Holidays

Christmas celebrations here start on Christmas Eve - with a feast at midnight. We spent all day Xmas eve day cooking and preparing our dinner. The menu included fried chicken, spaghetti (it's sweet here with a cheese similar to velveeta), rice, and for a change turkey (most of the group here had never tried turkey), mashed potatoes and green bean casserole.  Oh - Teresa had received 2 boxes of stovetop so I also made stuffing!



christmas feast



I've told the staff and kids here that everything is an adventure here - and that includes food preparation! Since it is too expensive to run the oven for the length of time it would take to bake, the turkey was roasted - over an open fire - in our back yard. I was asked to make green bean casserole, but there is no milk to be found and of course no crispy onions for topping. The mashed potatoes were mixed with canned evaporated milk and their version of margarine. Christmas cookies didn't taste the best, but we had so much fun making them! The spaghetti sauce is sweet and is typically served cold. We started eating at midnight - and ate leftovers on christmas day.

I was not expecting to have any gifts under the tree, but I ended up opening about 20 presents! Many of these were food items, but the sweetest thing is that several of the kids who live here used their "allowance" to buy me a gift! I also had a stocking that was full to the brim. Our christmas day was spent with worship, music, movies and games. 

morning chaos



my surprise gifts



It will be a christmas to remember!