We're in Addis right now for the weekend as there was a tri-Branch conference today that we all wanted to attend and Steffanie has to meet with a potential donor on Tuesday that is flying into Addis. We're seeing this as a good opportunity to get away from the kids and see what happens while we're gone. We're thinking the babies will be dressed up in doll clothes, will have been fed pebbles mixed with mud that the little girls fed them as play food and that the house will have burnt down? one can only imagine. . .
We ate at the Sombkes house today, a family that the husband works at the Embassy. It was like walking into America at their house. They made strombolli and we had ice cream and salad. Us three girls had a competition with the missionaries who could eat more. We definitely won for desserts. They were a little offended by our pride though, bragging on and on about how much we could eat, and then I think they were a little disgusted by how much we really ate. Sister LePrey, the missionary couple sister here, kept making comments like "you're kidding me" "good heavens girls" when we kept getting more plates full of food. It's kind of sad that I've only been here two weeks and already craving farenji food. But got to stock up now before we go back out to the village!
The pic above is one that Helen took. She found a cool feature on my camera where only green's, yellow's and blue's stick out. That was when I was making the mobile for Benji.
Here's Helen with Margitu after a few days without showering. Then there's me with Benji (Benjamin). That's three days without washing the mat of hair on my head and just a little sunburnt from being sensitive to the sun from my Malaria meds.
Little Balditu on Helen's lap to the right. She's doing so much better now after having girardia. She's smiling and being a baby again!
So on Tuesday the electricity went out at the compound because of some faulty wiring. Therefore the pump on the well shut down and therefore no water or light. . .for three days. Helen and I didn't take showers and were becoming a sore sight to see. Just look at us in the pictures. . .not too shabby? We didn't change our clothes either because we are always having the babies cloth diapers leak through onto our pants or babies throwing up on us, so what's the point of going through five pairs of clothes a day?
I made a mobile to hang over Benjamin's crib and Balditu got a hold of it and ripped it to shreds, so much for that.
The youth group that Steff started had it's first official activity on Thursday. We first met and had a general meeting and they picked a group name (Youth Service) and designed a logo that we are going to try to get printed on shirts while we're here in Addis. They also played volleyball and I was asked to step out for excessive cheating (actually I stepped out at my own free will- ha!)
This is a comic strip I cut out of the paper before I left. Though I hope this is never me, I thought it was pretty funny. If you can't read it, it says, "Any last requests?"
"Can I put one last entry in my blog about this?"
It's been nice to be in Addis for the day and to cruise around and show Helen and Steff around MY territory since I was here all last year and Steff has always lived out in the country in Kersa Ellala. BAD NEWS- on the bus ride to Addis yesterday morning Helen got her passport, money and immunization card stolen. Her dad's coming out her next week so she is going to survive off of my money for awhile and we called the embassy and they're getting her a replacement passport on Monday. She was pretty upset when she first figured her things were really gone, but only hours later we are joking about it.