crazy! or loca!

so Johanne and Steve left on Thursday to go see their daughter (who is the president of her student body) graduate college.

They took like half the kids, but gave me an extra person to help out.

We decided to make pizza since it's a friday, and borrow a movie. Somehow, half the kids that we know in the neighborhood ended up at our house :) It's been pleasant.

The last two days were rough. I think the kids feel like they need to test their boundaries or make sure they are not abandoned. I have quite a few people willing to help me out in a pinch, so that's nice.

One of the girls that ran off a few weeks ago, ran off again yesterday. I think she thinks that by running she can escape her problems. Here I always run after her, even reminding her that she quits when we exercise as a house while I keep going! She has come back both times, but the reason she is with us is because she ran away from her mom, she ran away from her uncle, etc. She is the one going back to her family in July, but I would like to see a change in her coping. After she was calm I tried to explain to her if she wants to be alone she needs to do it in different ways, but she didn't want to listen to me tell her those things. She told me she doesn't want the psychologist's help either. It's so tough for me when someone doesn't want to accept help.

Movies are a big privilege in our house as we don't have a TV. C- got out of bed 2 hours late after I'd told her to get out of bed twice, so I told her she had to go to bed 2 hours earlier. It's the normal punishment. This morning she accepted it, it wasn't a problem. But tonite, when she found out we were going to watch a movie she was TICKED. So then she told me it was my fault she didn't get out of bed. riiiiiiight.

I need a lot of prayer for my attitude right now, because next Friday I'm leaving for 2 weeks. I love them, but today it feels like a job, like a job I need to escape!

I didn't realize how much more free time I have when Johanne and Steve are here. They take the girls more than I thought.

It smells like summer here. I think it's from living next to big fields of wheat, but I can't be sure.

Some people here don't know the word in the other language. For example, there was a whole English conversation the other day, but every time we wanted to say "scold" we said the Spanish word "reganar." This happens to Spanish speakers or to English speakers. I use the word "reganar" a lot, but honestly, I had to look it up just now to know EXACTLY what it means. I think it's really amusing when we speak in Spanglish. Actually, sometimes people even use the shortest words or shortest phrases in both languages and mix them to be lazy. Kind of a complicated way to be lazy.

The other Spanglish things I like hearing are when people transfer grammatical structures from one language in the other. "What does the table lack?" (really, "what's missing!") that's using Spanish in your English!

(my girls are running to our house now, to beat each other to use the shower. crack me up!)

The other night we had a murder mystery dinner in honor of Julia. I tried to speak with a British accent most of the night, but even accidentally used some Spanish words. It was a real hoot. I also was voted "most dramatic" which I loved. I thought I was playing with a bunch of people that were honest all the time, so I was shocked when I got to the end and found out that people were sneaky, or purposefully mislead people!

GROCERY BILL SCARINESS.
so I go grocery shopping every week. and have been for quite some time, so I have an idea of how much we spend.
This time we went, and it cost $290!!!!!!!!! It is never that much. Luckily I had some of my own money on me, and we paid all but a dollar of it. The cashier told me not to worry about it. I was pretty flabbergasted though. I came home and racked my brain, and the receipt! Unfortunately the receipt only has prices on it, no labels. I intended to mark every purchase that I could figure out what it was, but realized that was unattainable. The very last item said I'd bought 10 @ $8.40 a piece. in total $84. I realized I hadn't bought anything for $84. So then, it was up to us to figure out what the item was. I realized what happened. She had asked me how much flour I had, and I said 10 kilos, and so she typed in 10 bags of 10 kilos each. I didn't get to go back to the grocery, but Angela talked to them with the receipt, and the lady said she realized it right after we had left the store. sigh.


well, I'm getting bug bites while I sleep, so I'm going to go bug out my room and go to bed.


I'll be home from May 28th-June 6th. Do let me know if you'd like to hang out. It might be a little crazy, so I'm thinking about trying to get an idea now so I can manage my time right.

<3

One of my girls has a 14 year old cousin who is pregnant. She heard that the cousin wants to sell the baby. SELL!! I asked how much they cost, and the girls got really upset thinking that I am interested in buying babies. last time I checked, I'm not interested in purchasing babies from the black market.


I think teenagers and adults don't understand each other a lot. Whenever my girls complain/whine I ask them not to talk like that. Then they say, "but I didn't say any bad words!" and I say "the tone of your voice is bad" but then they look at me confused. so today, I tried to sneak record one of my girls when she was whiney so that she could hear how it sounds, and she didn't whine all morning! It's funny to want two totally opposite things and have them foil each other. (I want them to not whine, but I wanted her to whine so that they might stop whining after I play it back to them.)


We served rice with sugar and cinnamon and milk this morning, which the girls were pumped about! apparently, it's a very mexican thing to serve. UNTIL they opened the pot and realized I didn't make it the way a Mexican woman would make it. (apparently you cook the milk with the rice, and I let them add it to already cooked rice.)


(and apparently, people here didn't know the electric slide. but now they do. Thank you Mr. 8th grade gym class teacher.)