Peguche!

Hey everyone,
We arrived friday to our host community of Peguche. We spent a couple of days in Iluman which is one of the other host communities. It was pretty amazing there and we had a chance to get accustomed to the food and the weather.
Peguche is absolutely beautiful. It is in a valley with Otavalo, Iluman and several other small communities. We are right in the shadow of Imbabura, a dormant volcano. We are going to climb up next weekend to a sacred site on Imbabura.
My family here is wonderful. Candice and I are living with Consuelo and her sister Marisol who has a two week old baby boy. Next door live her grandparents and across the yard lives her uncle Jesus. Jesus´ sister Luz Marina lives up the street with her husband Marcelo and their daughter Shelley. Luz Marina and Marcelo are the host family for Allan and Raphael so we see eachother all the time. Most days we eat with Consuelo and Jesus and Abuelito (which is what we call Consuelo´s grandfather.
The Spanish is coming along nicely but I still can´t communicate all the ideas that I want to. We started work today but there wasn´t much for us to do because it is the 10th anniversary of the school that we are working in. There was a presentation that took forever and then the kids and parents had soccer and volleyball tournaments. We made friends with some girls from the school and they helped Candice with her Spanish homework.
Overall my impressions here are good. Peguche is a beautiful town and the people are very friendly. It is very safe here and the people really look out for eachother. The food is really good too. Lots of corn and potatoes. We have fresh juice every morning for breakfast. Melon or blackberry or tomate de arbol (a kind of sweet tree tomato.) I have to leave it at that. I love you all!
Anna