Hi friends and family,
I wanted to write about a magical night we had just the other day.
It had been a hard past 24 hours. We had to take one of my lovely teammates, Emma, to the airport. She had to leave the field for medical reasons and it was really hard to say goodbye. She wrote a blog post that beautifully sums up her return to home: https://emmatew.theworldrace.org/post/a-bittersweet-goodbye.
Dave, the founder of Sending Hope International, had planned a bonfire for us to celebrate the girls’ birthdays from October. I was quite tired and drained from having to say goodbye, but still wanting to spend time with the girls and celebrate them. When we walked over, we noticed little individual cakes for all of the birthday girls. As they were all being announced, one of the girls who I’ve become super close to, Soso, was no where to be found. Her name was called and we were all looking around at each other and she wasn’t with us. Another girl ran to go find her and she came back with Soso crying. We were all confused as to why she was crying and we later found out that she had never had anyone celebrate her birthday in her 10 years of life. My heart completely shattered knowing that this was the first time she had ever been celebrated and her first time eating a birthday cake that was hers.
The rest of the night was filled with singing, dancing, and roasting marshmallows. The girls taught us a bunch of their favorite dances and we taught them some of ours. We also did karaoke and sang our hearts out. We snacked on marshmallows and birthday cake and everyone was so happy.
God loves showing me His love and beauty in so many ways. He turned a night where I was at first tired and sad into one of my favorite nights so far. He showed His beauty with a crackling fire, girls singing praises in English and Thai, and lots of giggles and hugs throughout the night. He constantly reminds me to be grateful for EVERY moment and to love people so well.
I can’t believe I have less than a month left her in Thailand! Pray for our team to cherish our time with the girls!
Blessings,
Natalie
