One child at a time

We are really excited to report that over the holidays over $2,400 came into our scholarship fund from family, friends, coworkers and people we have never met. There is more on the way too and this year is looking like a good year to send some kids to school. Right now we have 14 children ranging from 5 to 17 enrolled in our program. It has been difficult to cooridinate all the things that they need to get started in school. The school system in Guatemala is not nearly as organized as we are used to at home. Often times it has involved Corby or I making late night trips to the store to buy materials for the next day. A full scholarship includes yearly tuition, all the school supplies for the year, uniforms and shoes. We will also be supporting them in their yearly activites that require money to participate in.



Our efforts to choose students were mostly placed on kids that were not planning on going to school this year for reasons they could not control. A large percentage of them do not have fathers and their mothers do not work outside the house. It is nearly imposible to come up with money to live, let alone go to school. Each day we learn that the need is endless. We literally have had a line of people at our door nightly asking us for help. We hope that we can make a difference with this money and begin to stop the cycle of poverty that exists. Through education this can be done.



We now see some of the kids running to school to get there early. The enormous sense of self-confidence and pride they have in carrying a backpack, wearing new shoes or having the school supplies that are requested is amazing. We only wish that all of you that gave could be here to see what an impact you have made. Thank you for your generousity. We will continue to update about the program.

A brief...or not so brief update

A flood in our office at the end of November has taken us out of communication with the outside world until now. We finally have our internet back up and running and are excited to report all of our activities over the last 2 months.
Thanksgiving found us in the city awaiting the arrival of Kari's sister and her boyfriend. Our first visitors from the states! We did a jam packed tour of Guatemala with Katie and Kristoff, which included a couple days in Salacuim, a visit to Semuc Champey, Lake Atitlan, Antigua and the longest zipline in Central America. We were really grateful to be able to spend time with the two of them, especially around the holidays.





The beginning of December started off with us celebrating our 29th birthdays in Guatemala, as well as taking a road trip to Livingston and Tikal with our office before everyone left for Christmas vacation. With Christmas quickly approaching we headed to Antigua and spent Christmas Eve with our host family in Santo Tomas. We took part in their traditional celebration of mass at 11pm and dinner at midnight. The family of 40 stayed up until 5am celebrating. We were glad to have people that we consider good friends to spend the holidays with.



A couple days after Christmas we were fortunate to have our friends Tim and Julie pay us a visit as well. We took off for Honduras for a 5 day trip to the Bay Islands, where we enjoyed island life and New Years Eve on Utila. We ended our trip with a few days in Guatemala and enough time to take in Antigua, the market in Chichicastenango and a trip to Panajachel on Lake Atitlan.



The last couple months have been full of travel and time with family and friends, which we are so grateful for. It really is an amazing experience to have people come and see what we've been up to for the last year. The newly uploaded pictures say it all.