Starting Family Structures

We began some structures for the girls to earn trips, and allowances. We agreed on four family rules that we wanted the girls to follow. We met with them yesterday after dinner (we've had such meetings at every meal) and tonight we met with each one of the girls to let them know if they had earned their 'stars'. The big prize will be going to the movies and their first allowance. Some of the girls got all their stars, and some didn't. There are opportunities of extra things to do to earn stars back.
We continue to meet with the girls and prepare them for the U.S. culture. The girls are great but can be a little rambunctious and definitely talkative when they are all together. You have to also understand we have no big parks or yard (just a small playground in the back that is shared by all the residents), very few books that I have bought in bookstore close to here, Jenga, Uno and a swimming pool. Our apartment is about 1100 square feet, there is no dryer a very small fridge, a radio and two small T.Vs. The computer we brought has been extremely helpful. It seems that most of the kids in this complex are small. I have not seen very many kids the girls age. Our apartment complex has four buildings with four apartments in each floor and 21 floors. One plus is that the grocery store delivers and so do all restaurants and we get a cleaning lady once a week. The girls are revealing more about their history and we have no reason to believe that what they are sharing is not true. We can't and won't share any of these details with you. I know many of you are curious about this but we won't because the girls history is for them to share and we don't want to speak for them. All we can tell you is that these girls are brave, resilient and have positive attitudes in spite of their history. We have cried many times already sometimes in front of them sometimes not (one of the girls said about Alex: 'papi is very sentimental, isn't he?'). We have many funny and entertaining stories as well. So today as usual I went to the grocery store with two of the girls. In Colombia when you pay, you must show your national ID or cedula for plastic transactions. Since we don't have this, we show our passport of Colombian Visa. When I went to pay to show my passport, our youngest said to the cashier "We are the Martin family".
Before going to sleep today I told Alex to take the girls to the playground since they had taken naps earlier and had energy to burn. While they were down there they saw some boys playing in the basketball court. The girls were talking about the boys, our youngest said 'well, they were kind of cute'. Then our third said " No they were not, I didn't like any of them", our second replied "You never like any boys". Then she replied "Oh Yes I do, I like papi, he is the only boy I like". Alex gave a sight of relief. He has already applied for the new non-profit called "DADD": 'Dads Against Daughters Dating' :)
To Alex's dad, we say "Get Well Soon". --MM