Joe and I foam hats at the Thanksgiving party. It was a lot of fun with good food.
Beautiful ruins
A statue at the Jesuit Ruins
Ruins
Amazing stone work
I'm a saint
We could go to the top of this building and look at the full view of the ruins.
We had a great time at Thanksgiving, though we would have loved to be at home eating delicious food with family. We went to party with most of the other Peace Corps volunteers in Paraguay. We got turkey, mashed potatoes, and Joe got pumpkin pie. It was a great time with volunteers. We did something I didn't think I would do on Thanksgiving, we swam a ton and got sunburnt. It is so cold at home you couldn't swim at Thanksgiving. The hotel was great, there was 3 swimming pools, one pool with a high diving board. While at the hotel we went to see Jesuit ruins. It was beautiful to see some of the history of Paraguay. Then we went to visit a friend who lives close to the ruins. We had fun but missed our families.
Now we are going to have some summer day camps with the kids and count down the days until Chile.
Thank you Aunt Barb and her women's group, we got all the school supplies and will be taking some pictures of the kids. Also thank you Aunt Nancy for the supplies and candy. We really appreciate all your packages, love, and support.
We miss you all and are very thankful for you all!
Joe and a giant ant hill. Luckily these are not close to our house.
A flooded field after it rained, the sky is beautiful in the water.
Enjoying yummy Iowa sweet corn and mashed potatoes. Thanks for the seeds Heits.
Joe, the naturally cowboy
Joe and I riding horse.
We are back in Asuncion and you know what that means....more pictures! We have been trying to take a lot of pictures. Its not too easy right now because there is not much going on. Time has gone by fast, it is almost December...we have been here for almost a year. We have learned and grown a lot, this experience has definately helped us grow and mature in our marriage. We are together all the time and we will never be together this much the rest of our life. We both really enjoy the time together.
We are om Asuncion and Friday we are going to leave to go south in Paraguay. There is a volunteer Thanksgiving party, there are a lot of activities planned, a pool, and some good food. We might go see the ancient ruins so maybe we will have more pictures later. The pool will especially be nice, it was about 100 degrees today. It will be crazy to be sweating buckets during Christmas when at home there will be snow.
I don't have much else to add in words but I will add some pictures.
I apologize for not blogging for a long time. Joe and I have not had much time for the Internet. When we come into town we have to print off photos for people in the community, buy food, and run other errands. Today we came in for a full day to relax while running errands and send home some Christmas gifts. We have been doing pretty well, trying to stay busy because it is a boring time now. The kids are having tests at school and then they go home so there is not much for us to do at the school. I was really sick with stomach pains this week and today I am starting to finally feel better. I wanted a nice fluffy couch, cable tv, and some ice cream. Luckily it was cooler this week and a lot of rain so I didn´t feel too bad laying around doing nothing.
Joe is getting a community group started and we are trying to get some money from the government to build brick ovens so they don´t have to cook on the ground. Soon summer vacation will start and we plan on having day camps, going to Chile, and opening the library to help kids with reading. There is not much else to blog. We will add pictures in a couple of weeks when we go to Asuncion.
I also wanted to say how proud we are of Toni, my little sister. She just graduated from Air Force boot camp in Texas. We wish we could be there but we are definately thinking and praying for her. We love you Toni and couldn´t be more prouder! You finished boot camp and have a great trek ahead of you.
Every grade had a queen, this is Raquel the queen of 3rd grade.
Joe and our neighbor boy, Brian. He likes to come over and play soccer and we taught him frisbee.
Adorable Kindergarteners in the traditional Paraguayan dress.
Me with some 7th graders, aren't they so cute?
Kids dancing.
Here are some pictures of the kids at a school program that they called the Olympics. I took pictures, sold them for a little more, and am using the money to buy books for the school. We are really excited to get more books for the kids!
Its has been a while since blogged.We have been busy and haven't had much time to get to town to use the Internet, when there is time we are busy trying to email family and catch up on how the Twins were doing. Sadly their run for the World Series ended, Joe and I thought maybe we were bad luck at home since they were doing so well while we are gone. Speaking of while we are gone we have been away from home for almost 9 months. We have been in our community for 6 months, we are a fourth of the way done. Time is going fast but yet we have a lot of work to get done. The school year will be over at the end of November. We will be spending the summer having camps with the kids, going on vacation, opening the Support Room about twice a week for the kids to come read, maybe making a world map on a wall at the school, and probably drinking a lot of water in the shade. November-February are pretty hot months here so I am sure we will not be moving around too much in the afternoon. Joe is trying to get together a group of people in the community to form a commission and try to get some brick ovens built. A lot of people cook over a wood fire on the floor. We are going to try to build some of the brick oven/stoves in the summer time as well. Its sounds like we will be keeping busy, which is good because if you know me you know I don't like to sit around on my bum too long.
Here is a link to the the video of our school we work at. Those of you that know Spanish please excuse the bad spanish speaking. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujEB_Ao_Wmk
Joe watering our garden, it looks pretty nice. Though the corn blows over when it is too windy.
Joe reading on the porch, it was cold and rainy that day.
Happily knitting.
When Joe and I are not busy working at the schools, visiting people in the community, washing clothes by hand, or working on the garden or our large yard we have a lot of down time. We have been doing pretty good on filling the down time without being bored. We don’t have a television or internet, most people have a television but we don’t want to buy one and all the programs would be in Spanish (A lot of times they play American movies with voice overs in Spanish). We brought our computer and looked into getting Internet but we would have to get a 20 foot tower on our lawn which includes a lot of wires, we decided it wasn’t worth it. I have taken up knitting, two teachers at the school taught me how to knit and I really enjoy it. I am working hard on Christmas presents right now. After that the teachers said I am going to learn to crochete. Besides knitting I have been reading or working on materials for our Support Room. Joe has been reading a lot, I think he has read about 20 books so far and shows no sign of stopping. There is a great Peace Corps library at the office. Besides reading Joe has mastered the card games on the computer….Solitaire, Spider Solitaire, and Free Cell….also he has become a professional at pinball. We are glad to have brought our computer, there is a big market of bootleg movies and we are lucky to find some in English with Spanish subtitles.Joe and I have begun running as well, we thought now would be a good time to start our healthy lifestyle, we need to get rid of that Pizza Ranch and post wedding weight. We have also enjoyed adapted to the Paraguayan lifestyle of sitting outside in the shade on the porch. We sit out there talking, watching people pass by, and many times Joe is reading and I am knitting. We sound pretty boring but it helps pass the time when there is not much else to do. We are very lucky to be together, there are many volunteers alone. I can’t imagine being here alone; I think I would go crazy. Joe and I spend a lot of time together which is great, I am sure we will never get this opportunity to spend so much time together again.
We have been doing well. The Support Room is helping many students improve their reading and giving them time to get their hands on a book. School is starting to wind down. In November the students will start testing and classes will end around Thanksgiving. It looks like we will be doing more reading and knitting in December, January, and February. During summer vacation we are going to try to have summer camps with the kids, open the Support Room two or three times a week, and go on vacation to Chile. We decided we wanted to go somewhere for our 2 year anniversary and New Years. We are planning a trip to Chile with two other volunteers and cannot wait to go. There are not many details right now, we are trying to book plane tickets and find lodging.
Thank you everyone for the updating emails! We really appreciate them.We miss you all and are praying that everyone is safe and doing well. We have been keeping Toni especially in our prayers as she is in training with the Air Force, we couldn’t be more proud.Also Happy early Birthday Lane! I can’t believe my favorite nephew is going to be 2 and I will miss out! Don’t worry I’ll be there for the 4th birthday!
Thanks Heitritters for the Twins updates! Joe is was sitting on pins and needles last night (Tuesday) when they went into 12 innings with the Tigers.
We needed to come into the capital, Asuncion to get packages sent from my grandma and from Aunt Sandee and Uncle Doug. We loved the children's books, crayons, and Skittles (which only lasted 2 days). The kids love the books. We decided that we would come in to get the packages while Paraguay soccer team was playing Argentina. It was a great game. Paraguay won 1-0. This game was important because if they won they would go to the World Cup. The Paraguayans went crazy, there wasn't school the next day. That was last week Wednesday, Septemember 9.
Now we are in Asuncion again, we had meetings with our Peace Corps bosses. We have to come and talk with them every 3 months to talk about what we have done and what we plan to do. It went great and we got more ideas for projects.
Not too much else going on in site. We are working in the Support Room with reading. Joe is coming twice a week to help with the older kids. I am enjoying my time working one-on-one wit the kids and hoping to help improve their reading. We still have a lot of work to do but I am glad to have some work started.
I can't believe my little sister, Toni has started basic training with the Air Force. We are both so proud of her and praying for her.
We finally figured out the problem with the memory card on our camera. It had a virus and we would lose all our pictures. We bought a new card and now have been taking lots of pictures. Here are some pictures of what we have been up to lately.
1st graders after washing their hands, these kids bring a smile to my heart!
Kindergarteners and Preschoolers showing their clean hands.
Joe showing the kids how to was their hands with the bottle washing station we made. They loved it!
Our very own garden that Joe worked very hard on. We even put up a fence to keep all the chickens out. We have Iowa sweet corn (Thank you Heits), watermelon, tomatoes, green peppers, onions, and carrots. We can´t wait to eat our veggies.
The school garden, a little bigger than ours and ready to enjoy!
It feels like summer here though it is still winter, we can´t imagine how hot we are going to be in the middle of summer here. We have been busy and hardly have much time to relax. We have even started waking up at 5:30 in the MORNING to get in a run before we are too tired and it is too hot. We enjoy getting in some exercise. I have been working almost every day in the Support Room. I have about 5 students in the morning and 25 in the afternoon. The kids range from 1st to 5th grade. It is amazing how little the children get read to and how many books are in the school library. Most don´t have books at their house, that amazes me....especially since the Heits have their own home library. There are so many kids in the afternoon that Joe comes in to help me. It is a great project for us to do together. The kids seems to enjoy working with us too. I work one-on-one with the kids, most of them just need practice reading. I will try to take some pictures or maybe a video of my classroom, but it is not ready yet...I am still making things for the walls. Joe has been working on health issues in the schoools. Every Wednesday he comes with flouride for the kids to have healthier teeth. We are also going to the other school in the community and working with nutrition and hand washing. We are going to have some volunteers visiting us this weekend. It is another married couple, he is in health and she is in education. They are from Indiana and we really enjoy spending time with them. It will be great showing people around our community. Thanks for all the updates. We really enjoy them! We love you and miss you all!
Beautiful ruins
A statue at the Jesuit Ruins
Ruins
Amazing stone work
I'm a saint 
We could go to the top of this building and look at the full view of the ruins.
