La Casa

I thought I would share a little about our family and where we are living for these next three months. We have been blessed with a wonderful family to stay with here in Peru! They are very sweet and very patient with us and our lack of Spanish. Henry is the father and he actually teaches at the school we are going to so he is good at speaking slowly for us at meals. Juana is the mother and she is very sweet, makes wonderful food and loves spoiling Kai. Their children are Renato and Regine. Renato goes to college here in Arequipa and Regine was teaching children at the school we go to but is currently preparing to leave for Germany to get married in the fall.
I can't say enough about the kindness of this family. Henry has been driving me back and forth to school each day so I can get back in time for Tyson to leave for his classes. Next week we will begin walking but it has been very nice to get a ride this week. They have been very sympathetic about Kai being sick and very understanding of his not eating the food. I personally feel terrible at the food goes to waste but they are very gracious. They are always telling us to put a coat on Kai even if it is barely cold out. They are not used to cold weather here and all the babies are bundled in layers even if the sun is outJ The other day I decided I needed to get out of the house because I was getting cabin fever. I bundled Kai up in many layers plus a hat and a rain coat and put him in the backpack to go for a walk. I looked back after half a block and saw that Henry had followed us to the sidewalk and was watching from the gate. I kept walking and looked back and he was still watching. I began to worry perhaps it was dangerous for us to be out without Tyson so I only walked a bit further (so two blocks total) and turned around. When I got to the gate he asked me where we were going and I said we just needed to get out. He looked at me and pointed to Kai and say “esta frio”. He was worried that it was too cold for Kai to be out. It was sort of chilly and a bit damp but nothing compared to Oregon. I thought it was very sweet thoughJ
I’m sure we will have more stories about our family but all in all right now I feel very blessed by their kindness and generosity. I look forward to knowing more Spanish so I can begin to know them on a deeper level but for now I am amazed by how much you can communicate without knowing the language. Renato and Regine actually speak English really well but don’t do it very often…Spanish only in the house so we can learn faster.
We feel very blessed at the accommodations we have been given. We were expecting only a bedroom for the three of us but we actually have a little apartment above the main home of the families. We have a little living room, kitchen area (with fridge!), bathroom and our bedroom. Renato also has his bedroom up here and is very seems to sleep right through most of Kai’s early mornings. The water in the home is solar heated and unfortunately there has not been much sun this week. Our shower does have a switch to turn on electric heat but we went most of the week without using it. Finally I couldn’t handle another cold shower and turned it on…that was very nice! Okay, this is a long post so I will just show some pictures and call it good!

Here is our living room...lots of studying happening here!

Our cozy little bedroom

Our armoir...storing all of our clothes plus some...hence the mess:)

El bano

Looking out from our door on our little porch

Down our stairs and then you can see the ally to the street...there is a locked gate at the end so we feel very safe here.

This is the only picture I have gotten of our street...on the day Henry was keeping an eye on us:)