Home

So I have been home from Ecuador for about a month.
I miss it more than anything and wish I could be back there with all of my kids.
Being "home" in Cali is different and I actually miss Provo A LOT!
Living in a college town is the most wonderful thing ever, being here in Cali.. there is never anyting to do.
Although I have had some interesting adventures since I have been home.
School is extremely hard... duh it's graduate school, but it is long hours and constant work, can I be done already? The only thing that keeps me going is knowing that I will be done in a year!
Men.... I don't understand them. Confusing, confusing, confusing.

read more "Home"

Ecuador

hello to everyone in our address book! first i need to say that i am using a spanish keyboard and everything is weird i cannot figure out how to use capital letters lol. so anyways it has been a long few days we are here and are safe! our journey started thursday morning...we arrived at the airport got to the ticket counter and the lady who took Kayla's passport looked at us and said she can't go. we just stared at her, what do you mean she cant go? apparently to fly into quito your passport has to be valid for 6 months from the day you leave... her passport expied dec 1st and it was june 7th ...6days short!!! so to make a long story short we rushed to the federal building, cried to cut in the front of the line and after a very long 10 hour day of lines we got the passport!

so on friday we started the adventure again, my parents called it ground hog day so agian we went to the aiport and this time were able to get on the plane. at midnight we arrived in quito where we were picked up and taken to the quito volunteer house. we were greeted by 2 armed guards, no worries they are there to guard the house! we slept on bunkbeds that wobbled and were built with just sheet wood. at 6 am we got on the flight to cuenca, where we are today.

there has been so much to take in! we were greeted by 12 girls and 2 boys all of whom we will be living with for the next few months. the project directors and sweethearts and the house in very nice and very grande. today we had 3 orientations and were able to explore the city with our site leader. let me tell you that we stand out like a sore thumb!! especially me with the blond hair! the men just love us lol... we didnt go more than 20 feet with out getting a new cat call.. and quite frankly the city is scary!

there is mass poverty but also some very beautiful areas. we went to visit the coconut man. he carves beautiful jewlery out of this hardened fruit and it looks like ivory.

tomorrow we start our first shifts in the orphanage. 2 shifts... one from 7am til noon then we all come home and eat, mon through fri there is a cook who makes lunch. then we go to an afternoon shift around 2 and and come home at 7.

this shal be an adventure!

thank you for all your love and support

jess and kayla

p.s. appreciate your toliets! we are not allowed to flush anything down them, yes that includes toliet paper... so the little trash can by the toliet... yah, disgusting.



Hello family and friends!
We have completed our first week here, although it feels as if we have been here for a month. We work 2 shifts a day. The first is from 7-12. The second is from 2-6. In between we have a cook who cooks for us Monday-Friday. A typical meal consits of rice, potatoe, broccoli and some kind of meat.

Speaking of food, we had our first adventure to the supermaxi, that would be the grocery store. It was an adventure! There is no freezer section!! I wasn't aware that humans could survive with no frozen foods! Eggs are not kept in the fridge! We also had our first trip to the fruit market which is tables piled high of fresh fruits and veggies. There are people hand peeling pees, shucking corn, and using huge knives to chop bark off some types of roots.

We were able to go to Corpus Criste a huge celebration that has lasted over a week and when Ecuadorians party they party!! This is how Kayla described it "It was chaos! now i know why there are so many laws in the united stated we almost died like five times! There were paper cows with fireworks blowing off of them running threw masses of people. Dancers dressed in crazy costumes. Piles and piles of Ecuadorian candy. *we tried them ALL and no one got sick... so far!* There were giant barneys walking around and painted people. We had the Spanish teacher take us around so we were as safe as we could be"

Ok so back to what really matters... the work we are doing here!! So we work 2 shifts a day 7 days a week, and have only 2 shifts off a week! In addition on Wed and Thur nights we go to another orphanage from 6-7:30. On Tuesdays we have group meetings, on Sundays we have devotional, one day we go to supermaxi and one day we go to fruit buy so it is really busy! Some Sundays we get to go to church. I have been both Sundays and it has been wonderful! Although I cannot understand anything other than Jesus Cristo when we sing in Spanish the spirit is really strong. They have a keyboard and the boy who plays it must be about 6. The branch only has like 40 people in it!

We work in a total of 7 orphanages although we each have one that we work in the most. I work the most with the toddlers, almost everyday and Kayla works with the babies. Ecuadorian law does not allow us to use the names of the orphanages, the kids, or have any pictures of identifying infomation about the children sent to anyone, so I will try and tell you as much as I can. Kayla's kids are 2 days old to 2 years old. Mine are 2 years old to 5. In Kayla's section they just found a 2 day old abandoned baby. She does work such as change diapers, dress the kids, feed them, brush their teeth, bathe them and play with them. I do the same thing. She has about 8 ids and 4 babies and there are usually 2 to 3 girls working each shift. Where I work it is divided into 3 sections. Casa uno, dos and tres. The kids are divided by age and on average are 8 kids in each casa and one of us in each. They are adorable and have so much love for us! They call us mama which breaks my heart every time.

We also get to work in an orphanage with more babies and some handicapped children and another one with just severley handicapped children. The orphanages here are not what I expected. They are actual very nice! Some have volunteers that come from the community and they have everything they need... so it is not the run down desperation that I thought it would be. The kids eat basically soup and they grind up all the food into mush for the most part.

Anyway this is getting kind of long. We shal write more later, now we are trying to get Kayla registered to possibly to go BYUI in fall!!!!! :)
Thanks for all the love and support!
Jess and Kayla

Pictures from Ecuador... without the kids can be looked at at

http://byu.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2112809&l=99995&id=17802249

read more "Ecuador"

Death

So wow a lot has happen and i have not written in a really long time
So I get an email from my dad that says my sister has a very serious infection, my sister has not talked to my parents in about a month since a huge fight and she moved out and is living with friends so I am kind of the mediator. Anyways so I call her and I find out that she had like a tumor, weird pocket thing in her uterus, in her fallopian(Sp) tube or something and she thought she just had a bladder infection because it hurt but it turns out it was a tumor thing and if she had waited even one more day before going to the doctor she may have died.... and if it had ruptured it would have given her a staff infection through out her entire body.. as of now we dont know if she will beable to have children... this is some serious stuff... really scary and makes you think how quickly things can be turned around and how fast you can loose a loved one. But she did tell me that she started talking to my mom and dad again which is a really good thing and they are going through family council apparently. So yah I guess it helped heal one problem, well part of it. Im scared to move home.
I flew home last week to take the CSET in the last hour I got a migraine and could not go back and check al my work becuase I could not even read the problems, I do not think I passed it was the hardest test ever and will cost $222 to retake the test. So that makes me so worried. It was a short trip home I flew home Friday night and flew back on Sunday morning but it was good. I got to go to lunch with my grammy and papa... well they had kayla and I over.. and we had boca burgers seeing as how K is vegan.. it wasnt hapf bad and I loved being with my grandparents they are soooo funny!!!
I is really really really really skinny and it worries me. She has a bf who in her mind is the greatest guy ever which I am happy for. Her and Ben are way over... can you believe they were together for like 4 years and now its done.. good I did not like Ben.
I also went to my Grandma Valda's like a month ago.. she lives in Plymouth Utah.. never heard of it? Not suprising its like 50 houses and thats it.. oh theres a gas station and its in the middle of nowhere and grandma who is 85 lives in a beaten down trailer with scary unlce jerry and its gross oh and she building a house... the house is coming along but she yes 85 year old grandma is building the house.. like with a hammer.. lol it looks really good and is going to be awesome but the closest town is 40 minutes away I dont know why she lives there. When Tawnie and I knocked on her door she has no idea who we were... we didnt tell her we were coming, thought it would be fun to be a suprise but then she was like Jessica?? and she was so excited.
Work is going great there is a student teacher in the class her name is Mrs Foster and she is very nice Some kids are still a struggle to deal with but the rest are adorable and we have so much fun. I hope I get into CSUN Im really worried because I am applying a month well 2 months late so I hope they do not fill... I just need to have a little faith
I am now scared to death to go to ecuador.. my sister is probably not going and I was so excited to go and spen time with her and grow closer to one another while serving but now Im just scared... a third world country where I dont speak the language... I know It will be amazing but I am FREAKING out! Oh man
On Friday Hailey Howard, Tawnie and I went up the south Fork park and had a campfire.. we had smacos (totrillas with marshmellows and chocolate) and we lit a bottle of hairspray on fire.. well not the bottle but you know you spray it and light the part that is coming out on fire so its like a flamming bottle of hairspray it was fun lol and we had a boombox and just had a grand ol time. We stank after... really reaked of smoke PU
But it was a lot of funSatuday was the stake Sunday Musical thing kind of like a roadshow that was a lot of fun as well. I am really ready to go home and get away from utah. Yup.

read more "Death"

Grateful

Today I was just hit hard by gratitude. I am so grateful for my friends and the people who have been and who are a part of my life, even if things ended badly Im glad that I knew them when I did and that they enriched my life. Im grateful simply to be alive. This is one of my friends cars.
Glad he's alive.

read more "Grateful"

Moving Back

So as of today I am moving back to Cali next year and I am really excited. So school ends May 25th and then I will move home, hopefully go to Ecuador June 7- Aug 24 then start CSUB in September. The past 3 years in Provo have been just dandy but this year is just not doing it for me, I have never wanted to go home while leaving here but this year I just want to be home!! It's great and dandy but it's not "fun" like it use to be, with a great ward, and activities all the time, anyway I mean my one roommate wont do anything social, so it's hard to go to anything from Church activities to school ones to just fun ones cuz she wont go anywhere but this semester its guna be different. I will face going alone but Im going to go to institute and all the "fun" stuff. I really miss the Sarah. Anyways hopefully I will be able to do some international cinema with Gretchen, movies and dances with Ashley, and just have a fun last semster in Utah cuz then it's back to California! Im nervous to go back but really excited and I really hope that I can settle into the singles ward there and back to living at home.... eeeek! But Ill love it.. no one is ever home at my house anyways. In other news I have a 4 day weekend which will be exciting. Tonight Gretchen and Hailey and I are going out, already went to the gym... I think I am going to go earlier now because there are way less people. I really miss Coyles and am looking forward to being back in cali with her and being able to hang out and talk face to face
oops dinner is done

read more "Moving Back"

New... dare I say roommates?!

So I had a wonderful day at school... getting off at 1:30 today and on my way out to the car I get a voicemail from Tawnie... Jessica!!! You are going to be soooo mad!! I walked into the house today to BLARING country music.. Hayleys new roommate is here.... oh and shes an RM!!!!!!!!!
what a message! Oh man... So my stomach instantly turns to knots.. i get the guts to walk inside the apt.. and shes not here right now! I dunno what the problem is but I don't like meeting new people especially ones I have to live with!! What if things are worse than first semester.. I don't think thats possible.. but what if??? Oh man I gotta lay off the what if's.. but I'm freaking out!! I want things to go well and for everyone to mesh and get along I just don't want anymore crazyness here so I really hope everything works out!! I really don't want to be home right now.. especially home alone!! Ahhh! Oh boy. Ok I know everything will be great but I was hoping for a few more days with just Tawnie and I being here. Anyways I just think its weird that shes an RM... cuz shes way older than all of us. Oh dear. Ok so I best go learn some spanish... ecuador may be a calling!

read more "New... dare I say roommates?!"

back to utah

So leaving Cali was a huge upset for me and I finally realized why. I never thought I would really "miss" my family. This is my third year up here in Provo and I have never been homesick. Usually I love going back to cali to see my family, coyles, and of course my dogs lol but when the time comes to go home I'm a bit sad but ready to get back to things. It's like havin two lives... which in itself is weird! Ok so this year I really didn't want to come back not at thanksgiving and not now. I realize now that is really is true.. i miss my family. I think the thing that has changed is simple: my family. Growing up the house was full of hatred, screaming, fights every day, yelling, emotional issues, everyone pretty much hated eachother and put us all together and things got worse.. basically I lived on the verge that my parents would be separated at any day.. our house was built on eggs and do many had cracked there was barely anything holding it up. As the years went past my parents tried everything to hold the family together, basically only staying together because of my sister and I. Well after counseling failed, and those men are from mars women from venus videos, and everything else they seeked, things were still bad. However... things have finally changed. My parents constant efforts and endulging themselves more in church has really paid off. I remember 2 years ago when i went home I saw my parents sitting on the couch together.... and my dad had his arm around my mom.... I have never ever seen anything like this before and was a little taken back. In new York they actually walked down the streets holding hands and in Europe there was only one explosion... thank goodness! Parents can be irrational and embarassing in public.. anyways they actually.. dare I say it.. love eachother now?! Yah. So I like being home.. there isnt as much arguing I dont have to sit in the closet and cry or get in the car and just get out of there ... I can be home and truely love being home. I like being around my parents and my sister. My sister has come a long long long way. We use to hate eachother with a passion and I was pretty much for lack of other words a complete and total bi*ch to her. About 3 years ago we started to get along and last year we became so close and my love for her has grown a hundred fold. We can hang out and talk about things and it is just awesome. She too has come out of a really really hard time of her life and although she is still facing so many challenges with my parents they even get along. Anyway life is so much better and I have never had a chance to live with this "new" family. Which is a huge part of why I really want to go home next year and do school in Cali.. although I don't know if its just a facade. But whatever it is, I like it. Just goes to show people can really change if they want to.
Anyways enough about the family mumbo jumbo. Its snowing outside and I am not a fan!! Life was going so well here in Provo.. I have no roommates this week except tawnie and the one who hates everyone has moved out. Furthermore there is nobody in this complex so there is sooooo much parking!! It is so nice to beable to go to the gym and come home and not worry about where i am going to park.. we can leave and come as we please and know our spot will be there... sounds trivial and stupid but it's amazing the kind of things that can make you smile. For the only time I have acutally enjoyed living in this ghetto hole in the ground complex. I still wish so much that I could somehow move out but we are making the best of things. Speaking of making one smile.. I got a magic bullet for christmas ... lol.. it is the most amazing blended on the earth lol it is so awesome and Tawnie and I are having so much fun concocting things in that blender of ours.
Christmas was wonderful. Going to my grandmas was amazing.. something I look forward to every year. I love my family and seing all of them at Grandmas is so much fun. Especially eating grandmas food and just laughing for hours. Christmas morning is pretty much a laugh fest at our house with my dad always saying.. what is it velvet? Who knows where that came from but he has been saying it every year for as long as I can remember. Anyway this christmas was good.. my family and I decided to keep things simple and instead of overloading on presents for ourselves we decided that we would get credit gift cards with money on them and all year long we would buy christmas presents for the Sheriffs Childrens donation thing and then donate them all next year. So it will be like remembering others and what Christmas is all about. all year long. I love my mom for it. her and my sister and really have the kindest of hearts and are so willing to give.

read more "back to utah"