Happy New Year

It's hard to believe that another year has come and gone!  2009 was filled with wonderful memories and significant changes for our family.  It is definitely one for the record books!!

We had a great day with a trip to the park.  It was a beautiful day to be outside and play.  Alex loves going to the park where he can run around and be a six year old... without getting yelled at to get out of the streets!  He is always thrilled at the fact that his park has a McDonald's inside it!!  What little boy wouldn't be?  We didn't eat at the McDonald's this time though... instead we hung out with some friends and talked about the changes we have all been through this past year... knowing there are still more to come!

Enjoying the Park...

Alex likes to play

on this wall

around the lighthouse.

You know Alex...

he is always running!

The kids like to take the

palm tree branches and

use them as swords.

There's a beautiful lighthouse in the park.

The Official Tree of Africa!!

A Beautiful Sunset

In true American style, we decided to go and ring in the new year at the Chili's across the street!  It is so good and we don't get to go there very often.  Only on special occasions and a little reminder of home!  We went early and decided to get back to the apartment before it got too late.  We had been told we shouldn't be out and about late here... we weren't sure what to expect, so we decided it would be best to watch the action from our apartment.

Once we got home... Alex started in on a loose tooth that he has had forever!  He has been talking about pulling it for weeks and decided tonight would be the night.  He worked on that thing for over an hour.  So, instead of watching the ball drop in Times Square this year... we cheered Alex on to pull his tooth out!  He wouldn't let either of us near him to help :o)  Finally, after all that work...

 The Tooth Came Out!

Alex was so excited

and very proud that he had

pulled it out all by himself!

Can you go back

and ask for a

tooth for Christmas?

Once we could get Alex calmed down enough to go to bed... it was around 11:00.  Thankfully, he was so tired he went right to sleep.  We thought the noise at midnight would be enough to wake the dead; but Alex didn't budge.  We could here children laughing and carrying on... apparently, there was a fireworks display; but we couldn't see it.  I was just glad it didn't last long and we could get some sleep!  What a day... or should I say night!!

 We wish each of you a Happy New Year!

May the Lord bless you in 2010...

All Our Love,

Franklin, Rachel and Alex

Our Christmas Day

Christmas Eve Wrapping

This is what Franklin does while I wrap presents!

 

Waiting for Christmas Morning

Wake Up Sleepy Head!!

Christmas Morning

Stocking Goodies

 

Unwrapping Presents!

Franklin and The Hams!!

Christmas Dinner... Yummy!

The Children Exchanging Gifts After Dinner

Dessert... also Yummy!

Happy Birthday Jesus!

Skyping Mamaw and Papaw

Excited Over New Movies!

 Skyping Our Other Mamaw and Papaw

 

 

Having Fun With New Legos!

 

 

Merry Christmas!

Love,

Franklin, Rachel and Alex

Christmas Past

It's been a while since I wrote something and we have heard from many of you wondering if we were still in Africa!  Unfortunately, the blog writer has been sick for a while and when the writer is sick, then she doesn't go out much and when she stays in hibernation... that doesn't make for good blog stories :o)

So, what was Christmas like for us?  Well, we waited until the last minute to finish our Christmas shopping; although it didn't take long this year to finish, and we didn't have everything ready for lunch on time Christmas day!  Doesn't sound much different than normal in our family whether we are in the States or here in Africa :o)

One adventure was looking for Christmas wrapping paper.  We've seen some and knew that it existed; but the hunt has been on for over a week and none to be found.  We went back over to a large shopping center where rumor was that they had some.  They did not!  What were we going to do?  A six year old has to have presents to open Christmas morning.  I had decided to resort to birthday paper; but couldn't even find that!  I was beginning to get a little upset.  By now, it was Christmas Eve.  So, what does any good husband do; but go out in search of any paper.  I didn't care at this point if it was the Arabic Times!  He returned a little while later with some paper.  He said that he had found a stationary store that had a bin of different types of paper.  It was rolled up in rubber bands.  When I started to unroll the paper, it turned out to be scraps of small pieces in various sizes... but it worked and I was grateful to have it!

Another adventure was finding the ham everyone wanted for dinner Christmas day.  We had "heard" there was a butcher on the outskirts of town... banished probably by the locals.  A friend took Franklin there to show him where he was.  Of course, when they went earlier in the week, the guy didn't have any ham.  So, Franklin had to leave a deposit to come back on Christmas Eve and see if there would be any then.  He went back the other day and the guy had these little, bitty hams.  So, we had to buy like five to feed everyone that was here.  It was too funny!  We were excited to have ham for dinner; but then decided that it had a funny taste to it.  All the meat here does!  I'm told we get used to it eventually...  It definitely wasn't a Honey Baked Ham!!  But served to be a good substitute for our gathering.  Did I say we have been pork deprived lately??

Alex woke up Christmas morning and to the delight of every child began ripping into the two presents we would let him open from us!  All the rest were from grandparents, aunts, and uncles... so we wanted to wait to skype them so they could watch Alex open his presents.  Thankfully, Alex was distracted by some friends coming over for dinner because there is a seven hour time difference between here and home!  Once we got a chance to skype, we realized our internet wasn't working!  What were we going to do??  This happens from time to time; but never for a whole day... and certainly wasn't happening to us today!!  Thankfully, one of our friends let us borrow something that worked and we were able to have a few, short conversations with our families!  What a blessing that was... we didn't realize just how much we would miss them on Christmas Day!

One of the special moments of Christmas day was the birthday cake we had for Jesus.  It was wonderful to see the sparkle in the children's eyes when they sang Happy Birthday to Jesus.  What a reminder of such a blessed gift through the faith of a child!  I'm so thankful that it doesn't matter where we are and whether we have wrapping paper or ham... we have a gift that was given to us many years ago on a dark and lonely night!  Jesus left everything he knew and loved, the splendors of Heaven... to be born in a manger.  He knew when He left what his future would hold, the death on a Cross... and He still came for each one of us!  It's hard for me to wrap my mind around His love for me when I think about His life and His death.  Every Christmas I'm drawn to Mary and how she treasured everything she heard and saw surrounding the birth of her son in her heart.  This year, we treasured the hope that Christmas brings to our hearts as we watched those around us lost without this same hope.  May they one day know our Lord as Immanuel!  "For unto us a child is born... unto us a son is given, and you shall call His name Jesus, for He will take away the sins from the world!"

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

We Hope Your Day Was Filled With Joy 

of Knowing the One Who 

was Born This Christmas Day

and Love Surrounded by Family and Friends!

We Love and Miss You All!!

Franklin, Rachel and Alex

A Meal Fit For A King

Well, a meal fit for an African anyway...

We've talked about this favorite local dish before... fool and falafel.  It has become a regular around our dinner table as well.  It is so cheap and easy to make and can you believe it... yummy!

Well, the fool is; but for the falafel fans out there... eat your heart out!

The fool is on the left... a bean mixture that you mash up and eat with pita bread.  You can fix it any way you want to; but our favorite is with tomato and onions.  Good, southern, comfort food :o)

The falafel comes from the same person.  They already have it cooked for you.  It's ground chick peas, deep fried with various seasonings.  They look like large meatballs.  Brown on the outside and green on the inside!  The thought of eating those will make me turn green... but Franklin and Alex sure do love them!!

Throw in some vegetables with ranch dip and you can basically feed a family of three for less than a dollar!  Unbelievable, I know!  So, now you know what you'll be having for dinner at our house when you come to visit!

Getting Wild at Little Caesars

Alex was invited to his first African birthday party here in the city... he was so excited!  So, off to Little Caesars we go...

The invitation said that it started at 6 pm, so we should have known better than to be on time or even worry about being a few minutes late!  The birthday boy wasn't even there yet and didn't come with his family until closer to 7:00.  There were two other foreigners besides Alex there... probably the only three that go to his school, and we decided that was possibly the only reason we were invited in the first place.  We didn't quite "blend" into the crowd :o)  Apparently, to know foreigners, much less have three come to your birthday party, is a really big deal here.  Who knew we were so popular??

Anyway, the party finally got started and I couldn't believe all that took place over the next four hours... yes, I said FOUR hours!  Really late and on a school night!  First, they had hired a DJ to play really loud American dance mix music... something from the 80's because I knew most of the words :o)  Not really something I would have played for a group of children!

After we had all been deafened, a magician showed up to do a few magic tricks.  You would have thought he would have the kids help him; but instead, he was apparently interested in one mother in particular!  Thankfully, it wasn't me!  It was so funny and we even moved a few times to get out of his direct stare; however it didn't help much.

The next thing I knew, I had this bright light in my face... a lot!!  They had actually paid someone to videotape this entire birthday party... for a seven year old!  However, most of the time he spent taping the three of us and our children!  Who wants four hours of video footage of strange foreigners??  We laughed at the fact that we tape about thirty minutes of our weddings that we hardly watch, much less a birthday party for our children once you get past the time they turn one!  Well, the music continued to be extremely loud, and by now all the locals had started smoking up a storm, so it was beginning to get more than just a little uncomfortable for us!

After the magic show had ended, they had hired some poor, pitiful soul to dress up in various silly costumes and dance with the children!  I think at one point they were supposed to be Mickey and Minnie Mouse; but they had really strange eyes :o)

Maybe Minnie Mouse... Not Sure??

This went on for about another hour or so and we couldn't figure out why they hadn't fed the children yet?  One of the other mothers and I finally realized that they had all come home from school, took a nap, ate dinner... all before coming to this party.  So, not eating again until 10:00 or so would be normal to them... I am beginning to understand that our cultures are on vastly different schedules.  It's all in what you are raised in and get used to, I guess... Well, we were starving!  I was feeding our three kids chewing gum to fight off the hunger pains :o)  Note to Self:  Eat next time before leaving or bring snacks!

We wondered if they were ever going to get around to eating and cut the cake so we could go home.  I had just talked to the birthday boy's mother and she said the person who was bringing the candles hadn't gotten there yet.  I wish I had known... I'm sure we could find her a few candles to throw on that birthday cake.  However, once I saw the theatrics behind lighting the cake, I realized that what we do to blow out the candles wouldn't have even compared to what was about to take place!  After all they had done already, I wasn't sure how they were going to make this cake the center of attention... but they found a way!  The owner of the Little Caesars had put the cake on this huge table because the cake was huge!  They had placed four, big sparkler tubes on each corner of the cake and once those were lit, they started shooting straight up into the air!  They had turned out all the lights, so when the cake got surrounded by smaller sparkler sticks... it was truly amazing!  Then, all of a sudden, a large amount of confetti fell from the ceiling... all over this cake I was about to have to eat :o)  For the finale, they covered everything in silly string to finish up the presentation of this cake.  However, I thought I was going to roll in the floor laughing when I finally got a glimpse of this cake!  They have a few party themes around here to choose from for a seven year old boy... Spiderman, Transformers... but do you know who was on the center of that cake??  A huge decoration of a scene from the Tom and Jerry cartoon!!  I knew now that I had finally seen it all...

The Fireworks Display!!

Finally, it was time to eat and I laughed at the fact that they were going to feed these children pizza, soft drinks, and chocolate cake at 10:30 at night!  We were ready to go home and go to bed :o)  Even Alex had said he'd had enough and that's never like him!  So, once we noticed a few people starting to leave after the cake had been cut, we decided it was time to make a quick exit!

What a night!  It was interesting to see how different cultures celebrate a child's birthday.  I couldn't help but think just how disappointed they will be if they ever came to one of Alex's birthday parties :o)  We're just not that much fun!

Do We Look Tired??

The Zoo Has Winter Hours

Well, Alex went back to school on Sunday...

We're still not sure why... after everyone had made such a big deal over the schools being closed; and of course, in Africa, no one had called or emailed us to let us know that school would be back in session... a bus just showed up downstairs very early on Sunday morning!!  There was a wild frenzy around here for about five minutes while Franklin ran down to ask them to wait in his best Arabic... while I tried digging out Alex's uniform and books to go with him.  Thankfully, Alex had already gotten up because waking him up in the mornings is a challenge and he can be a grumpy, little bear about the whole thing :o)  The chaos definitely resembled feeding time at the zoo... CRAZY!!

Alex loves school so he is very excited to be back this week.  He had missed his friends and teachers very much... apparently, I'm not that exciting to spend all day with anymore :o)  So, as far as we know, he's going back on a "normal" schedule; which I have decided doesn't exist around here... EVER!!