I can see clearly now the clouds are gone....

Since we were out really late last night, this update will consist of yesterday and today!

Saturday, August 1, 2009 (Day 22):

Today we got to sleep in and it felt wonderful. My room is the room with the late sleepers and for that, I am thankful. We all slept until 11:00 a.m. Once we got up and moving, we went to eat some lunch at the mall and then headed out for some shopping. We walked to the market, but decided to take a taxi back..we bought a lot of stuff! Peru has some pretty cool stuff at their market. There were Alpaca blankets and scarfs, black and white pottery, brightly colored purses and crosses. This market was probably the nicest market I have ever been to. It was very organized and clean. I liked that the little shop owners didn't bug you all the time. If you walked in, they would speak to you, but they would not hound you and guilt you into buying something. In Uganda, I felt bad if I kept walking and someone from a shop was talking to me. I hate when people pressure you like that. I'm not very good at bartering. I feel guilty, so I don't really do it. That's why I take people with me to do it. When we were in Cusco, I would look at something and they would give me a price. Then I'd put it down and they would bring down the price, so I never really had to convince them. It was kind of the same way at this market in Lima. All of them would say, " # soles just for you." I ended up getting some pretty good deals on some cool stuff. I'm really thankful for my carry on suitcase too! I'm going to place all of the breakables in that so that TSA won't rummage through, take off all of the padding and break my stuff. When I got home from Uganda, TSA had taken the padding off some of my breakables in my suitcase. Luckily nothing broke. If it had, I would have been one angry girl!

After dinner, we went dancing! The place we went is very unique. They have people come out and do traditional Peruvian dances from different regions of the country. Then, all the guests at the restaurant go out onto the dance floor and dance for a while. We would join in. It was so packed, so we mostly just did danced in one place. We were definitely not dancing like the professionals. On our way home, we piled six girls into the backseat of a taxi. I know, real safe huh? It was better than on our way there. Robyn and Emily sat in the very back of the taxi with the gas tank between them. Drivers are crazy here and I think they thought we were going to be rear-ended a few times. Thank goodness we were not! We finally got home around 2:30 a.m. Basically got ready for bed and crashed.

It was a great day off! I enjoyed shopping and hanging out with the girls! We were all talking about how we just met 3 weeks ago, but we feel like we have all known each other forever! We have all definitely formed strong bonds. Thankfully, we will all be in the state of Texas and we can all visit each other when we get back!

Sunday, August 2, 2009 (Day 23):

Since Kelli has been sick and we were out late last night, we slept in again this morning. We were going to have church through another Podcast, but we got back late tonight. Please forgive us Lord!

Today we got up a little earlier than yesterday. I went to pull the curtains back and lo and behold, I saw blue sky! Seriously, I almost started crying I was so happy. I know, that sounds very strange and wierd, but we have seriously only seen the sun in Lima maybe 3 times and that was for only about 10-15 minutes each time. When we have seen the sun, we haven't really seen blue sky, so the fact that there was a blue sky was huge!!! I noticed the clouds moving away and the sun coming out. I could actually see down the street from my hotel window and see the Pacific Ocean. It was a beautiful blue color! All of us girls were so excited!! To make it all better, the sun stayed out for most of the day!!!!! We all went for a walk just to take in the sun. Even realized on that walk that I should have pulled out my sunglasses. I had forgotten about those bad boys. Everyone and their dog was out too! I mean that literally! Last week I had a dream that the sun had come out and we were all in such shock that we were taking pictures of the sun and sky. Basically, my dream came true! I admit, I immediately grabbed my camera to take pictures of the sky! After lunch, we bought tickets to go see "The Proposal." We were so excited because it was in English with Spanish subtitles. Some of us had already seen the movie, but we were happy to see it again! When the movie was over, we actually saw somewhat of a sunset! The clouds had sadly returned, but we could still see an orange circle. After dinner, we went to this fountain park. It was so cool! There were different color lights shining on the fountains and music playing. I was really impressed! Robyn and I got in this one fountain that shoots up every once in a while. You can walk through it and get wet if you want, or you can stand in the area where the water doesn't shoot up and stay semi dry. We did it just to say we did! We stayed pretty dry. Mostly got wet from the little munchkins running around through the water.

This week we will be at the home with 700+ children. The kids have lice and will be very dirty. Pray that we don't let that get in the way of loving on these kids!

Pray for strength and health through this last week. Thank you so much for your prayers and support!

Blessings!
Dawn