Hortensia lives with her five children Vilma (27), Danny (23), Olga (21), Roxana (20) and Wilmer (13) in the village of El Duranzo, Chimaltenango.

For twelve years, Hortensia cooked over an open flame adobe stove, the smoke would fill the air of her kitchen causing smoke to enter her eyes and causing a cough. She had problems with the smoke before because it filled the area. “Now everything leaves,” she says. Hortensia, beams when talking about the new stove she received thanks to the volunteers with Habitat.

She likes her stove because it saves wood—she now uses only two pieces. “It’s good for cooking my food, especially my tortillas and her atol, a traditional central American dish made of corn. Her message for the brigade is this, “it was a pleasure to have you with us –you helped us in this and we never had to wait, thanks to God and to you for helping us with us.”

Dorotea Chon Recopachi, her husband and 4 children live in the village of El Rejon Sumpango. Dorotea’s husband works in agriculture while Dorotea is a homemaker. The family has lived in their current house for fifteen years, where all the girls Jenny, Dora, Karen  and Kay were born and raised. For most of those fifteen years, Dorotea has cooked with an open fire “pollo” stove, the smoke from the wood affected her eyes, her throat and even her nerves, Dorotea says.

Recently, the family received a smokeless stoves. “Now (the smoke) leaves the house, it goes outside.”

She mentioned that not only does the smoke leave the house but the stove also saves wood. “I can cook all of my food at once, all of our breakfast is easier to make and even all the food before we go out to the fields.”

Having her new stove has changed her family’s life, now they all sit around the stove, which is big enough to be used as a table and now used to enjoy families meals together. “They can be this close to the stove and nobody gets burned” Dorotea demonstrated as one of her children ate, she shared that the kids sometimes got burnt while near the old stove.

Dorotea and her family are thankful to the volunteers who came and helped to build her new stove “I love it and i am so thankful to God and to the volunteers for coming so far to be with us and to give us such a beautiful gift.”

Maria and Oscar live with their two sons Wilfredo (12) and Ervin Elias (9) in the village of El Rejon Sumpango. Maria is a homemaker while Oscar takes care of the family’s farm while their sons are enrolled in school. They’ve lived in their current house for 12 years and just 6 months ago, they received a new smokeless stove through Habitat. Maria’s favorite feature of the stove is its space, because she can cook a lot of things at once.

“When its only one stove, you can only cook one thing at a time, you can’t do more than that.” “A lot of things I owned were ruined, most of my things the smoke turned yellow” She demonstrated soot left on walls in the house and talked about how the fire from the old stove would char the walls, melted some of her utensils and turned others with a yellowish color. Now, with her new stove, she no longer has to inhale smoke fumes, and her utensils no longer melt from the fire.

When asked her favorite thing to cook on her new stove, “frijoles” she says, “it doesn’t spill into the fire like before.” The high temperature from the former stove, made it hard to control the heat causing the beans would boil over. Now with the new stove, the fire is evenly conducted, and the beans are easy to cook without bubbling over and spilling out of the pot. She shared how thankful she is for the volunteers who came to build her stove, the volunteers, she says “they gave me something that makes my daily life, much more manageable.”

Rosalina, her husband and three children live on a hillside of Colonia Puerto Rico that overlooks the nearby city of Chimaltenango—it’s a beautiful property. The view of the surrounding mountains is green, verdant and expansive. Rosalina’s father owns the land and gifted Rosalina and her husband the land, but building a house was a costly undertaking they simply couldn’t afford.

A neighbor shared with them about Habitat –the organization would afford them the opportunity to build their own home, if they could secure their own land – land Rosalina’s father already had ready for them. Rather than continuing to rent the house they were in –they decided to pursue the opportunity of having their own house. “We knew we could be pushed out at any moment,” Rosalina said. When asked how she feels having her own house, she said, “I feel content, it’s our house, our own property. The kids are well and we are very happy.”

The family remembers the volunteers who came to help them build. “They were very kind. When they left, almost all of us cried.” “We want you to know that we remember you all a lot, the kids ask for you, whether we can call you, when you’re coming next, and when is the next time you can play?” “I show them the photos we have and remind them of the joyful time—you are in our hearts.”