The Zoo

One day, with Grandma and Grandpa, we went to the Zoo. The Zoo was kind of fun. It was a bit messy, not like the zoos in America. It had some animals, most of which live in Honduras, like owls, snakes, monkeys, deer, and even a jaguar. 

That's when Jonathan learned to say his first word other than Mama and Dada and Papa and Baba, and Mas which means more in Spanish. We were looking at the jaguar when Jonathan said “Cat.” We had never taught him that, so we thought maybe he didn't really know the word. But when we got back home, Jonathan saw our cat, and he said “Cat” (like this “Cah”) and he kept on saying it, every time he saw our cat, even when we gave him a toy cat. That's still his favorite word.

I would like to go back to the zoo again some day, even if it's not the most beautiful Zoo.

Michaela, Joshua, and Jonathan

Grandma and Grandpa visit!

One day, Grandma and Grandpa came. They are Daddy's parents. They have never been to Honduras before. They came to stay with us for two weeks, starting December 14. When they came, we had a fun time. We had already moved into our house, so they got to stay with us. Our attic wasn't really ready yet, because the men from the hospital were still painting it and fixing the floor.

Grandma told me Little House on the Prairie stories. She knows a lot of them. And Grandpa cuddled with Joshua on the couch every night until Joshua would fall asleep. We had a very fun time! Jonathan was 8 months old, and he was already crawling. They helped to watch us when Mommy and Daddy were busy.

I love Grandma and Grandpa! I hope they will visit again some time.

Michaela

The Christmas Program

We had started a choir and we were going to have a program with the choir for Christmas. Joshua and I were both in the choir. We practiced every Saturday afternoon, but at the end we practiced every Friday, Saturday and Sunday to get ready. We had learned nice songs, all in Spanish. I loved them! The program was about Jesus, we were acting the story of Jesus. Joshua and I were angels, in the angel choir. We didn't have any real animals but we had a real baby Jesus, he is the brother of one my friends, who was only 2 months old. People kept saying we should use Jonathan, but he is really big! He would start crying and try to crawl off the manger.

At the end of the program, I sang a song all by myself. It was called “Mary, did you know?” but in Spanish it's “Tu Sabias Que.”

Mommy made a background picture for the program. It was humungous! Mommy paints really good, better than any other painting I ever saw!

I think people enjoyed the program. I did too.

Michaela

Christmas Day

After waiting for so long, Christmas finally came! Grandma and Grandpa were still here, and we were having a fun time with them. We put up a Christmas tree with lights. And I have this Barbie with wings, and since we didn't have a star for the tree, we thought we could make a dress for her to use as an Angel. It turned out very beautiful! 

I got a ton of presents! Grandma gave me a pretty Hello Kitty purse, and Grandpa gave me a new electronical toothbrush, and they gave me a lot of other things, too. I got cowgirl clothes and costumes, and a little play kitchen that goes up to my waist, all with food and stuff to play. We had macaroni and cheese and hot dogs for lunch, my very favorite food!

It was a Merry Christmas!

Michaela

Gymnastics

There is this man that works in the hospital as a missionary, but he's not that old. His name is Jonathan Jackson, and he is a physical therapist. He's not here forever, only for one year.

One night, he came to have dinner with us. And he taught us some cool gymnatics stuff. He flipped us over and he made us stand up on his knees. And it was really fun! I hope you like the pictures!

Michaela and Joshua

Adventurers

Ever since we got here, we have gone to Adventurers, which is a club for children at church, like Pathfinders but for kids less than 10 years old. I am a Sunbeam for Jesus (7 year old) and Joshua is a Busy Bee (6 year old). I think it's very nice, because we do a lot of activities and games. We go every Sabbath afternoon from 3 pm to 4 pm. Sometimes we also go on Sundays for special activities.

At the end of the year, on Sabbath December 11, we got to do something special. It's called the Investiture. We said the law and the mission and We also earned a lot of awards for our uniform. It was a fun day! 

Michaela

Kindergarten

This day I graduated from Kindergarten. That is the Honduran flag next to me. I liked Kindergarten. Now I'm going to First Grade. I'm on vacation until February. So I'm having fun now with my friends. My friends don't speak English, but I can speak Spanish now.

Joshua

Abuela visits!

One day Abuela came and stayed with us for a whole month, from the end of October to the end of November. She brought me a lot of stuff and toys. I love the toys she brought me. She even brought Joshua stuff.

On Saturday nights, we went out to have ice cream in the town. My favorite flavor is chocolate. Abuela's favorite is lemon, just like Joshua.

I can't wait until Abuela visits again.

I love Abuela.


Michaela and Joshua

Our New House

After 2 months of living in Honduras, we finally got a house. I love the house! It's the best house I've ever lived in. It has 4 bedrooms, two bathrooms, and it has a playroom in the attic! It has three levels. Three bedrooms are downstairs, one for Joshua and me, and two for visitors. Upstairs there's a bedroom for Mommy and Daddy, and a kitchen, a dining room, and a living room. And in the attic, we have all our toys, and our desks for school and a table for activities, and all our books in a big bookcase. I love my new home. It took us forever to move in because the men were working on it, sanding the floor and the walls, and painting, and fixing everything. Then they painted the house outside a red-orange color called terracota with white on the windows.

We have a little kitty, her name is Candy, or Dulce in Spanish. She has a little house outside. She's really cute.

Michaela

Jonathan James Lohr

Today we are going to talk about our little brother Jonathan James Lohr. Though his real name is "King of the Rolly Pollies, Wiggle Worm, Moving Target, Baby Baton, Jonathan James Lohr!"

His 1st name is King of the Rolly Pollies because one day we were pretending that Jonathan was doing a roll race and... he won! so...that made him King of the Rolly Pollies! Because he was also rolling from one side of the room to the other end of the room.

His 2nd name is Wiggle Worm because when I change his diaper he moves and moves and moves and moves and moves. So I call him my little Wiggle Worm.

His 3rd name is Moving Target because its hard to keep him still, like when I'm trying to put his socks on.

His 4th name is Baby Baton, because after the parade (see the post about the parade), my uncle Chris wrote to us on the comments and told me that Jonathan could be my little Baby Baton and I had to swing him around!

He learned how to crawl and he crawls faster now. I have to put Mommy's phone or something he likes on the other side of the bed and he will crawl to it.

He learned how to stand up today in his little playpen! He loves standing up! He holds on to the edge of the playpen for a long time and peeks over the edge to see what we are doing.

He loves to laugh about silly things that we do. He's soo cute! He just turned 7 months old on Sunday.

Michaela and Joshua

My Front Tooth

A few dayth ago I wath eating granola, and well, I took a hard bite of granola on my front tooth which wath already looth. Tho I tried to touch it and it wath more looth. I told Mommy and she checked it and it wath looth but not THAT looth. Zo she thaid that if it came out at thchool, I should put it in my thnack bag that hath peanutz zo I would not loothe it. But it never came out at thchool. I kept waiting and waiting for it to come out. And Thabbath pathed and then Thunday came. It wath a very fun day becauthe we had pathfinderz (thometimez we meet on Thundayz for fun activitiez). Thiz Thunday we did exerthizez and my tooth wath really looth and at one point it ztarted bleeding, but it didn't come out. It wath hanging by a thread.

When I got back home, I ztarted reading a book and while I wath reading, I felt a little thing in my mouth. It wath my tooth! I put my tooth under the pillow with a note that thaid that I wanted to keep my tooth and ztill get thome money. When I woke up I looked under my pillow and thaw a letter with thixty lempirath (which ith three dollarth)! I wath zo happy! But my tooth wathn't there becauthe the tooth fairy in Hondurath doethn't know English, zo she wrote me back in Thpanish and didn't leave the tooth. She thigned it "El Ratoncito," which meanth "the little mouze."

Michaela

My First X-ray

I had a bad day yesterday. I was just having a very good day until I hurt my foot. This is what I was doing: All the children slid down the slide, but I was jumping on the slide and then sliding down on it. It was fun! So this time when I landed on the slide my foot twisted all the way back and I landed on it like that. It hurt so bad! I couldn't walk on it at first, and I started to cry. Two teachers helped me (one was my teacher and the other was the man who is the English teacher because he teaches English). He carried me to the Emergency Room to check my foot. I was crying the whole time. And I wanted my Mommy or my Daddy, but they couldn't come because both of them were at a surgery with Dr. Schneider. So, the doctor, the nurse and the teachers checked my foot, and they told me if it hurt here or here. And I told them "aca" which means here. And then after that they called my Mommy and I talked to her on the phone, and my Mommy sent Mrs. Schneider to come stay with me. Then I had to get my first X-ray. So they looked at it but my foot was not broken. So I thank God that it wasn't broken. So I learned that I should just go down the slide and not jump and go down.

Joshua

Children's Day

Last Sabbath was Adventist Children's Day. And the kids in the church did the whole program, including a special song and the sermon. The children's story was so nice, because they gave us a bag with candy and crayons in it. The crayons are to color the picture they always give us when its children's story. It was really fun! We also had a lunch, which was chinese rice that had vegetables and onions. I hate onions! But I still had fun, because my friends Thamara and Ximena (said like Hee-may-nah) and Fernanda were there.  And they gave us cake and ice cream for dessert. Yum! Half of the cake was vanilla and half chocolate, so Joshua only ate half his cake, the vanilla part.
We took a nap so that at night we could go to the fair. It was so fun! They had rides for children and for adults. Each ride was 20 Lempiras, or about one dollar. We went on 4 rides and had fun. They had the fair because it was La Feria that comes to Valle once a year. I hope we get to go next year.

Michaela and Joshua

Puppies

You know, we don't have a dog, but Mommy said we could have one. Well, one day we went to go see some puppies. First, we went to Dina's house (she's my friend who has 14 dogs!). We saw three cute little puppies there. Then, we went to the "petshop" in town. The pet shop had a little Chihuahua. It was SO cute! Joshua doesn't think it was cute at all. But they also had a Siberian Husky, a white one. It was cute too! Mommy said it cost $250 dollars. But we can't get it because we don't have our house yet and Siberian Huskies are not good guard dogs. German Shepherds are the best. We are going to try to get one in Tegucigalpa, which is the capital. I can't wait to get one!

Michaela and Joshua

Our School Uniforms

Last week, Mommy got us our school uniforms and we love them! They were fabulous! They are the same as the ones the other children wear. We got both the uniforms for school and for the Adventurers Club (it's Pathfinders Club for ages 4-9). Mommy even got us the exercise pants for school. We wear the exercise pants and shirt only on Tuesdays and Fridays, because we have to do PE (physical education) on those days. The other days (Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays) we wear our normal uniform to school.

Michaela and Joshua

The Visitor

One day, a visitor came to visit us in Honduras (she's a visitor even though we already know her). Her name is Lisa Walke, but we call her Aunt Lisa. She is a nice doctor and she helped Daddy in the hospital. We met her in Africa, when she visited us two times. She came to help Daddy in the hospital. She always ate with us in our house, except on the last day we went out to eat at a restaurant. We loved having her visit us. We are going to miss her.

Michaela and Joshua

Orchestra Conductor

The Superman Look

The Alfalfa Look

I don't like going to school. I can't understand anything they say!

Joshua

(Joshua would much rather be goofy, trying various hairstyles, and practicing his orchestra conducting. Silly Boy!)

Click below to see a video of him being goofy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eil8I7Tg6Oo&feature=youtube_gdata_player

The First Day of School

Wednesday was the first day of school! We wanted to go there so much, we just couldn't wait to go. And the day finally came. Mommy took us to our classes and we stayed there with the teacher and the other kids and then at recess we went out to play. Then Mommy took us to the Hospital, because we were only staying half the day.

Joshua said he had hated school. But I loved it! I wanted to go back so bad. But we wanted to drink water so we went to the nurse's station and finally got water. But then I begged Mommy to let me go back to the school for the rest of the day. So Mommy said it was ok, as long as we still do home school back at home. So I went back there and they had finished recess and had already started schoolwork again. 

I really like the school. I met a lot of friends. 

Michaela

The Parade

Today was a very fun day. There was a parade! It was the last parade of the year. It had all the schools in Valle de Angeles. Some of the boys played the drums. They did so well! There was even a little boy (who looked like he was 4 years old) who had a little drum. Then some of the girls were cheerleaders. And some other girls had batons. And some boys were dressed up like police with sunglasses. And Daddy said, “Look, there goes the FBI!”

Then our school came, la Escuela Adventista Maranatha. There were hundreds of children! The Maranatha sign was the prettiest one of all. Joshua wants to join the drummer boys wearing the red cape, and I want to join the baton girls wearing turquoise because it looks like so much fun to march with the baton. I hope I can join them next year.

Michaela