Day 2. 48 children with new smiles!

It has been so busy and very little access to wifi!  My day starts at 5 am and i do not go to bed until 1030. There are ao many children at the hospital and then we go over to the shelter where more children wait their turn. I love playing with the babies. There are so many that need their lips fixed. Today i had a chance to go into surgery with my grandfather.  He took care of a 14 year old girl who is the youngest of 13. Her family did not know about opsmile until this year. Ahe is quiet and does not have much confidence. I hope now she will. I have pics of her before and right after. Her sister brought her to the hospital.  We are working with lots of high school students from the local opsmile
Club. There are ao many people here volunteering. Did you know nicaragua is the second poorest country behind haiti?  They really need us!

Playing catch up. Day 3

I have been working hard and there are so many kids getting surgeries. We screened 257 kids and after three days of surgery have taken care of about 65 kids. There are lots of babies and i love playing with them especially before they go into surgery. Lots of times after surgery they are groggy and not ready to play. I really like working with the different volunteers and the students from nicaragua  everyone works very hard. Yesterday i went into surgery with my grandpa to watch a surgery for a 14 yeR old girl. She had never heard of opsmile until this year. Her sister brought her to us. Her sister was really happy when she saw her after surgery. The gi was the you gest of 13 kids!  Today i went to give my presentations about shamrock to a bilingual school 6th and 7th graders.  It was funny that they were all excited to have a picture with me. There is a high school club at their school and now they are excited to join. Then we went to a day care for children of the market workers. 145 kids in one open space but ll separated i to different sections and learning. If this school was not there they would just sit in the bot market on the floor while their pArents  worked. It is paid for by the sugar ane company. After lunch we went to an orphanage for 22 girls  they seemed happy but it was a very uncluttered place. I could not figure out where they kept their clothes. All the girls were in two rooms with lots of bunk beds. They liked the high school presentations and the talk about operation smile. The end of our day we spent helping the moms with their cruing babies. The moms look so tired. One time my mom had one and i had one but mine was really happy.  We took care of lots of kids with palates so they do not liem the string in their mouth that holds the bandage in place. Tomorrow they will cut it and thry will like that.  I only have one more day here. It will be a little sad to leave but i will not miss my cold showers!  I will keep trying to send pictures. I dont know why we cant get it to work.  I cant wait to show you all fonthe beautiful kids.

Screening over. Surgery starts!

It has been a busy few days and now we can finally find some wifi to update everyone. Our opsmile team is great and from lots of different places. Denmark, Sweeden, Australia, Turkey, Nicaragua and the US. We have LOTS of Nicaraguan students volunteering with us and they are so dedicated to The children of Operation Smile.
We screened 257 children and there are a lot with new clefts and open palates. Lots of small babies. Even a 5 day old. But we can't take care of some of them because they are too small. I am going to try posting pics in the next post. Tomorrow we have 26 kids on the schedule and hoping to do 115 kids this week. It is hot here but everyone is drinking lots of water and staying happy!

Three days and counting....

We are almost ready!  Bags are filling with toys, balls, tattoos and toothbrushes!  I am trying to find all of my opsmile tshirts!  Morgan our program coord in already there and she said it is HOT!  Last thing I need to pack are the hospital gowns my 5th grade friends and I at Alanton made last week!  Stay tuned.....