My Sweet Isaac

I received a letter from Isaac in Mexico today with this picture enclosed.
Oh my goodness!  Don't you just want to squeeze him?
Isaac just turned nine, and I love his cute smile.  Boys always have a hard time knowing how to smile for pictures, but they come out looking adorable.  
On the back, he wrote, "Estoy en jardin de mi mama, hay flores, platanares."
That means (although not written perfectly), "I am in my mom's garden, there are flowers, bananas."
I will not correct his comma splice. After all, I just learned his language.  :)
I'm so happy to receive a picture of him other than the official Compassion pictures.  He is only the second out of my eight children who has sent a picture.  I love the fact that I can see him at his home, and I totally love the banana trees, being the fan of all things tropical that I am.
Isaac wrote a rather long letter; I've always been impressed with how well he writes even though he's so young.  He's been writing his own letters ever since I began sponsoring him, which was about 18 months ago.  It's unusual for one so young to write himself.  The cool thing about that is that I've been able to see him mature as a writer.  Oh brother, there I go being an English teacher again!
I write very often to my children--once a week.  At first I was afraid that was too much (how crazy is that?), but they thank me often for sending "muchas cartas."  I pray the letters help them to feel loved.  He says that it is the rainy season where he lives and wants to know if it ever rains where I live.  Hmm--there's a tropical storm headed this way at the moment, so yes.  
This is the part I like the best:  He says his family is happy because they know me through my pictures.  I often think of just the child and me and forget that the family is also involved.  I imagine how good his parents must feel to know that someone in another country loves their son.  :)
Sponsorship rocks.  That's about all I have to say about that!
Even though Isaac writes his own letters, he always draws a picture.  This is the first one without a mountain, but he always has a horse (or maybe it's a donkey), and I think this one might also include a rabbit.  I love it.  I'm glad to see that he has drawn a sun.