A mission team from Fishersville UMC in Fishersville, VA recently visited Casa Hogar La Familia and took all of the children on a shoe-buying venture to the City of Puebla, about one hour west of the children’s home.

         Joe Lupo, a member of my church and at one time a volunteer at the home, will long be remembered by the children of Casa Hogar La Familia.  And this past week, the children were able to meet for the first time Joe’s wife, Betty and renew their relationship with Joe’s grandson, 17-year-old, Cullen Walker.  Betty practically received celebrity status because of the children’s close relationship with her recently deceased husband, Joe.

         A team of eight missioners joined in to give the living room of the new home its first coat of paint.  The walls badly needed painting since the “sala” is used constantly for dining, study, worship and just hanging out.  Director Silvia seemed very happy with the work the team did.

And thanks to a team from Fishersville UMC, two soon-to-be occupied rooms upstairs were painted two weeks ago.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Visitors can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel when walking up the stairs to the second floor.  One of the first two upstairs rooms to be occupied will house the female volunteers and the other will be occupied by a couple who will be married at the home on April 6, 2013.  The soon-to-be married couple — Omar and Cintya — recently began their engagement.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks to a gift from Acton UMC in Fort Worth, we believe we have enough capital to complete construction of these two rooms.

We have two very good reasons for wanting to complete the second floor: the first is to give us space to accommodate more children and the second is to bring us into compliance with Mexican Law.  We have more children housed in the dormitories downstairs than code permits, so we are receiving pressure to get into compliance as soon as we possibly can.

As you can see from the partially completed second floor, we will have much more room to conduct worship services on Sunday mornings and Thursday evenings.  Right now, Pastor Juan Francisco often has standing room only in the much smaller living room on the first floor.

 

 

 

 

 

It’s my pleasure to introduce a new volunteer who joined the La Familia staff this month.  Her name is Mayo and comes to La Familia from Colima.  She has made a one-year commitment to service at the home.   This photograph was taken during my visit to La Familia this past week.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now, meet our newest resident at La Familia.  Her name is Yoana.  She is 13 years of age and is originally from the city and State of Colima, located in Southwestern Mexico about three hours south of Guadalajara.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And here is a brand new photograph of the children of La Familia along with the volunteers and the directors.

 

 

This week, I received an email from Ruth Irvine, our sister in Christ and La Familia supporter from St. Andrews Episcopal in Downers Grove, IL.

Here’s what Ruth had to say:

“Well, we had the Fiesta [fundraiser] and it was just great.  I think we had about 70 people.  We got some new faces from St Andrew’s, which was wonderful.  Again, people were generous and excited about La Familia.  We raised $3,759.03, which is better than last year.”

St. Andrews has accepted responsibility for monthly support at La Familia for the month of September 2012 and has designated the balance of the money they raised to the second floor construction project.

The pastor at St. Andrews announced his support for another mission team to travel to La Familia in 2013, so this will be great news for the children.

Our thanks go out to Ruth Irvine and all of the good folks at St. Andrews in Downers Grove for their hard work and generosity in making the Fiesta Fundraiser such a huge success.