Kat, yes, in fact I talked to and played Scrabble with Maria earlier today. We have an on-going couple of games going on Facebook, just whenever we have time to take our turn. She's planning to come back to visit this summer or in the fall if she gets accepted to a college here. She still hasn't heard from them. She's still engaged to her boyfriend she met here last year. I invited him to spend yesterday with us celebrating Sola's birthday because he sent me a message Friday about the tornado warnings and said he wanted to hang out with us sometime. The last I heard from Johanna was when Luther died, she posted on my facebook page. She doesn't keep in contact with any of us, including Maria, which kind of makes me sad. And, no, not at my goal weight. I gained a few pounds over the Winter, I think from eating too many carbs that I wasn't supposed to eat. I added bread back into my diet and am cutting it back out again so I'm back down to what I was before now. I'd like to lose another 25 pounds even though everyone tells me I'm too skinny now. We did try a college student, not one that lives with us just to spend time with the family and do things with. The one we started with was a graduate student from China who was always too busy. We finally had dinner together and she barely spoke to us and when I invited her to have Thanksgiving dinner with us she said she was going to the university's dinner. So, I took that as she didn't really want to spend time with us. She was older, around 27 so that may have been part of the problem. The program called me about a month ago to see if I wanted another student so I said ok. This one is an undergraduate student, same age as Alex, from China again. Our first outing didn't happen because she got drunk with her boyfriend the night before and didn't answer my text messages or calls when we went to pick her up because she was asleep. LOL! That's kind of sad, Ellendi, that's the whole point of the exchange programs to get to know the host family and their culture. Maybe that's why they don't pay us. Maybe they think people who aren't paid will be doing it for the right reasons, not just the money.

Me too Kat! Bunnylover, I tried so hard not to cry yesterday because I knew it would make it worse for her and her boyfriend. I did tear up, though, can't stand it when other people cry. She sent me a message on Facebook and is home now. Her boyfriend came over last night to give me a hug. He said he was too upset to think about it at the airport. Poor kid. He, Lauren and one of Lauren's friends played dance, dance revolution last night and then we played a couple games of Sorry. He's a nice kid and I told him he was welcome over here anytime.

We ahve also had exchange student. The first couple of weeks are hard with adjustments for everyone. I expect some of what you saw was just being overtired! What program are you going through? Do they have a "counselor" type person who oversees their stay? We went through Rotary and they had a member assigned to them. They took them out to eat and talked about any issues the students were having. They would also sit down with us and go over anything we were concerned about. They did a family meeting within the first few days to go over rules and expectations. It really helped! Let me know if I can help!

Thanks for the update. We hosted an exchange student from Italy when I was in high school, I was a sophomore and she was a senior. Initially there was a bit of jealousy on my part- but when I got over that we became more like sisters. We did not do much together socially, but got along well at home. I also was an exchange student to Germany the year after I finished high school. Homesickness is a big part of it, but having a caring and involved family helped me to overcome it. Letters from home were an important link, there was only snail mail, no e-mail or texts for instant communication. I think in some ways that helped me to assimilate to their way of life. Congratulations for taking in the 2 girls, I would bet that the cultural understanding and friendships that you gain will be well worth any expenses of having them with you. Best of luck-and please keep updated!