BV Day 4 - Belizean in magic

The van ride from the Cardies Hotel in Independence to Bella Vista takes about 15 minutes

We dropped off the soccer balls from BSU Women's soccer and Washington Elementary

Drew bringing a little Idaho to Belize

We are flying the colors today

Daryn is all smiles to be today's project manager

She jumped right in to brief the crew on the plan for the day

By the way...  it's really really hot and humid today

Ready, set, go... getting going

We've been storing our supplies in the storage shed (aka Ladies Toilet).

Tory (above) and Tara (below) help out the std VI (8th graders) on clean up duty

Tory escorted to the trash can

Half the school is out today to start their Easter/spring break.  The other half gets out at noon.  No rest for Principal Ovado seen here mowing the grass.  Principal Ovado is working hard to improve the culture of the school to develop pride in his students.  He works tirelessly to enrich the students' lives

Std I-III is out today, which means we have a full work crew.  Tasks today include finishing the tire playground, building a swing set, raking rocks off the site.  

This is difficult to see, but crews are working on various activities: tires being painted, structure being bolted, swing set being built

The tire playground activities include

Colors being chosen

and tires painted

I'm thinking the Oregon Ducks would like this color scheme

Go Broncos (we didn't have orange so use your imagination)

Color is cool

and children are really cute

For the tire structure

Tires are bolted together

And testing.... see Daryn 'testing' the tires 

While keeping watch on her crew.  Nice job multitasking Daryn

After testing, tires are painted with a primer coat

Then holes drilled for drainage

Darren, Kirsten, and Tara becoming 'one' with the tires

Our paint team wants you to guess what 'animal' the tire structure represents

Gloria's comment on the tires......'muy bonita'

I wonder how the swing set is coming along

Sara is our lookout and guard

Prepping the bolt holes

holding up the walls to the school

or not

then sawing actual 2 x 4's (i.e the boards actually measure 2 x 4.. unlike the US)

Don't believe me?  See for yourself

and sawing

and sawing

Then bolting together

oh no! we read the drawings incorrectly

So we do what any good constructor does...  get a bigger hammer

and presto.. it's fixed

buried 2 feet deep

and it was perfectly level on the first try!!

Gloria gives it a thumbs up

Caia poses

School girls clap

and Darren dances?

putting the seats on the swing

Giving the final product a test ride

We also had a lot of rocks to rake and shovel.. 

the soil here.. in non-geotechnical terms is 'lot's and lot's of rock'

so we brought in our subcontractors

and our synchronized rake team

Tory and friend checking out all the action

We learned this week, shade is our friend

Here's one of the hardware stores that we purchased sand, cement, lumber.

The site has come a long long way in 4 days

BSU students, Joni Valencia (Peacework), and Gloria's family