A Baptism, a Holiday, a Wedding and a Baby Dedication!

We made homemade Thanksgiving decorations since we can't buy them here.

 Ben and Caleb just hanging.

Getting ready for the baptism in the tub.  Since we don't have a building, we have to think outside the box a bit!

Singing before the fun begins.

In between the two backsides you can just barely see the baptism.  The location wasn't conducive to photography!

There's the newly baptized woman and also the bride to be.

The groom is proud to have dunked his lovely bride.

I found these critters peeking out from a tree in the yard!

Much more Ben's style.  He doesn't like to be cramped!

Just monkeying around!

A couple of other monkeys

Thanksgiving with friends

Z finally filled his plate when he was sure that everyone else was taken care of!  

Crafts included candle making while Auntie Barbara was here this time!

Auntie Barbara is a face painting genius!

Ben and his beloved Mater

Trying to lose use of his other eye now!

If we'd had a funeral to attend, we could have covered most of the important life events.  I am glad that no such opportunity presented itself.  We wouldn't have had time for it if it did.

I think I've given up on keeping you up to date on everything that is happening around here.  I am so behind that I'll never get there.  We'll sum it all up by saying Mike got home (Yay!), we had visiting missionary friends (yay!) and we've told some stories.  Everything else is just a jumble at this point.

Last week was very busy.  We had a baptism on Wednesday.  Bamba's wife-to-be asked to be baptized before the wedding on Saturday and so we accomplished that.  Since Mike didn't feel like risking life and limb to go back into the lagoon again, we started looking for other options.  Mike got the Mission to loan him a bath tub that was just sitting around.  He built a make shift frame for it and voila, he had a portable baptistry.  Bamba baptized her with Mike standing alongside.  I think he was supposed to pull her out if Bamba held her down too long or something!


Thursday we celebrated Thanksgiving along with all of you.  It wasn't so different her, besides the temperature.  We don't have family hanging around out here, so other missionaries are our family.  We only had one of those on hand, though, so we had to invite a few Indians to this Pilgrim party!  We invited out househelper and the other missionary's helper.  That still wasn't enough, so we invited the office staff too!  When we moved beyond double digits, we decided to hold there.  Africans can eat once they get started!  We couldn't have turkey as it is fairly rare and expensive around here.  Nevertheless, the two big chickens I cooked cost nearly $40.  OUCH!  I think next year we'll tell the Indians to bag their own food on the way to the feast!  Hee hee.  Our missionary friend had some canned sweet potatoes, canned cranberry sauce and canned pumpkin, so we didn't miss out on some important parts of the meal.  The kids and I decorated cookies, which we usually do at Christmas, but we couldn't pass up the chance to use the maple leaf cookie cutter we were given in Vancouver to help us feel like fall!  All in all it was a nice day.  I got to talk to my family for a few minutes on the computer to top it all off.

Saturday was the big wedding we've been waiting for.  Mike got his debut in weddings.  He did wonderfully even in French with a rowdy crowd.  We left the house around 9 AM and got home just before 5 PM.  AAAAHHHH!  Here a wedding has three components.  The village part was done a few weeks ago when the groom wannabe presented the potential brides family with the presents required to give her up.  This was comprised of some fabric, a sheep, some sheets and some cash in lieu of alcohol.  After her family gave their blessing they came back and planned the civil ceremony 3 weeks later to be followed the same day by a church wedding.  The civil ceremony has to take place at the mayor's office and then the couple rented a room for the church ceremony and reception.  They are a part of one of Mike's group, so no church building exists.  It was a very nice day.  They honored Mike and I by asking us to be their witnesses.  That means for the rest of our lives, they'll come to us for marital advice and if there is trouble.  Yikes!

Last but not least we had a baby dedication for one of our Vridi friends on Sunday.  It was a long hot day to follow our other long hot day, but it was nice.  They gave the baby my African name as a middle name, so that was very sweet!  Ruth Esther had a lovely service, and Tauntie Esther took lots of photos! ;)  I'll try to get some of those up another time.

It's getting late around here and tomorrow holds another big day.  I am looking forward to being with my Vridi buddies in the afternoon after I finish teaching the kids.  Pray for Christine if you will.  You'll remember her name as my older widowed friend.  She's been in and out of the hospital for a couple of months now and they are saying her typhoid fever is back.  We are hoping they can get that taken care of and she can come home for good soon.  Christine has never made a decision as far as I know.  She knows a lot of stuff and has heard so many stories, but ultimately she is holding onto the hope that Mary along with her good works can get her in! 

Heather