Shortly after 2, we headed off with them for the last time this year in the red truck. We stopped at the Catholic Church Hall, just around the corner from our little Vickey's house. It was time for Sister Maureen to give out the education money, provided by the myriad of sponsors, so the kids can attend school. Today it was for grades 1 to 6, and there was over $4,000 to be given out in total.
They got a table set up, and envelopes with names, were spread all over the table. Sister Maureen has a local helper named Lupe, who helps her with this as well as all sorts of things, including distributing food, clothing, and household needs.
There was already a good sized lineup, and Lupe's mom sat by the door and let the line advance one by one. It was very organized and obviously practiced much more than once in the past. If Sister Maureen did not have a current picture of the child being sponsored, she took a new picture for her files, and for letters to the sponsors.
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| This is just a great picture Katie took |
We got to meet Pat Sullivan, who not only built the church hall we were in, but got married to his wife JoAnn in the church, where they met, after they had both lost their spouses'. He also builds houses, and bunk beds for the people of Neuvo Progreso.
Here is an article about Pat and his wife.
http://m.brownsvilleherald.com/news/local/article_fb48fb5a-6b83-11e3-af31-001a4bcf6878.html?mode=jqm
What a guy, he was like a whirlwind while we were there, getting all sorts of the parts he had pre made for more bed installations, into his truck. He has a local kid helping him, who we are told used to be a problem kid, but not anymore. Then they were off to install bunk beds, so some people don't have to sleep on a concrete floor or worse.
Pat explained to me the reason they put a couple of layers of carpeting on the beds is because if they were to use mattresses, they would get all infested with bugs and rodents because of the conditions they live in. This helps greatly to alleviate that problem.
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Pat's bunk beds...fantastic...he puts them in about 40 houses a year |
Then we were off to see Erika and Karelly and Livy. They were anxiously waiting. Sister Maureen and the group came in as well, as their job for the day, giving out the education money was done.
Wasn't long after we got there, the kids told Katie and I we had to close our eyes, they had a surprise for us. We did, and when they counted to three in English, we opened our eyes to this...
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A shirt for Jim |
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Jim's coffee cup and picture with wind blown hair  |
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Katie's coffee cup  
Now was the time for some wetness in our eyes, not the kids. What a wonderful gift!!!! They had the shirt, and the mugs made by travelling to Rio Bravo, which is over a two hour drive, and we only took the pictures on Saturday.
We had a great visit then, but Katie and I decided we did not really want it to end quite this way. We didn't want to say goodbye to our family right then, and we just felt like we wanted to have some really private moments with them. So even though Tuesday was to be our complete packing day, ready for departure for home on Wednesday morning, we told Erika and the kids we would be back for a couple of hours on Tuesday afternoon, after the girls got off school. There were big smiles all around.
So off we went again in the red truck, and when we got back to the residence we said our goodbyes for now to Sister Maureen, Ken and Vickey, and Dena, all of them our good friends, and our many thanks to all of them for accepting us so warmly and putting up with us every year.
and so ends another great day in the Valley....
more later....
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