DAY 4: Women's Group

This day was packed full!


In the morning we wrapped presents and got them all ready for Casa Hogar Imperio De Amor! There are 65 kids at this childrens home. This is the home that Rodolfo is captain of. So, he is there every week hanging out figuring out projects, building relationships, and wrestling with the older boys of the home:)

After gathering everything for the day, we headed out for Imperio De Amor. When we arrived we all went to the church they have on campus. The women brought a ton of musical instruments and so we decided to break up into teams and have an "AMERICAN IDOL" competition. Each team had 15 minutes to come up with a skit/song. They could grab any of the instruments that they needed. It was such a hoot! I was very impressed with what each group came up with!

Rodo's team won! It will be a picture ingrained in my mind forever watching all the older boys and my husband dancing around and singing!

Prior to American Idol, we had the women pre make "SNOWBALLS" out of socks filled with flour. So, we had the winners of American Idol get to peg Rodolfo first with the snowballs. Since the older boys won they were SO excited about that! The second place winners were able to keep their musical instruments. And 3rd place team got candy!

After American Idol, we went into the kitchen area and ate lunch with the children. We baked 115 potatoes and had all the toppings. We also asked Vita (our mexican cook) to make 400 tamales and her incredible salsa. It was AWESOME!

Once our bellies were full of yummy food, we had the kids open up all of their presents! They were all so excited to see their names on an individual gift. Sometimes, groups come and give gifts as a group. So individual presents are a BIG deal!

Our morning at IDA was very successful and entertaining!

We departed from IDA and went to one of our Squatter villages we call "Rio 3". We had a little church service with the community and then we had families line up for a photo shoot! We brought fancy clothes from our donation room, 5 digital cameras, and 3 awesome photo printers. This was probably the biggest Christmas gift the women could have given out because those families that live there have probably never had a picture of themselves let alone a picture of their entire family!

Then to end our day the Ladies took all of the group and all of our staff women to a nice italian restaurant here in the city. It is the equivalent to a Bravo's or a Macaroni Grill. It was such a treat for us. It made us feel so special that these ladies thought of us staff women even though they were already thinking of the 500 orphans we serve here in Monterrey! We felt very blessed so THANK YOU WOMEN FOR THAT YUMMY DINNER!