Child Of The Month

“I would like to study teaching or something related to physical education because I like sports”. Bertha arrived at Casa Sonrisa 8 years ago. At present, she is 16 years old and is one of the many adolescents who live in the foster home. She is about to finish high school. Next August, she will begin University, where she wants to study education, or to become a physical education teacher. She says that there is nothing that Casa Sonrisa does not provide for her, and that she wants to continue living there for many years to come. “I have a grandmother and a grandfather to whom I am very grateful for all that they have provided for me since I have been here.” Before coming to this home, her parents had her begging for money in the area´s streets and fields, while her mother carried on with a man who was not her father, whom she has never known. Although her mother assures her that she has more sisters, Bertha has never met any of them and lives without any blood-related siblings at Casa Sonrisa. However, that does not prevent her from looking at the other children who live with her as her brothers and sisters, and there is even a little girl named Brenda who follows her around a lot, since Bertha really helps out in the care of the little ones. “Each time I fight to go forward and not give up; I do my best and I put a lot of effort into what I do.” Her hobbies include playing soccer, watching television, spending time with her friends and reading, and although she says that she doesn´t read much, she loves reading about things that are related to what she wants to study after high school, and she also dedicates a bit of time to reading the Bible. With regard to the spiritual, she has been baptized for 4 years and recently she started joining the youth activities; she is very enthusiastic but she feels sad when she doesn´t feel like others are supporting her. She is a very happy person and the kind that is needed to do God´s work. Now her happiness appears to be contagious for the other young people. “I thank the Lord for having brought me to Casa Sonrisa because I don´t know what I would be doing if he hadn´t done so”.

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Letters From Casa

Translated letters from the children of Casa

JUNE 2009    JULY 2009    AUGUST 2009    OCTOBER 2009

Events

Chihuaha
At the end of July, a group of fourteen teenagers from Casa Sonrisa went to Chihuahua and spent a week there during a youth meeting organized by the local church. The say it was a very good experience during which not only they learned a lot, but had a lot of fun meeting people and making friends, and there were several baptisms (none were from Casa) during the week. They went to a hot water spring on their way back to Torreón.

León
Only our oldest child went to León. Her name is Karla Alonso. She came to Casa sixteen years ago. Our first child. She is currently a first semester junior in college. She is majoring in journalism. She has kept an EPA of around of 3.6. She raised 75% of expenses Casa helped with the rest. León also had a youth meeting and she was anxious to attend.

June 2009: The social events went on Saturday last week. One of them was a farewell party for American, Canadian, European and Mexican k-12 teacher that work at a local bilingual (English-Spanish) private school. They came to work with the casa children on Saturdays from 11:00: to 14:00 teaching them English and tutoring them in their school work. The other one was a group of college students that wanted to spend sometime with casa children and play with them. They brought them some goodies. (Click on Casa Events in Picture Gallery for photos)

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