August Update

Its been a busy month at House of Hope! We have a new intern from the Netherlands who has been spending a lot of time with the children, teaching them new things and having lots of fun!

Swamini, Sandesh and Sonali playing a game of homemade Twister. 

Sweet Esther is growing so fast!

Vishal learns to make pizza.

Taekwondo class

Future Taekwondo Black-Belts

Chetan, the rockstar

Chetan learned all his cool moves from Aunty!

Monsoon Update

After 2 1/2 months of rain, rain, rain, monsoon is almost over here in India. Monsoon can be boring when you're a child because you can't play outside in the rain. But we have managed to have some fun and stay busy in the past few months. We are also happy to say that our children have all stayed relatively healthy during a time where many people become ill with the change of weather here. 

Here's some pictures of what's been happening around our house over the past few months:

Baby Esther is growing so nicely.

The kids got a package from America with lots of fun glasses!

Sakshi, the rockstar

Funny Face Prasanna

Sanatan turned 11 in July! We all really enjoyed his airplane birthday cake!

The children started back to school at the end of June. 

They are all doing well and enjoying their teachers and classes. 

On 15 August many of the kids performed in their school's Independence Day program. 

HOH Girls performing Raang De Basanti

Sandesh giving a speech about Mahatma Ghandi

Happy Independence Day!

Congratulations Monica!

Today is a big day for Monica Mathew - she has just completed 12th standard! What a relief to be finished with high school! She is all smiles today and her mother, Sangita couldn't be more proud. Monica has spent a lot of her time working at House of Hope during the last several years. The children love her very much!

Monica wants to be a teacher, so she will start teacher training school in June. She will also be working part time in Bright Star Education as the UKG teacher assistant. She has grown up to be a beautiful young lady and we are excited for this next season of her life!

Congratulations Monica!
We love you and are so proud of you!

Introducing Baby Esther

Esther
Born April 19, 2011
Weight 2 kg

Our newest addition to House of Hope is tiny baby Esther! There was some confusion over her name. The staff had the privilege of naming her. First they chose Hope, then Hosanna, but finally they settled on Esther. Esther's mother is also at House of Hope. As soon as she gave birth, the mother and baby were abandoned by their family. A social worker brought them to House of Hope. We are very thankful for this new life and excited to have her in our family!

Mother and Baby

Monica and Swamily welcoming Esther.

Angel and Esther: the start of a new friendship?

Sweet baby girl

She is already loved by so many!

Bye Bye Anneloes!

Yesterday was a sad day for us at House of Hope. It was time to say goodbye to Anneloes, an intern from Holland who came to work at our house. During the 5 months that she was here, Anneloes did many fun things with the kids. Much thanks to Anneloes for her friendship and hard work! She will be missed by everyone!

Happy Holi!

On the 20^th of March we celebrated Holi, a festival to celebrate the beginning of the spring. What it’s basically all about is COLOR. Everyone carries around bags of colored powder which you can throw on other people while you wish them a ‘Happy Holi’. In House of Hope we had a huge explosion of pink, purple, green yellow and blue with a lot of water. It eventually ended up in a mud fight and we had a lot of fun. Pictures say more than a thousand words, so enjoy:

New Furniture!

Slowly but steady we are getting an extreme home makeover! A few months ago, the inside of the house was given a fresh coat of paint. A few weeks ago, the play area was renovated and is now looking bright and colorful. And this week we got new furniture! It's as if we have a brand new living room. The kids love reading their books here, and the staff doesn’t mind joining them! It has been a lot of work, but a lot of fun as well to make this house a home!

Wouldn't you like to come sit and join us for some tea?

And we'll leave you with a few pictures of just some of the smiling faces from around our home: 

Angel enjoying bath time

Chetan is all smiles!

Sakshi and Sanatan with their best friends Justin, Jaleesa and Nadine

Prasanna the high jumper!