Sharing the Dream

Thursday, July 6

Got up early and did my journaling and worked on finances some more. At 9 Virginia and I were going to the accountant that we work with here. Julio is the accountant for our NGO here. He is very good and works with Mayan Hands. His office/Mayan Hands warehouse, is right next to our friend Deborah's house. We jumped in Virginia's little Volkswagen, where the door is falling apart and she has to shut it from the outside by opening the window. I guess there wasn't any jumping, it was more like squeezing. We spent several hours with Julio discussing finances and also shipping. He is going to help Virginia for a few times do our shipping. He is setting up some computer programs to help us. Shipping crafts from Guatemala is very complicated. When we shipped before we always did it with another organization but now it is time to do it ourselves. It is a way to get new items, items that we have designed with groups and no one else has and also to help out the very small groups we work with in Guatemala who don't have representatives in the US to help them. I am excited about doing this.

We left and came back here to the centre. We had lots of people coming today. Diego's son came in the afternoon with a huge bag of crafts, Domingo brought the beads back and Angie and her granddaughter and another friend stopped by to talk and to pick up the check. It was good to see Angie although she is really worried about the orphanage. We spent an hour together just talking. She said the money was a God send and would really help them right now... Later in the afternoon Heather came from Santiago to spend the night. Sara and I did packing and then Sara, Diana, Heather and I planted our plants. We then made a typical Guatemalan meal. Platinos, beans, eggs, and tortillas. There is a stand right across the street where two women make tortillas so we went over then and bought some fresh ones...

It was a pleasant evening. I was going to do my journaling but decided I would just spend time with them instead... So.. I got up early this morning to do this. The taxi is coming at 6:30.. I am packed and ready to go. I will send some more photos later. Please keep the orphanage children, the workers, and the volunteers in your prayers.

Thank you to all of you for your continued support of the projects and the artisanias. None of the great things would be happening without all of you. We really do walk hand in hand with the people here to "Share the Dream".

Peace and Love,
Diane