Wednesday night

I was just chatting on line with Kath and Colin. It's nice to be able to keep in touch in almost real time. Some families here do video conferencing with their families back home, but I don't have that technology. It rained all afternoon. Actually it thunder stormed to beat the band. I think at one point there was continuous thunder for over 10 minutes without a break. Since we were stuck inside, we worked on homework with Luke and I tried to teach Felipe how to write his new name which was a challenge because he doesn't know how to write his old name. He does know what the alphabet is and can recite the letters although not always in the correct order. It took a while, but I got across the concept of tracing over and copying the letters that I drew first. We had a bit of a discusion about what his name is. He insists that he is Juan Felipe Pinzon Gomez. I tried to tell him that he had a new family and a new name, Jonathan Felipe VanTol. Right now we have both compromised with Jon Felipe. No news on when I will be coming hack home. One of the couples who are our friends here, Phil and Laura, spent last night and all day in the hospital with their four year old son Daniel (who they adopted previously - a picture of him as a baby with Jon was on the blog a couple weeks ago). He had swollen up like a basketball after dinner last night with his tummy really distended and in a lot of discomfort. They ran a lot of tests on him, but could find no cause. By this afternoon he was over whatever it was, so they discharged him with orders to put him on a restricted diet. Laura is going home with him on Wednesday, which is the earliest they could get a flight. Phil is hoping to be able to leave with the baby then also, but it depends on all the paperwork coming through tomorrow. So pray for them, they have been here more than six weeks. If you are wondering about Jonathan's health he is doing well. He had one seizure since we have gotten him, that was on the first Saturday after we got here. He hasn't had any since. He has pretty good use of his left hand, he can grab things with it but not with much strength, and it isn't as coordinated as his right. He walks well when he has his brace and special shoes on with just a little hitch in his stride but he does get tired out and ask to be carried after a bit. He gets around without his brace okay too, although he does drag his foot more. He doesn't seem to think of himself as disabled at all and participates in all the activities all the other children do and is even a bit competitive. He also is quite charming and makes friends easily. I'll post some good pictures of him tomorrow.
Love from the boys in Colombia.