The New House in Honduras - The First Week

I apologize that it has taken me a week to find time to sit down and write a blog entry. This stay at home mom/wife thing takes up a lot of time. There is still so much to do and trying to keep the kids occupied has been a challenge. Brother sprout doesn't have as many things to do as he used to in the states. Papa is out right now buying a little pool for the kids to pass the hot days. I mentioned that we do not have AC. This is a big challenge for me at least because I can't seem to stop sweating and sometimes I feel like I want to scream from the stickiness I feel. Taking showers helps. So far the most I've taken is 3 in one day. I think I would most days, but there is usually something that requires me to be sweaty anyway...so I pass on the heavenly cool shower. Did I mention we don't have hot water either? I could care less now.

Our house is beautiful and I am very happy with our colonia. I should get out and take some more photos of the houses around here. They are the brightest homes I've seen in Honduras. The colonia has a few Americans living here too I've heard but haven't met them. I guess they are from S. Carolina. I talked to the owner of the internet cafe here in the colonia who speaks really great english so he was telling me about things around here. He also gave me a name of a woman who works at one of the nicer bi-lingual schools teaching english. I guess she also teaches spanish on the side to anyone who might need and she will come to the house!

We were up at the internet cafe last night while papa was calling his family in the states and Brother and I went for a little walk hunting for frogs and to watch the family of puppies next door. I ran into a lady who spoke a little english. She seemed really lovely. I love when I meet people willing to try and talk to me even though I don't speak spanish yet.

We don't have the car yet which has presented a problem being able to go out an buy things for the house. We took a taxi a few times to this awesome store called Diunsa. It's kind of like Target, I guess. It has just about everything and it's clean and organized. I like that. I was a little worried and relieved to find a store like this. We also have gone to the grocery store a few times and Walmart has a nice south of the border company called Paiz. There are a few other nice grocery stores too. One challenge is trying to find skim milk. They have this stuff that's in these containers that has a really long shelf life. I don't know what they do to the milk, but it takes like skim milk. Hmmm....I would take a photo but my battery is dead on the camera.

There are many things we still have to do around the house like hang all our clothes on hangers. I got some up yesterday but have been slow to get things done. Cooking, cleaning and seeing to the kids takes up a lot of time. And as of today...I LOVE IT!

I really do love being here for the kids. I love being here with Papa. I feel safe and protected next to him. I don't remember the last time I felt this happy. I think I need to find a rhythm to things still. How to get things done efficiently. I need to learn how to cook again too, especially for Papa. Not that I forgot, I just haven't really cooked much the last year.

Here are some more photos of the house:

We have a big yard. No trees and prickly grass. We are talking about what to do about how to make this space more usable.

We had a few pizza nights so far which the kids loved! We finally got dishes since we were eating off of paper plates for a few days.

The kids bathroom. Basic.

The pila where we do some laundry by hand. I wash Brother's diapers in the pila instead of the washing machine. That large rubbermaid the yellow bucket is sitting on is Brother's bathtub. He does not like the showers.

We have a washer but not a dryer. I am thankful that we have the clothes line in the back. Some of the houses have lines hung from all kinds of places like pillars on the house tied to a tree or some other post in the yard.



Papa and Brother on Papa's "bike". The kids love going for rides on this. Yes, the house across the street is under construction. It does cause noise and dust. I couldn't imagine working out there all day building these houses under the sun. Some of the new houses in the neighborhood are absolutely beautiful. The colonia is new in 2001 and there is lots of construction going on around the neighborhood.

Sister Sprout's main hangout spot. She usually has the fan about 6 inches away blowing full blast. Like her American flag flip-flops (on the floor) she picked up before we moved? We had some furniture re-apolostered. A couch and 2 chairs. They look very nice, but are small. The living room isn't huge, so the smaller furniture will do for now.

There are many other things I could write about right now...but Brother Sprout's ice pop is melting on the floor and I need to get him outside.