First Casa Alba Shift

Friday was our first Casa Alba shift. For those of you who are not familiar with Casa Alba, it is the foundation-run orphanage that holds a little over twenty children. The children range from ages three to eleven and are divided into four rooms according to their ages. We work primarily with pink room (Camara Roz) which holds the youngest children, all around 4 years old.

We decided to visit them the day before, Thursday, just to say hi and let the kids know we were here so it would not be a shock to them (especially Alex) when we showed up to work the next day. It was so neat! As we walked up to Casa Alba, the children were upstairs and could see us through the windows. They started yelling, "Todd & Rocio are here! Welcome Todd & Rocio!" They were all so excited to see us, even Alex! It amazes and humbles us when things like this occur. It's incredible to be part of these childrens' lives and have them care about us as well.

On Friday we had the afternoon shift and it was a blast. Yet we can't deny that it was EXHAUSTING! We try to blame it on the jet-lag but perhaps the fact that neither of us were ready for the energy of 5 four year olds during seven hours is closer to the truth. We kept them busy though. We took a walk to the local park and even had fun playing dress-up. Enjoy some of our pictures below!

Diana, Georghe, Gina, and Cerasela being themselves outside Casa Alba

Walking to the Park

Alex all dressed up