. Morgan says he’d rather fish! So Saturday I spent the day underwater and it was glorious. Its absolutely astounding how many little tiny pieces of the ocean that God put there. The tiniest piece of seaweed was actually a pipefish. On the ocean floor clinging to a small stone was a flamingo tongue snail. We saw a big rainbow parrot fish. I remember the book The Rainbow Fish that I loved reading when I was little and the parrot fish reminded me of that book for some reason. We finished the dives around 4 and I went home and slept!

Sunday morning we slept in and listened to Alex&Bethanys wedding. We had an early lunch before we all headed off to Bananarama for the afternoon. It was a beautiful day and the water was clear. Some days its murky because of currents so I always hope when we’re there it will be clear and calm! Morgan and I went snorkeling just off the beach close to where we swim and actually saw a spotted eagle ray that we followed for awhile. They are beautiful. We also saw a four foot long “baby” reef shark! They are very rare to see on the west side of the island. We hadn’t seen either of those things yet so it was really neat to see them so close to where we swim! We met more people at crab races in the evening, lots of Canadians this time.

Tuesday the 13th we had a rough day at school with sad kiddos to hug and lots of science fair preparation. We got home and decided to go on a date and eat sushi. We got to Bambu and found out it was 2 for the price of 1 which we made use of! Wednesday after school we went to Eldons for groceries and made quesadillas for supper because it was too hot to make anything else. Except I made no bake cookies for the little neighbor boys quick because I feel bad for them. Thursday evening we were just home. It’s been more humid than usual I think and between that and science fair prep everyone is tired after school. I saw a cockroach run from under the fridge and we just watched it because maybe it will die in the heat while we watch haha.

Friday was finally science fair!! So much prep and the kids had to memorize the different parts and do their experiments for the judges that walked around. It went really well so Monday the winners will be announced. Grades 1 and 4 hopefully!

Saturday mathew and I went to the dive shop at 8 again to start our second day of diving. Sam had us watch 2 hours of videos and do quizzes before we went to the water to practice skills. Morgan came and had lunch with us and then went to rent a car after lunch. Mathew and I went on our dive in the afternoon. It was terribly windy so visibility was bad in the water and we had a bunch of skills to do on the surface in open water so that was crazy trying to fight the wind and currents and 3 foot waves the whole time. I thought I was going to get seasick but luckily didnt. It was a short dive so we didnt get to swin around and see much. We got back to the shop at 4 and morgan picked us up in the rental car.

This morning morgan and I went to Bean Crazy, this really cool little coffee place, for breakfast. Then we headed out in the car for the East end of the island! We called in Daniel and Sara’s wedding while we drove except when the service was spotty. It’s only a 35 mile long island but the road is dirt and curvy and sometimes wide enough for 5 cars and sometimes your mirrors hit weeds on both sides of the path. It took us about 2 hours to get to the end of the road and it was a neat drive! The farther east you go the less people and the more wild it gets. We stopped at a little tiny place over the water to eat lunch and drove through a couple little villages to look around. After we got home we went swimming in west end and then had supper here. The lady on our yard is raising money to take her baby to the specialist in san pedro sula so she made a bbq lunch and we had valerie buy them for us and put them in the fridge so we had that for supper! Listened into Pincher tonight which I miss dearly all the time. We come home in 13 days!! We are so excited and ready to be back in our house♡ also we are planning to go to Kansas the last week of September with Dillons and hopefully Mom so looking forward to that too! Have a good week!

Last Saturday morning we did laundry and around noon we took Jaz and Mathew and went to Bojangles for lunch. Then we walked to West End and spent the afternoon snorkeling in Half Moon Bay. There is an old submarine sunk there that we swam out to and there used to be a big boat you could swing off of into the water but they took it out now for some reason. We went for gelato later and took the water taxi to Bananarama to drop off the kids with their mom Jane. We ended up swimming there for awhile. Mathew came home with us and we all relaxed the rest of the afternoon. Morgans phone got stolen so that’s unfortunate but he got a temporary replacement here so anyone that needs him can text me for now. We made supper at the house and played games all evening with Mathew. It was so much fun spending the day with the kids!

Sunday morning we went to Megapaca to look for bargains. Valerie dropped us off at eldons on the way home to get groceries and we got back to the compound just in time to get ready and go to the beach with everyone. Spent the day in the water and snorkeled again. Best thing ever. Selling crabs for the crab race is also fun. We like talking to all the people and seeing where they are from. Some evenings it’s slow and sometimes someone will buy $100 worth of crabs. It seems like people realize they have spent $5,000 on a big family vacation so they want to give to feel like they are helping the world somehow so they buy crabs or even give cash. It’s awesome. And since morgan and I are there we can talk to them and let them know the money IS going directly to the kids.

Last Friday, the 2nd, we had a normal day at school. Mostly. So Valerie’s office is the safe place at school where people leave their phones and stuff because her and Miss Jessica are usually right there and they’ve never had a problem with anything getting stolen. (Miss Jessica is the mom of 3 schoolboys and a daughter and also the paid cook/cleaner at school.) Lots of people walk through the office though like other moms, the water guy, Mr. Gary to fix the pipes, etc. So I left my phone in the office Friday annnnnd it got taken. I went to get it after lunch and my case and cards were there but the phone was gone. We had a giant search to see if it was around school and of course it wasn’t. I felt awful because I hadn’t meant for it to be a temptation for anyone and of course Morgans phone had been stolen already so I was pretty bummed. We went home and prayed about it and figured it was already at its new home. For TGIF supper we bought fresh shrimp from the street and made that and garlic bread and Valerie cooked lobster tails. It was so amazing. After jane got off work she stopped in and talked for a while. She is a darling. Anyways she got a call from Miss Jessica so Valerie called her back and Miss Jessica said she had found my phone! So I was excited but didnt want to get my hopes too high.

Saturday morning Valerie and we picked up Miss Jessica and her daughter and got the whole story before driving to the fiscal. Miss Jessica’s daughter had stopped at school and brought a friend and the friend had taken my phone and sold the SD card to one person and the phone to a pawn shop in the Swamp. So Miss Jessica had gone all over talking to people who’d tried to buy the phone but the shop had been asking too much so finally she figured out which shop it was so she went and explained and got my phone back and the SD card. It really was an answered prayer. Since the girl had sold it so fast in the Swamp, it was easy for Miss J to find it. So we went to the fiscal so Valerie could file a police report and we definitely found out how the police here operate. They wanted to confiscate my phone while Valerie filed the report but to get phone back I’d have to bring proof that I had bought the phone! Obviously I didnt do that but Valerie says anything that needs police attention has to be done with bribes or when a non-corrupt officer is working which is rare. This wasn’t a big deal but I cant imagine how frustrating it is for Valerie to deal with the police here when she files against parents beating their kids or rape cases. So we rewarded Miss J by taking her shopping. She is a single mom and her boys all have problems with their legs growing properly. They are amazing kids and have a really long walk to school on their little crippled legs and Miss J is quite poor so we figured groceries would be best! Christian is the youngest and in 4th grade and enough money has been raised by Valerie’s friends that he can now get surgery before he is totally crippled! Very exciting for them! Anyways Miss J told us we can come over and she’ll make us chicken feet and beans in her little shack so that will be so fun.

After the whole fiscal and grocery morning, Valerie dropped Morgan and I off at a resort where we had booked a room to spend Saturday and Sunday nights to celebrate our anniversary abit early. Our room had a nice bed (the one we have now is terrible at best) lovely sea views, a kitchenette, and air conditioning. We turned the AC on and breathed in that cold beautiful air the entire two days. We relaxed in the pool mostly and went snorkeling one afternoon. Theres a VW bus you can snorkel out to that’s 25 feet underwater so we went and checked that out of course haha super cool! We saw a puffer fish and a bunch of squid that look like little rockets and are amazing to watch. We went and got massages one morning and I spent some time getting stuff set back up on my phone. I still am in awe we got it back. God truly answers prayers for the small things.

Monday morning our relaxation came to an end and we caught a collectivo back to school to start another week. We are hitting science fair hard this week. Emily hasn’t been feeling well for a couple days so I have been teaching these 24 adorable children mostly alone. It is so awesome to watch them come to trust Morgan and I and I am so attached to some of them. Teaching them has been a delight but goodness is it different from our schools. It makes me thankful for our private schools! Last night after supper we took a walk out on the beach behind our house and watched locals play football and looked at hermit crabs and watched the sunset. This is the tiniest one so far!

Today after school we went and snorkeled for a couple hours in West Bay and then got baleadas supper from a little street food place. $8 for two meals and two drinks! We saw a lobster today and another puffer fish. I watch for moray eels because they’re disgusting but so far haven’t seen one even though they are rumored to be all over out here. I love how much more comfortable I am in the ocean since we’ve been here. My first time scuba diving 5 years ago or so I was scared and watched for sharks the whole time. Now I dont even think about it and I actually swim down to get closer to the lobster so I can see it better. I’m going to miss the snorkeling the most. My skin has gone through various stages of peeling from being in salt water all the time. It’s disgusting but also weirdly great because I dont get this chance very often to just swim in the Caribbean every day.

So that’s our week! Oh another thing. A HUGE SHOUTOUT to Farwell, Texas, for sending some of their Bible School money here to Charmont School where we are! They sent enough to buy meals for the school for two weeks and the kids were very excited! If anyone else is interested in helping, let me know. These children have so little. Our twins from the street haven’t been to school for 3 days and we dont know why or where they are or how to help so remember us and this little place in your prayers tonite. Thanks♡