Anybody got an ark?

So, that tropical storm I was talking about in my last post has come and is on it's way out...however, ANOTHER tropical storm, Nicole, is coming through today! It has been raining absolutely non-stop since last Friday. That makes drying clothes impossible. Actually, it's raining so much and there is such a high threat of landslides and flooding that school got out early today and is cancelled for tomorrow and Thursday. That makes for a great 4 day weekend, although it's raining too much to get out and do anything. The good thing is that I will have time to do all my work for my master's class....it is a little bit more involved than i expected, but the topics we are talking about are SO interesting. Maybe I'll go more in depth in that one day when I have more time. So, keep praying for our little country which is totally waterlogged right now. Thanks!

random happenings

So, today Suzy and I saw our national bird in our neighborhood park:That was such a nice little surprise this morning!


In other news, Monday is gonna be a big day. First of all, Suzy will be 10 months! Whoa! How did that happen so fast? She's at such a fun age though. It's the best when you walk into the room and she starts clapping for you. Who else does that? I mean, my 3rd grade class did that for me once when I walked in with my new haircut- my bangs were practically glued into this awesome wave and it was so impressive that they actually clapped when i walked in! True story.

Also, Monday is a big day because I start my first online class at Fuller Seminary! It is called "Ministry Issues in Gender and Human Sexuality." The fun part is that Kelly McPhail and I will be taking the class together!

In even different news, we would appreciate your prayers for El Salvador: we've had some problems on a nation-wide level recently with increased gang activity/threats...to the point that a couple of weeks ago, there was no public transportation whatsoever for 3 days because of gang threats. That's a big deal in a country that depends on buses. All this has been in response to a new law that makes being part of a gang a crime. Thankfully, nothing really happened other than the fear that was generated amongst the people which in someways is worse than if anything actually happened. We're praying for physical peace, as in the lack of violence, as well as peace in the hearts of salvadorans. Don't worry, gang activity is not something we see personally, but it's something we are aware of.

You can also pray for El Salvador as we are experiencing the effects of Tropical Storm Matthew this weekend. Excessive rains always show the fragility of houses and roads here.

Also, as a country we are all mourning the death of the zoo (and the country's) only elephant, Manyula. She personifies every salvadoran's childhood and everybody has fond memories of her. Really, everybody has been talking about her death as if she were a family member, she is that loved. I even met her one time! She died at the age of 60 years old (55 of those years were lived here at the zoo), and thousands of people went to her funeral. She was buried in her area of the zoo.

Mama

So, even though "mama" was technically Suzy's first word several months back (she said "mama" just minutes before saying "papa" so i win!), she definitely prefers saying "papa" all the time. However, in the past few days, she has started saying "mama" a lot more which of course is music to my ears! We finally got a video of her talking:

1st trip to the lake

Today was Independence day here in El Salvador, so we took our free day and went to the lake! It was Suzy's first time and she loved it.

Get up, stand up...

So, Suzy has decided she loves standing up and walking around (with help, of course). She's always standing up in her crib when we go get her in the morning. We know that she's awake because through the monitor we hear: "Papa, Papa" in her sweet little voice. She knows that Papa gives her her bottle in the mornings, and so she's always saying his name! So precious. And here are some pictures from our trip last weekend to the botanical gardens:

Teacher...and student!

So, I survived my first week of school. This year, I am teaching 7th and 8th grade History, and 8th and 9th grade Spelling. New subjects, new grades. It was a good first week for the most part (except when I covered the board with permanent marker the first class of the first day), but I can tell it's a whole different pace than I'm used to. Hopefully we will all survive and we will all learn something. Here's the obligatory first day of school picture (I look a little tired because it was actually taken after school) and I got Suz to pose with me.
Speaking of Suzy, she just turned 9 months yesterday! That's 3/4 of a year already! Whoa!

As the title hints, this year I will not only be a full-time teacher and mom, but also a student again!! I have been accepted in the Masters of Intercultural Studies program at Fuller Seminary and will start my first online class in September. I will be starting slowly to get back into the swing of studying, so I will just start with one class. Thanks Kelly and Brian McPhail for paving the way at Fuller and sharing your infectious excitement about studying there!!

I'm excited about going back to school, but nervous about having enough time and energy. So, I sure am glad we found a neighbor that sells charamuscas for 25 cents down the road....they are basically fresh fruit popsicles, but instead of actually being a popsicle, it's just frozen in a plastic bag.You just bite the corner off of the bag (a skill you MUST learn if you ever live in central america) and suck on it for a fresh fruity goodness pick-me-up. Here I am enjoying a fresh pineapple/coconut charamusca and Elvis a carao one- a fruit that smells and tastes like dirty socks. Definitely an acquired taste.

Suz News

We went to Suzy's monthly checkup yesterday, and she is now weighing in at 17 pounds! I can definitely feel it in my arms now when I've held her for a while. She is also 70 centimeters now, which is about 28 inches. She grew almost 2 inches and put on 1.5 pounds just this month! Go girl! It's a big change from being so worried about her weight when she was a new born. She's right on the average line on the growth chart...the first in the Baldwin family tree. =)

She also has cut her first tooth...finally!

I will be posting on more exciting news in the Henriquez Baldwin family soon (no, I'm not pregnant...) but this Monday the kiddos come back to school. This year I will be teaching 7, 8, and 9th grades, History and Spelling for the first time ever. Should be interesting. So, to relax before the first time, I'm going to cash in a gift certificate Rafa and sarah gave me for my bday for a hot rock massage at the salon! Heading there right now...gotta run!

FBC Wallace mission trip

We just finished up a great week with the mission team from First Baptist Wallace, which included Mom and Dad! I was so thankful to get off work for a few days to help translate and lead children's programs with them in a poor community in the country where Wally has started another church.
We started off the week with a church-wide retreat for our church, Ruta 3:16, on Sunday. This is the first time our church has ever been able to have a retreat like this! We focused on preparing yourself for marriage and how to maintain a healthy marriage (for the three married couples in the church!) and setting boundaries, such as purity before marriage. This is such an important yet ignored topic down here! It was an excellent retreat! Here are some pictures:


Then, we spent the next 3 days leading children's programs in the mornings and afternoons and feeding lunch for the kids. It's quite possibly the only meal that had all day. We had a great time playing silly games and singing songs. Mom and Dad and I were in the Bible story station. This is the first time these kids have ever had VBS at their church.


Yesterday, the team led a marriage retreat for 12 pastors and their wives from little tiny communities up in the mountains. These guys have no support whatsoever and I know it was a big treat for them to be blessed in this way. I wasn't able to go to that, so I don't have any pictures, but they said the pastors started off really shy but ended up in tears just because they were so moved that someone had taken time to care for them as they care for so many people.

Here are a couple more pictures of our short time with Mom and Dad...they really only got to see Suzy at dinner time but it was fun nonetheless.


On Thursday we went up to visit pastor Jose Luis and his family, and they have a guy from Honduras living with them for now, helping out with church. That makes 10 mouths to feed at their house now! He is a rapper, so he and dad had a rap contest. They had 5 minutes to each prepare a rap and present it. Here they are...you be the judge of the winner!! (Santos, the guy from Honduras, had Jose Luis's son help him with the breakdancing)

august vacation part 2

Since we were both off work for the past few days, we took a trip to our favorite beach resort. It was the first time just the 3 of us have been out of town together! We had so much fun and as always, Suzy loved the beach and the pool.







I took Suzy to the children's museum here in town on Tuesday with her buddy Joey. Her favorite parts were the butterfly garden and playing the piano =)

August vacation

As of last Friday, I'm on vacation again! The first week of August is a national holiday, and Elvis will be off Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday too. That's the most vacation he's had since he started working! We got a head start on vacation, however, and went to a pool with some of Elvis's family yesterday. Suzy LOVED splashing in the water and did not mind at all getting wet. You'll see in the first picture that Suzy and I have the same bathing suit cover up...you see, there is a lady that makes these and sells them on our street. She's always been a big fan of Suzy. When the Quaker Gap mission team came, they bought tons of dresses from her, and so to thank me for getting her so much business, she made a tiny little dress for Suzy! It's so cute!