PingYu Home of Hope

When our family moved here, Michelle and I wanted to be able to connect with all of the kids, we decided that once a week either Michelle would take the girls that were 14 years and older out to eat or I would take the boys 14 years and older out. This was fun but we soon found out that the cost of taking out the kids to eat every week was too expensive. Also with the kids school schedules (a lot of the high school kids only get off every other week) some of the children missed out on the fun. So we decided that what we should do is just have a party at our house every Saturday night for the kids.

A typical night will involve watching a movie, playing games (like charades, this is where you have to act out something with out saying anything and have someone guess what you are, we also play several board games that we have brought over or people have sent.) Michelle usually always blesses us with baking some cookies or cakes, just recently the kids have shown a real interest in helping her in the kitchen. Another favorite thing to do is drink Kool Aid, which is another thing we are very thankful that we brought along with us and have had people send, the kids really enjoy it.

Lilly and Gail drinking Kool-Aid

Michelle and Ben both playing games with some of the kids

Holly and Rena, Michelle and Lily making soap (Thank’s to Karen’s Friends for sending it to Lily)

How many people can you fit on your couch????

John and Shirley making chocolate cake

We started off with just having the high school kids and college kids over but soon felt bad for all of the younger children (ages 9-14), mostly because they would stand at the gate of the Home Of Hope with big puppy dog eyes looking at us wondering when they would be able to go. One main reason we did not want the younger children to come was because when the children would go back home they had to take a taxi home and we did not feel comfortable with the little ones in a taxi so they were not aloud. As you probably read on our last page we bought a van back in November, so now I shuttle all of the children from the Home of Hope to our house, which takes a few trips but well worth it. Of course now the 4-8 year old kids are starting to stand at the gate wondering when they its there turn to come over. Unfortunately we just can not fit anymore kids in our home, so we try to bring them over in the morning so they can play with our boys.
We really enjoy having the kids over and sharing our home with them, but I don’t think we enjoy it as much as they enjoy coming over. Usually when we arrive at the Home of Hope on Saturdays we get bombarded with all the kids asking, “Can we go to your home?”
We thank you for reading about our everyday lives and we hope you can get a glimpse of some of the work we do here.