A Time To Celebrate

Me and Haley, one of our little neighbor girls...we’ve nicknamed her “Pig Pen” though it may be culturally inappropriate to talk about that animal...she loves dirt and sometimes it plumes off her!  Part of the problem is that she is on the verge of walking, but her current mode of transportation is just to scoot across the ground...haha!  Sometimes she just lies in the dirt and goes to sleep making her look like a poster child for World Vision...I assure you she is not.  She has a mommy and daddy who love her very much as well as an australian auntie and an american one who cuddle her every chance we get, no matter how dirty she is :)

Since it’s been a year, I thought it would be fun to show you what our backyard looks like now...it’s really green!  We are growing all kinds of things from bananas, to pumpkin, to corn, to tomatoes, to watermelon!  It’s amazing how fast and how well things grow here...good volcanic soil you know...haha! :)

We called on Ali, our brother who lives next door, to come and chop down our tree...he is better with a machete than me and Corinna combined...haha!

We held a neighborhood block party in our backyard following the felling of our banana tree :)  It was great to get to sit down with our local family on our turf and share a meal that we were able to give thanks for in the local language.  It was such a fun time and gave us the opportunity to play “host” for those neighbors who have been SO hospitable to us!

Our party had a special holiday meal type feel.  It came complete with fried bananas, fried cassava, grilled chicken wings, sodas, and of course the local hot sauce!  Delicious!

Me, Lesley, and Anna took a quick trip to the "big island" to visit the ATM and do a little grocery shopping.  It's 20 miles between our islands...by glorified row boat with two motors it's a 1.5-2 hour ride across the Indian Ocean...haha!  It's like being at Water World for next to nothing...haha!

Here are some of our groceries:  Real Hamburgers with cheddar cheese!!!

Real Hotdogs on homemade buns!

We had a two day team retreat on the south side of the island.  My mom had sent a birthday package which included stuff for smores, so I talked the boys on the team into helping me construct a bonfire on the beach.  We sat by the ocean roasting marshmallows and reminiscing about old campfire stories and teaching the Commonwealth team members what a smore is and how to eat it..:)

I am now a quarter of a century old...for the first time in my life, I feel old...I was graciously told by my older teammates that I should get used to the feeling.  The other three single ladies celebrated with me.  Corinna made a delicious chocolate cake with strawberry jam in the middle! :)  And they agreed to suffer through my movie choice..."The Grinch Who Stole Christmas"  Haha!  It's never too early to get into the Christmas spirit :)

Corinna, my housemate, gave me a beautiful rolling board and pin and two purple coffee cups :)  I love it!  I'm making homemade tortillas tonight!

Continuing on with the birthday celebration, we decided to create an oven on our stove top.  Theoretically, you buy a very large pot and a medium pot to go inside.  You elevate the medium pot with sardine cans, rocks, corral, or whatever is available...Everything was fine until the pot started to smoke aggressively.  As we removed the large pot from the stove we discovered that we had managed to burn our way through the pot...it wasn't a total failure though...

We successfully cooked pizza before we lost the pot :)  All in all it was a great birthday!  It was quite different from any other birthday that I've had, but it is one I will not soon forget! :)