CLUB ESPERANZA HAPPENINGS

  
We want to send a long overdue “Thank You” to Rachael Paris for her work this summer at Club Espernaza!  All the teachers raved about her way with the kids and how she put them in line, which is a huge compliment because some of these kids are crazy!  Praise God, we so appreciated the extra help during your stay here Rachael!  All the kids miss Teacher Raquel and send you their besitos!  And the girls from Havilah send hugs too!

The third level of preschool had a fun little time planting plants in our garden during “Tree Day” in Nicaragua.  It was so sweet, because they all brought little plants from their houses in cans, bags, plastic bottles…it was obvious they had been growing at home…and we planted them together at the club!  Getting your hands dirty is the best way to learn.

We got an excellent upgrade to our main gathering area….Ceiling FANS!!!  Thanks to a group with Austin Samaritans from Austin, TX we got five new fans installed.  The days can be long and hot here and having these fans installed makes it easier for everybody…especially the kiddos!  It was an adventure putting them in amongst all the action of the day…but they are up and running!  The kids all had a great time with the group as well; playing different games, reenacting Bible stories, and just hanging out together…we only lost once sconce off of a fan!!!  It was a blessed time together at the club.

Lacrosse The Nations keeps our ongoing lacrosse program running at the club.  They make due with a small space, but the kids love the game.  I am pretty sure we are the only place in all of Nicaragua that has Lacrosse.  But the way these kids play, I think it will catch on around Managua.  I know they already have a second location going!

I had a little fun with Josue this day as he was having lunch at the feeding program…I was trying to get him to share his lunch with me, he wasn’t having any part of it.  He had that big chunk of meat and gave me a look like “are you kidding me”.  Smart Kid.  Cute Kid.  We continue to feed nearly 300 children every day of the week at Club Espernaza!    Praise Jesus!

We also had visitors from Florida that are part of an organization called Beautiful Feet.  We hunkered down at the Club for the week working on painting the kitchen and some of the outside parts of the wall that were unfinished.  They also took the kids on field trips to the Zoo, Volcano, Ruby Ranch, Soccer…it was such a blast!  One of the leaders from the group always had a crowd around him…he did some of the craziest magic tricks I have ever seen!  As you can imagine, it was fun to watch all of the students trying to figure out what was going on.  I mean really, I have seen magic tricks before, but I had no clue what was happening!  It was much fun!

We recently received a donation that is going to allow us to begin working on some of the much needed construction projects at the Club.  We mentioned some of these recently when we made our last payment on purchasing the Club land.  Well we are off to a great start.  We replaced the fixed glass windows in the main area with windows that actually open!  It is glorious and with the new fans it is a much better environment to learn, Praise God!  We also put some metal work on the front of the new windows to prevent theft, and they look nice too!  In the near future we hope to finish the exterior wall, improve the playground area, and put a roof on the Feeding/Tutoring Center.  Praise Jesus we are moving one step at a time!  Thank you for your continued prayers!

We have a small computer lab at the Club which we are realizing is a HUGE blessing to offer the students that come for our tutoring programs.  This is a place we are hoping to expand as we finish our second building and have more space.  Please be in prayer for more computers and a perfect space!

We have also begun to grow some vegetables on the piece of land we have down by the lake.  We hope this small crop of Pipiyan (local squash) can give us a good nutritional supplement to our meals at the Club.  The crop has to make it first, but we definitely are happy to be using this land in the new neighborhood.