Home at last!

Hello everyone!  I have now been home for two weeks and it has been wonderful!  I was so excited to see my family and reunite with my friends!  It was a little overwhelming to jump into Christmas right away but it was so nice to be back in my town and all the familiarity.  I will now be home through February before heading back to Peru.  I don't know what I am going to do all this time.  Last week I worked 30 hours at my library but they don't have any more hours for me and even if they did, I'm not sure I could handle it since I had nothing to do!  But actually I would be thankful for any work because it would be nice to make some money after all the spending this semester.  I have one small "job", helping with childcare for an hour and a half on Thursdays during a yoga class at a church.  And really I am thankful for that, even though it is very few hours - every little bit counts.  Otherwise to keep occupied I think I will be working out a lot - I got a month long membership to the Y and am enjoying exercising a lot.  I am also planning on helping out at the high school youth group at my church on Thursday evenings.  I used to help out at junior high youth group when I was in high school so I'm excited to hang out with some of the same kids who are now in high school.  This weekend I am hoping to go up to Hope to visit all my friends who I have been missing all semester.   I am sooooo anxious to see everyone!  They say that reverse culture shock can be really awful but I have to say that I don't seem to be experiencing it yet.  I had a shock yesterday when I was at a grocery store checking out with my mom and I was looking at this display of special bread and at first I didn't even realize what I was looking at and then suddenly my eyes grew wide.  It was a huge display of panetón, which is this really popular Christmas bread in Peru!  Everyone eats panetón at Christmas time in Peru, although I don't know why because I did not think it was very tasty.  Apparently it is a bread that comes originally from Italy and the bread that I saw in the store yesterday was not Peruvian since it was spelled Panettone instead of Panetón, but still.  I am starting to miss Spanish a little bit but at the same time it is so relieving to be able to talk and know that people will understand me and that I don't sound ridiculous.  I don't have to walk around with the fear of accidentally saying something embarrassing that I didn't actually mean to say.  And I don't have to worry about understanding other people!  It is so relaxing!  I wish I still had a way to practice Spanish though.  I feel like I am going to forget a lot in the two months that I am home!  I'm hoping to make it to the Hispanic church that meets in my church's chapel on Sunday mornings.  I went there a few times over the summer and I am anxious to go back and actually be able to understand people when they talk to me.  Plus the pastor is Peruvian, so it will be exciting to talk to him!  Last night I started talking about Diego and Valentina with my friends and suddenly I really missed them!  They're going to get so big in two months and what if they forget me????!!!  And there is going to be a new baby when I come back which I am so excited for!  I am soo glad to be home for five months and I really needed a break from Peru but I think I will be excited to go back in March.  I miss my host family.  Soooo, that's about all for my update on home I think.  Thanks for reading!