6:30— wake up. lay in bed for a little bit & question why I am unable to sleep in ever
6:45— get up & get ready. try to remember to use as little toilet paper as possible in order to keep Fabi happy/ to prevent him from spending a ton of money on it
7:00— go downstairs for quiet time with Jesus & wrap myself in fuzzy blankets in the comfy corner of the couch
8:00— get in line for breakfast & ponder what random drink will be served this morning. eat!!! every single morsel. Fabi & Mabe are very passionate about the fact that ZERO food is to be wasted
8:30— go upstairs to put my bible & journal away & grab my fanny pack in order to get a move on (obviously the fanny pack is necessary)
8:40— head out the door to walk to ministry. get incredibly winded after the first hill right outside the gate to our house. side note: we don’t always start walking at 8:40, sometimes earlier, sometimes later, but for some odd reason we always manage to make it to ministry at 9:06 am
9:06— walk through the Camp Hope doors & proceed to put our belongings in a locked little room
9:10— open the door to “sala benignidad” (room kindnes (for an explation read my blog “”)) & get kindly greeted by Tia Betty (the nurse that is in charge of the room), all six of the kiddos (named Damian, Andrew, Anabel, Vicent, Camila & Alan), David & Christie (my fellow volunteers), & Isaac (the occupational therapist that works the mornings in our class). great, great people
9:15— I am usually asked by Tia Betty in the morning to help the kids with cognitive skills & motor/ sensory skills. this looks like coloring in their notebooks, squeezing/ rolling play dough, practicing vocabulary words, colors, directions, etc. while a do this with a kid, the other volunteers are doing it with another unless they aren’t working with Isaac or another therapist (there are more occupational therapists in addition to Isaac, along with physical & language therapists too)
9:45— bathroom break for Alan. && most likely Andrew too
10:00— snack time! ranges from fruits to random drinks to crackers. you really never know what you’re going to get
11:00— walking with A? in the park. & by walk I mean we play with this rectangular teeter totter like thing & put fruits that fall from the trees on it & tip it back & forth as Andrew watches them roll. something so simple but oh so enjoyable.
12:00— I return Andrew to the classroom with Tia Betty while the other volunteers and I go to lunch.
12:30— we go back to the room to retrieve the kids an take them to the dining hall for their lunch. starts off with a soup, then a main dish usually including meat, rice or noodles, & veggies of some sort, then finish with a juice. they eat real good here!
1:00-2:00— this time ranges because it depends on which kid I am watching over. one can eat as fast as 20-30 minutes while others are barely halfway done with their soups at that point. but after lunch the kids are taken to the bathroom to wash the food off their faces & to brush their teeth. even though most of them hate it, it has become a healthy habit
1:10-2:10— bathroom break!! lots of changing diapers & filling the bathrooms stalls
1:30-2:30— in the afternoon I usually go out to the soccer goals with either Alan or Vicent, or sometimes both. they are both in wheelchairs but find it soooo fun to post up the goal while I kick the ball over in their direction. they also really like music so if we aren’t up for soccer, we will sit in the grass, take their shoes & socks off & jam. Alan is super up to date with pop culture, no joke, & knows lyrics to a ton of songs. including Justin Bieber songs in english, quite impressive
2:50-3:00— it is time for us to say our “hasta mananas” & we walk back to Casa Blanca, the house that shelters all of us racers.
3:30— this is where free time begins. it is hard to do “a day in the life” kinda thing for this time bc it is different everyday so I’ll just bulletpoint what this time may or may not consist of
- reading a book (most likely this)
- practicing spanish verb conjugations
- napping
- getting wifi at the mall
- listening to a podcast
- socializing with team/squadmates
6:00— the time that dinner is technically supposed to start but also can happen as late as 7:30 so the above bullet points also usually occur in this time
7:45— daily chores and/or housekeeping of some sort
8:00— usually get in to some sort of deep talk or really random conversation in my room with my teammates & that too is something that has no certain start or end time
9:15— get ready for bed & relax
9:30— in bed & most likely passed out within the next five or ten minutes
&& then I wake up & do it all over again!!! I am thankful for routine & all that my days have to offer. although you can’t precisely document all that goes down in a day & honestly all my days look different, I am hoping this gives a glimpse. crazy to think there are only 23 more days like this then debrief for 6 of them & then home!!!! who knows what those days will look like. ah crazy!
anyway thank you for reading & look out for the other blogs that are coming next!
