Another Day in this "Whole New World"

**My most sincere apologies for the slow posting. My internet connection has been really slow this past week and I could not get pictures loaded. Hopefully this problem won't continue :/ **

Well, I didn't get off so lucky. My migraine did not go away with sleep, it continued throughout the next day. Which meant a day of glasses for me and a day of boredom for LeAnne. 

Just kidding. ;) 

We tried to make ourselves as useful as possible, as we were quarantined to the house all day. Tanya stopped by and mentioned that the previous night the number of kids had passed her maximum prediction so she needed more "puzzle pieces" cut out just in case more showed up that night. So we helped her cut out the little characters. It took us about an hour and we finally had enough pieces for 100 kids. "That should hopefully be enough" Tanya told us after we were done. Ha, ha....

The next day I woke up with NO migraine. Hooray!! So we were excited to be able to go to the meetings that night. When the truck came to pick us up, we saw they had attached a trailer. But all the Filipinos were still crammed into the back of the truck. "They don't like the trailer, its too bumpy." Roy explained to us. "Well then, we'll just have to make it cool" I returned. As we climbed into the trailer a couple of the kids left the truck to join us...and so it begins ;) We made it a point to laugh and squeal everytime we went over a bump that sent us a good inch or so in the air or when the truck tires would spray us with a nice coating of mud. Soon enough we had all the kids laughing with us...maybe now they will ride in the trailer...only time will tell.

This is a picture of the second load of people.

Haddie with Skye and Angela...
she remembers them :(

Haddie with her Daddy. Pssh! She
remembers him! lol, jk.

I was really excited for the meetings this night because baby Haddie would be there. Haddie is the daughter of 2 of our missionaries, Danny and Rovelyn. She is the cutest little thing and made my last stay in the Philippines so much fun! Rovelyn and Haddie had been in Mindanao for the last 2 months and were finally coming back to Palawan and tonight was the first time I was going to see them. My heart was broken as I realized this precious 2-year old did not remember me at all. Taking these pictures of her was the closest I could get to her without her turning to her mother in fear. I now realize that I have to spend the remainder of my trip making a 2-year old love me again......Challenge Accepted!

Andrey with Haddie...she obviously remembers him too. Not fair! :(

LeAnne and I went over the the children's program right at the beginning this time, because it looked as if the number of children had doubled since we had last been there. Sure enough, we counted 130 kids in attendance! (Looks like we'll be cutting more puzzle pieces) The rest of our evening was spent trying to keep 130 kids quiet and sitting still, which is hard enough when you speak the same language! Also, Filipino children, like American children, tend to get louder when raising their hand to be selected. The best way to describe it would be the Sea Gulls on 'Finding Nemo', except instead of "Mine! Mine!" the kids scream "Mam! Mam!" Its incredibly stressful after awhile. Tanya has the patience of a saint and managed to get through the entire program without losing her cool. So please add Tanya to your prayer list for the next week or so....she is gonna need all the help she can get!

I mean, seriously, would this NOT stress you out?!?!?

After the program, the kids play games
the circle of children almost surrounded
the basketball court! LeAnne even
played with the kids for awhile!

Another day gone by, although I still feel as though I have been here forever. I guess the feeling of 'Brand New World' doesn't exactly work if you return to the same 'New World'. But that doesn't make the adventure any less exciting.