Well last week the carpet for the upstairs levels of the center was delivered. The fellows also did some cleaning up of the rooms. So the kids and I decided to have a few pictures taken with carpets and also to show off the clean rooms. The kids took advantage of the clean space in the large room to run around and let out some of their energy. Lord willing we will be able to begin painting the upstairs sometime next week.

The carpet has arrived.

Look how much room we have to run!

Doesn’t this room look nice and clean? Now all we have to do is get it painted.

As most of you know, we have two children at the orphanage who are not “officially” orphans. Giorgi and Marius both have living parents, but because of the lack of care that these two received, they were referred to us for placement. After seeing the conditions these children were living in and how they were being “taken care of”, we choose to go ahead and allow these children to live at the orphanage. It has been a little over three years since Giorgi and Marius came to live with us and we have never regretted this decision. As of today we are even more sure of this decision. Let me explain…when we went to pick up Marius and Giorgi three years ago, their mother had just given birth about two weeks before. This is how we found this little boy and as you can tell by the picture you can image what kind of care these children were receiving

As of today this little boy is now in Heaven. It is a tragic story. Giorgi and Marius’ mom was in the hospital for some physical problem and their father was at work and they left little Raul with his grandmother. While Raul was in her care, the grandmother began to do what she does almost every day get drunk. Little three year old Raul cried or complained, or did something to upset his grandma and she took an ax, hit him in the head and killed her own grandson. She then went to the neighbors and said nonchalantly, “I killed the little one.”

As I said it is tragic and Giorgi and Marius and the family need your prayers. As of this evening, Giorgi and Marius haven’t been told of this tragedy. However I know when they find out they will be heartbroken. Every evening they pray for their little brother. How do you tell a child about such a horrific event?

As I think about what could have been, that if these children wouldn’t have come to the orphanage, this could have been Giorgi and/or Marius. As the realization hits, you hold these children closer, you hug them harder, you tell them you love them and remember that this work is not in vain.

Please pray for Giorgi and Marius during this difficult time and pray for all of us who work at the orphanage as we try to deal with this horrible, horrible situation.

There is a little more tile work to be done before I can say it’s all done…however, yesterday and today, the men cut the tiles we used in the rooms to make edges around each one of the rooms. They have all of downstairs bathroom done, kitchen, side hallway and also some of the front hallway. Each day we are getting closer to finishing. What a great feeling!

The front hallway

The kitchen

The bathroom

Most of the plumbing has been installed downstairs. As you can see by the pictures, there is still some work to be done.

Like the sinks?

Boy’s bathroom

Girl’s bathroom

Just because I haven’t blogged doesn’t mean that there hasn’t been any work done . The men have finished most of the painting in the front hallway and also have laid the tile in this room. They have also been working hard on finishing the tile on the stairs. Things are turning out pretty nice.

The front hallway

The stairway