bananas out the wazoo

Alexia and I made banana bread to give out to a few of the women in Pancho Mateo last night. On our way back into Puerto Plata, we bought 21 bananas (and 3 avocados) for a grand total of $1.88 (60 pesos). Pretty good deal if I do say so myself! The women loved the bread too which was great. One even asked when cooking classes were going to start up! It was a humble, but pleasant end before the Christmas break. One more day of class tomorrow and then it will be a mad house to get everything packed and ready to go before the flight out.

a restful weekend picks right back up to a heavy week

Ok, so I know that it has been a while and I apologize. I think that I might spend some time over Christmas while I am in the states typing up a few stories to post when I have a little bit more time. One thing that I would like to write about at the moment though is how wonderful the past few days have been. Matt, Brad, Halim, Ryan King, and Heather came up for a few days from the Austin Stone, and though our time did not overlap all that much while they were here, Alexia and I got to spend the past couple of days of their trip with them at the beach. We went snorkeling and tossed a football around, listened to people playing the guitar, and slept in an amazing hotel room with air conditioning. It was so wonderful to have familiar faces here in the DR, and it gets me excited that I will be back in Texas very soon! Thank you guys for making this last week before Christmas such a breeze to get through!

On a completely different note, I also wanted to pass on some information that I discovered today. Angel, one of Salvador's younger brothers (Salvador was the child that died not too long ago) was injured this past Saturday. He is 4 years old and can often be found running around Pancho Mateo in nothing but his birthday suit. Today though I found him lying on the hard floor in his house with a cast on his entire right leg. He was thrown from a moto and broke his foot and cut up his leg very badly. His cast covers his leg minus the spot that was cut out so that his bloodly wounds are receiving some air. Cristina spoke to the mom for a little while and said some pretty empowering words (she is so great), but I cannot imagine the pain that she is feeling with so many different things happening to her children.

Ian :)

We just got an updated picture of Ian with his new family in Haiti. He's huge!!!!!!!!!