Final Day at Casitas Kennedy

Just a warning, this is probably going to be a really long post. I don´t have much to do today, as I am staying 4 days longer to work at a medical mission in Honduras. So, I have nothing but time to blog, and TONS of photos and thoughts to share. :)

Our group´s final day at Casitas Kennedy was one of mixed emotions.  It is very tough to say goodbye to all the kids, but we need to realize that us being there is not going to be what makes the children happy.  There were a couple of events yesterday at the orphanage that kind of threw a wrench into what we had planned for the day.  While we could have been frustrated, we just kind of rolled with it and hung out with the kids.

In the morning, there was a group called Simply Help there.  I think there were also representatives from the Honduran government as well.  The kids put on a big show for the visitor with a lot of dancing.  Then Simply Help distributed clothing, toys, and shoes.  We were allowed much more freedom yesterday to take photos, so we all snapped away.  Yesterday I wrote about the young girl Katrine and her baby.  While I wasn´t able to talk with her today, I did snap a picture of them during the performances.


I got kind of bored of sitting in the performance/political spectacle (especially since I couldn´t understand what anyone was saying), so I decided to go to the baby´s house. Here is a photo of me with Jose. He was so precious, and just loved being outside. When I set him down, he started crying. It just broke my heart.


After lunch, a group of what looked like college students (or that age at least) came to entertain the kids. I hung out there for a while, since a lot of the kids were there. It was a good opportunity to see and realize that our group isn´t the only source of joy to these children. That sounds kind of bad, but I think we felt that way a little bit throughout the week. It was kind of nice to see that we are just one little part of bringing joy and God´s love to these kids lives.


The child closest in the photo is the sister of the 2 girls in the middle (the floral dress and aqua shirt) and the young girl in the dark pink shirt in front of them. 4 sisters from one family here together. They were always with one another, and very reserved. It was nice to see that they were able to rely on one another so much.


The girl in the pink is named Brenda. She was such a sweetie. Her front teeth were rotten, probably from having a bottle (or something) in her mouth too long as an infant. Quite a few of the children had the same problem.


This is Senia. She had a hilarious personality. She would make tease us, and also mimic things we said. She just loved the new dress she´s wearing.


This is Karen. She is deaf and just started to learn sign language. The day that we gave her new clothes she signed that it was the happiest day of her life, and that she would never forget it. Fortunately, one of our team members, Carrie, knows sign language so they were able to communicate.


We bought a couple of mobiles for the baby´s cribs. When I put them in, they immediately started to play with them. It was so cute. I hope that they´re able to get a lot of use out of them.


This is Ramon. He has special needs, and was often just kind of wandering around. I saw him swinging on his own and went over to push him for a while. He seemed to enjoy it a lot.


This is Rixty (probably spelled wrong). She was kind of a tomboy. She followed me around quite a bit during the week.


I´ll continue to blog throughout the rest of this week while I´m in Honduras. We appreciate all of the prayers, support, and encouragement from all of our friends and family. Tomorrow I´ll tell you how you can get involved in helping the orphans.

Here are all the photos from our final day.