Hello!

I cannot belive it has only been one week since I was here writing to you. It seems like a month has gone by. It has been a busy week!

First....the PACE order came in.... sort of! Two of my English PACE numbers did not come, and I have kids who have had NO English PACEs all year because I have needed these numbers. The word is that they don´t have any of them at the Bodega in Tegucigalpa....so I dug through old PACEs that had been worked by students, and found a 1013 and a 1014 and took them home and erased everything and used white out on the incorrects and other pen marks, and then we had copies made so now ALL of my 2nd grade students have English! This is wonderful!!!!

I met with the father of one of my students last week. He is a very smart boy, but he works very slowly, he does not like to make any mistakes. And then when he does make a mistake or gets to a page where he thinks he can´t do it he just stops working. And he has not been doing his homework so he is very behind. His father came last week to talk to me because he didn´t understand, he had seen the grades he was getting on his tests....all 100 except for one test....so he thought Miguel was doing great. But he should have 12 PACEs complete and he has only completed 5. His dad calls me now most days after school to check on Miguel. He speaks pretty good English, so we are able to communicate on the phone. And it has made a huge change in his work! Perhaps he just needed some special attention from dad.

I still have two boys who are very behind.... Brian and Anthony. Please pray for these boys and pray for me to have the wisdom to know how to help them, how to motivate them, and how to keep them focused on their work.

I had my first real melt down last week..... It was Wednesday. During the night there was a horrible cat fight going on the top of our house. They kept me awake for hours. Thumping and howling and screetching....and then when I left for school that morning part of the barbed wire from the top of the house was hanging off over the sidewalk. I thought.. . great ' something else I need to take care off. That evening was the day of moving all the furniture and things from Rickie and Lucy´s apt....and also picking up some items from the ministry school that had been given to Annette.... I had a rough morning that day with my kids. When we broke for lunch, Angel came in with Sandra to talk to me about the barbed wire at the house ( he had been there earlier to clean up the back yard). I began crying. Angel was sweet and said he would come over after school and fix it....not to worry about it! I just completely had a meltdown with Sandra. I was feeling so unqualified with my kids. I am responsible for 15 children, resonsible for a year of their life and a year of their education. Am I really capable to teach them? Am I the best teacher for them? I had had several parents tell me that their kids didn´t like having a teacher who didn´t speak Spanish and it had really gotten to my heart. I think a combination of being tired, and the the stress of additional responsibilities with the move and getting my new house cleaned and ready, and knowing we had a missionary coming in a few days and I just broke. Some of the kids saw me crying and ran to the office to say something has happened to Miss Stephanie. Lisette came and we both cried together as I shared my heart with her and Sandra. I pulled myself together and listened to all the encouragement from them.

But in the process many of the kids had seen me crying and knew something had made me terribly sad. The rest of the day kids were coming to me to ask why I was crying. The next day in class almost every one of my 2nd grade students had drawn me a picture or written me a note. One of my students had even brought a little flower for me. It was so sweet of them! They are great kids!

We got the apt moved, and furniture delivered to Annette´s house and my new house, and to the school. I took the boys to eat Pizza afterward then took them all home. I finally got home about 10:00 and collapsed, I was exhausted! But it was done and it all worked out. It was a fun evening with the kids. Two of the girls from school came along to keep me company...or to be around the boys. :) I enjoyed having them with me. I had 7 boys and 2 girls, plus me...and many trips with a loaded truck. The kids were great and a huge help!

We have a new teacher who arrived yesterday. She is 19 years, and currently in college studying to be a nurse. She was homeschooled and graduated early. She began taking college classes when she was 16. She is very sweet and will be a huge help at the school. She loves chemistry and biology, and she is good with math. Oh how we will love her in high school!

This morning I took her to Sandra´s chuch, it is just down the main blvd from our house. I went once while Rickie and Lucy were here and I really enjoyed it. So this morning Alysha had a cultural experience. A hot and sweaty experience! Then we went to eat lunch at La Casita, I showed her around town a little then to the mall to do some email.

Please remember Alysha in your prayers and her family. She is the oldest of 6 childen and is very close with her siblings. Her sister who is two years younger than her really had a hard time with her leaving. She will be here for 6 months. Pray for her and for her family while she is with us in Honduras. We are so happy to have her here and know that God will be able to use her here. But I know how hard it is to be away from your child, and how hard it is to be away from your family.

Please continue to pray for the students at the school, pray for the school, and for the teachers. There are too few teachers and we are all hot and tired and the kids are wound up.

Please continue to pray for Moises in my class. He is really out of control, and Merlynn is having a lot of trouble with him in her spanish class as well.