Settling into Life in Peru

One of our favourite parts of life in Peru is the opportunity our children have to get to know some children who live at a local orphanage. Every week we have two planned playdates. On Fridays, our children play with the two oldest children, Rachel and Anhel. This gives them an opportunity to play at the park with children their own age and just have some fun. On Monday afternoons, our children spend time at the orphanage playing with the younger children. Nathan really likes to play with the twins (see older posts of him with them in the pool). Pictured above, is Nathan teaching Anhel how to play the game, "Rush Hour". It didn't take him long to catch on and zoom through the levels.

This is a photo of our kids playing with some local children at the park outside our home. There are usually lots of kids to play with and plenty of dogs to pet and play with as well. I think our children will learn the most Spanish by playing with the local kids. Their soccer (futbol) skills have certainly improved. As well, the 'futbol americano' we brought along is a novelty that many of the kids here want a chance to play with and was one of the things that first got us playing together.

Every afternoon Evan and I are attending language classes taught by a local Peruvian woman. Today was our first class and we found it a valuable learning time. Our teacher has taught for many years and feels confident that we will acquire the language skills necessary to teach. We have hired a Peruvian Bible College student to play with the kids and teach them Spanish in a less formal manner. Adri (pronounced Audrey) is a real sweetheart and a natural teacher. Evan and I are thrilled to have her spend time with our children while we are at class. The race is on to see who learns the language the quickest. I have a feeling our kids will be our translators soon!

Rachel is pictured here wearing our Skype headset. Since we haven't decided if we will get a landline yet, we have started using Skype for our phone instead. This allows us to call other computers for free or landlines for an inexpensive price. Last week we even spoke with our missionary friends in Nigeria! That was a real blessing!

Most of our furniture arrived this past week. The beds and kitchen table are really nice. Having them enables us to start homeschooling again. Our couches arrived on Saturday, but a mix up by the salesperson caused the wrong couches to be made. Oops! Amazingly, the company admitted the error and agreed to make the correct ones. Now that we have our kitchen table and school can start, not having couches is just an inconvenience.