Welcome baby girl!

Special welcome to the newest baby girl!

She is so precious and we are so excited to have her in our family.
Please be praying for her as she adjusts and grows here.

Please be praying for this sweet baby girl. She has already been through so much in the first three weeks of her life. She was abandoned on the ground and the next morning brought to the hospital where she stayed for ten days. This beautiful baby is healing from where ants ate away at her face leaving a large cut from her head down to her cheek. It has been amazing seeing her transform already as her cut heals and she has already regained weight. What a precious little one.

I will try to get some pictures soon!

Thank you for praying!!!
Much love from Bolivia,

Lily Fluharty

2 years in bolivia

Two years in Bolivia.

Two years ago today an 18 year old girl stepped blindly unto Bolivian soil and started an amazing journey.

I never could have imagine how God has lead me in these past two years.

So much has happened and I've grown and learned so much and can't believe God's goodness and faithfulness and love for me in this time called Bolivia.

It's been a pretty crazy two years.

Traveled alone and with my best friend
Learned a new language
Eaten snake, tongue, cow stomach, armadillo, worms and ants
I've become a Tia and mommy to these little ones
I've worked hard and learned how to wash clothes by hand, clean a house even when there is no water, cut up a cow, clean a pigsty, use a machete, cook, walk up and down mountains and so much more.
I've played hard and made goals and swam and gone to waterfalls and rivers
I've laughed and laughed and laughed with these beautiful children.
I have made some amazing friends
I've had a little baby named after me
I've had problems and felt weak and alone and have cried
I have seen God lift me up and give me strength again and again.
I have fallen short and cried our for forgiveness and God has lavished His grace on me.

I have grown so much and God is teaching me that He is my everything. Oh how beautiful is my Savior and His love for me. I don't deserve it. Amazing love how can it be?

Praying that this would be a year where I would continue to be blown away with God's love.
A year filled with joy and boldness.
A year filled with seeking Christ above ALL else.

I want to thank you all for your love and prayers and support over these last two years!!!
I have grown so much from the 18 year old who didn't know Spanish to where God has lead me today.
Thank you for your love for me and also for these precious children.

So much love from Bolivia!!!


~Lily Fluharty

Rainy update

It has been raining nonstop for the past 2 weeks.

Makes it a lot harder to hang clothes out to dry.
Everything is MUD. Good thing the kids have rubber boots.
The road to Casa de Esperanza from town is really bad right now (super slippery mud) and our means of transportation are limited which means quite a few days that the kids are missing school.

Ironically we haven't had water in the houses for the past four days... so we've been collecting rain water to wash dishes and to clean the house and use in the bathrooms. The joys of living in Bolivia! :)

I've definitely taken water and sunshine for granted in the past!

Juanes and Javier on their first day of Kindergarten

There's been a LOT of changes this past week.

School started for all the kids and four of my littles started kindergarten and they are SO excited.
They love their uniforms and their new shoes and backpacks. So cute!!!

Three of my oldest kids in my house (they started first grade) ended up switching to different houses and little baby Emanuel moved in to my home. The noise level has been reduced significantly. It literally makes me laugh how loud my house can be at times. 8 kids.

Emanuel fell asleep talking on the phone

Enjoying each new day with these crazy kiddos. They make me laugh as they learn and laugh and play.  Their getting soooo big!!!

God continues to blow me away with His love. Living alone in a different country is definitely an adventure and not always easy and God continues to teach me to cast ALL my cares upon Him. Resting in His faithful arms.

So much love from Bolivia!!!

Please be praying for...
-Water!!! That the mud wouldn't clog the pipes and that we could get water ASAP in the houses
-For my 4 kindergarteners that they would be able to thrive in the classroom
-For baby Emanuel as he adjusts to our house. (He's such a good baby)

Thank you all! Lots of love!!!!!

In Christ who blesses me abundantly,
Lily Fluharty

Happy birthday Emanuel

Baby boy at 3 weeks

Happy 1st birthday to sweet Emanuel! He has grown so much in this past year from the little baby with no name to this sweet and precious little boy. Sweet Emanuel may God bless you in this next year of your life! May you live for Christ and grow up in Him. I love you!

Emanuel now 1!

I don't deserve syrup!

Wow! So blessed by God's goodness and the love and kisses from my little ones. Gorgeous sunrises that bring tears to my eyes as I feel God's nearness, little ones wrapping their chubby arms around my neck surprising me from behind when I most need a hug, amazing times of worship and letting go of my fears and failures and resting in the completed work of Christ. I don't deserve it! So blessed by my life. So blessed by these children. So blessed by my Savior.

Finishing up the last few hours of my day off before I head back to my house and the kids tomorrow morning. Is it weird that I miss them on my day off? 

And my weekend got 1000 times better when someone brought me SYRUP from the states. Seriously!!! I almost started crying. Well... not really but I definitely miss some of the weirdest stuff. So I have made pancakes 6 times in the last 24 hours from scratch. Oh so good!

Here comes another crazy week! :) Headed to the pool with a bunch of the older girls tomorrow. Classes start next week for all the kids so were trying to enjoy the last week of vacations. 

Thank you for all your prayers and support!!! Thanks for reading this blog as well!!! I hope you fall in love a little more with my beautiful children as you read and see how good God is. His love never fails! 

Much love!!!

Lily Fluharty

Waterfalls, water and superwoman

Josue at the waterfalls

I have several half written blog posts that I keep starting and never finish. Sometimes it is so hard to express my life here and the joys and ups and downs of living with so many kids. It is definitely an adventure.

This week we took all the kids on a 1 hour walk up the dirt road away from the orphanage to three small beautiful waterfalls and we had a blast laughing and playing together. On the way up to the waterfalls, one of my little guys got tired so I lifted him up on my shoulders and carried him for a while with him clinging to me with his arms around my head sometimes covering my eyes with his tiny hands. We laughed! On the way down, I ended up carrying his twin brother sitting on top of my backpack filled with waterbottles. I wish I had a picture of him sitting there barely holding on and crying because he just wanted the road to end and to arrive back at home. We all arrived home happy, tired and dirty.

With lots of crazy kiddos at the waterfalls

The past 3 days there has been no water which is always an extra adventure. We have been collecting rain water for bathrooms, for washing dirty clothes and for washing dishes. Woke up at 2 am this morning to a thunderstorm and my first thought was “YAY! MORE WATER!!!” And I ran outside in the dark to fill up more buckets. Made me laugh this morning as I realized how bolivian my thinking was. 

Today I have the day off and it feels good to just curl up on my bed, plug my ipod into my ears and relax. Sometimes there is so much chaos and noise in living in a small house with 12 people plus having over 100 people around 24/7. I love the craziness of my life but I also don’t take for granted the time I have to slow down and rest because I definitely need it. I am not superwoman- even though it would be so much easier if I was. I wish I could fly and have superstrength. 

Amazing to see my weakness and cry out to God and see His faithfulness time and again. In Him I am strong. 

He gives me strength to do what I do. 

With the twins Javier and Juanes

I wish I could videotape our home one day and put it in fastfoward and watch us all move around like tiny ants. It would be hilarious. There is so much movement and noise and we definitely do LOUD really well. All the giggles and laughs are permanently recorded in my brain. At night I have memorized the sounds of my little guys and call tell who is waking up to go to the bathroom or who is whispering without even having to look. When there is a storm I know that Andres will come in wanting a hug and to pray. I know that if it’s really hot out Ismael will be curled up on the cool cement floor. I know that if I wake up super early, Ely will wake up with me and follow me around with whatever I do. 

These kids are precious. So blessed by God to be a part of their lives. 

This post is really jumbled. It’s like 4 posts smashed together and whatever else is trying to escape my head. Sorry for the craziness of my posts... :) Just trying to share little snapshots of the beauty of Bolivia and how crazy good God is. And also just how adorable these kids are. 

Much love from Bolivia and 10 munchkins and a GIANT frog that we caught (I’ll post pics later)

~Lily Fluharty

Watching God's show

Yesterday I had the day off and I locked myself in my room to get some rest and downtime. Sometimes living with so many people can be overwhelming. I was ready to sleep and be alone and enjoy my night off. 

I couldn’t fall asleep last night and after midnight I dozed off to the sound of falling rain. Ten minutes later I heard one of my little guys crying because he was afraid of the lightning. He crawled into bed with me and I thought that was it and that he would be able to sleep. He lay stiff as a board staring out the window at the lightning flash and I knew I wouldn’t be falling asleep anytime soon. So we wrapped up together in my blanket and tiptoes outside with two pieces of chocolate chip break (my favorite Christmas food here) and we watched the lightning show. So amazingly beautiful. Come back inside and we snuggled back into my bed. I was dozing off when he goes, “Tia, is God here right now?” oh it made my heart sing. We then talked about God and how He is EVERYWHERE at once and how God wants to enter our hearts. My little guy giggled and pointed to his chest, “In here?” he asked me. We giggled and whispered for an hour before we both fell asleep after he promised me three times he wouldn’t wet the bed. 

It was a precious time with my sweet little guy. 

It made me laugh to realize that on my “day off” I ended up staying up with my sweetie pie till 3am. But I loved every minute of it. This morning he hugged me and smiled up at me. He didn’t say anything about last night. But He doesn’t have to. We will always have a special moment together, sitting out on the porch listening to the rain fall and watching lighting light up the neighboring mountains. Watching God’s show as we call it.  

Blessings,

Lily Fluharty