We are soooo happy to be back with the children from Stone Lion.  They don’t get as many visitors as some of the other orphanages we travel to, so they were pretty excited to see us too. All the older kids remembered us from our trip in September.

There are about 40 children that live here with another 20 more in foster care nearby. The kids in the orphanage live in units with 2 nannies and 7 kids of various ages. They stay with the same nannies and same group of kids as they get older.  Because the numbers are smaller and there is more consistency with caregivers, there is an intimacy here that we don’t feel in some of the larger institutions.  And the smaller numbers also means lots more time with each child that we meet! 

Our day started with Renae and Reagan—yin and yang.  Renae is quiet, gentle and very sincere. Reagan is outgoing, silly, and incredibly charming.  They are best friends. They bring out the best in each other.  Opposites really do attract.

We then moved on to some other familiar faces, the boys: Reid, Remy and Rylan. They amazed us with their goofy jokes and rough-housing when they played together. As well as their intensity and concentration in showing us their math and reading skills.  And the sweetness of their grins, I mean….

The end of the day really was the icing on the cake though. We played memory. Well, that was the central activity—but it was mostly an exercise in turn taking.  With six kids of various ages, things got silly quickly. As the kids got more comfortable, more English started getting spoken.  Echoes of “Ok”  “your turn” “what?” and huge giggles filled the room. 

It’s so good to be back here!! We have a few more kids to see tomorrow and then we will travel back to meet up with the rest of the team again.