The Old and the New

My heart and head are full.
I have so much to say, so much I want to share!
My mind is going a million miles a minute and a billion directions all at once.
But, I've got quite a bit on my plate right now....LIFE, in fact.
Being a wife, mommy, school teacher, and missionary are keeping me quite busy at the moment. Plus, I want to squeeze every minute of time out of this short holiday time I have!
Life is supposed to be back to its normal schedule next week so I plan on getting back to my normal blogging schedule then, too.
Until then, enjoy this beautiful picture taken by Glenna Gordon over at scarlettlion.com. It reminded me of 2009 and 2010 -- the old and the new!

Over the River and Through the Jungle to the Capital We Go!

We all know the holidays are a busy time, but I still wanted to stay in touch with everybody! I've been sick as a dog for the last week with malaria so my dear, sweet husband let me use this post so everybody could at least see a few pics and know what's going on here!

We normally only go to the capital for government paperwork or to pick up teams that visit us on missions trips, but two weeks ago our family took a family trip to buy gifts for Christmas. We left on Monday morning via government bus that departed at 5:00 in the morning. Think Grey-hound with African movies and music, minus the bathroom.
Monday we arrived about noon. After checking into the Baptist guest house, we headed out to town. We went to the mall. The Accra mall is our only mall in Ghana, and one of only three in West Africa. It is really nice. It has stores like: Shop Rite, Game, Mr. Price, etc. These will not make much since to our American friends, since all these are chain stores from South Africa. After a few hours of shopping we headed back to the guest house for relaxation and play. The guest house has a playground that our kids and our friends' kids played on for hours. (These late nights with mosquitoes landed Patty with malaria, but after 6 years of not getting malaria, it's hard to remember it is still here. But that is another story!)

Tuesday our friends watched our kids so that we could go shopping for our kids. I'm sure I never got as many gifts as these kids! On Wednesday, we watched their kids. In the afternoon we loaded up in a taxi and we headed over to Churcheese. The couple that takes care of the guest house told us about it. It is a mini-Chucky Cheese. They have a playland with a ball pit. There is a mini-merry-go-round and some games. The kids loved it.

After playing for about two hours the kids were ready to eat. They had great fried chicken and fries. Mom and Dad got to buy food from a new sandwich shop. We had shakes and smoothies with gourmet sandwiches. It was a really nice treat!
Thursday our kids said good-bye to the Guest House Snowman and we headed back to Kumasi for our Thursday night Bible study. We were able to finish most of our shopping and had a great time of relaxation.

Now that you know what I've been doing......What have you been up for fun this Christmas season?

Giving Thanks

I have so much to be thankful for this year! As I spent the day of Thanksgiving in preparation for our feast, I was overwhelmed by how good God is to me!

God has blessed my family and me in so many ways, I can't even begin to count them.
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Some of them are huge things -- victories in our daily walk, the growing of a group of baby believers, the growth of our children, the winning of daily battles involved in understanding and speaking a foreign language, the salvation of those in utter spiritual darkness.



And some of them are small -- hearing my husband pray for the first time in Twi, fun family time with our silly girls, wonderful Ghanaian friends to share the holiday with, leather leaf trees shedding their huge leaves at just the right time so we have something to crunch in as we walk,



bushes on our compound needing a trim so we could build a mountain of "leaves" to jump into, a friend who is willing to push me when I need it so I can progress as needed in the language, fresh pumpkin to be made into pumpkin pies,


time as a family to prepare for Christmas!

I hope you enjoy the pictures of our wonderful Thanksgiving holiday, and I hope your holiday was wonderful, too!
I'd love to hear about it!

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year!

Last week I tried to get a post up about all my hospital visits. I ran out of time. It is still sitting in draft form in my computer. And now, I'm pretty much sick of thinking about being sick or hospitals or the like, so I'm not going to post it!
But I am, by the way, feeling much better! Thanks for asking :)
Now, on with life!
This is my favorite time of the year!
THE HOLIDAYS!!!!

I must be honest. When we first moved to Ghana, this time of the year was my absolute hardest. I and my husband are originally from Michigan -- the Great Frozen North. We always had to wear winter coats over our costumes when we went trick-or-treating. The first day of deer season was frigid, and if there wasn't snow on the ground at Thanksgiving, then something didn't seem quite right.
Enter the move to a country on the Equator. Not only is Ghana on the Equator, but because of our seasons -- Rainy and Dry -- this time of the year is the hottest.
We originally moved to Ghana the end of August of 2003. The weather wasn't too difficult to adjust to at first. We were leaving Michigan at the hottest time of the year and coming to Ghana when it was pretty warm. It was summertime in the States and "summertime" in Ghana. Lots of sunshine in Michigan and lots of sunshine in Ghana. Piece of cake, or so I thought.
September passed and even though it was a little warmer than the summers I knew, it still wasn't too different, kind of like Indian Summer. I was still doing okay until the day I received a package in the mail with Candy Corn inside. Candy Corn!?! It was still summer in my book! Who can eat Candy Corn when it's hot? I decided that people in the States must be getting ahead of themselves. I put the Candy Corn away for later when it was closer to Autumn and trick-or-treat time. The closer we got to the end of October, though, the more agitated I got. Where were the leaves to crunch through and jump in? Where were the cool breezes? Where were the pumpkins? the scarecrows? the corn shocks? AAAAAAHHHHHH! Where was I? What kind of crazy place doesn't celebrate my favorite time of the year?

Pretty soon it was time for Thanksgiving. I kept waiting to see turkeys somewhere, anywhere. Where was the StoveTop stuffing? the cranberry sauce? the canned pumpkin?
I hadn't moved to another country; I felt like I'd moved to another planet!
Now it was time to start thinking about Thanksgiving dinner. What were we going to eat? What about decorations? (At this point I must tell you that we don't exactly have the most common missionary story. Suffice it to say that we were not working with any American missionaries. We didn't hardly know anyone from the States at this point. The rest is a story for another day!) What would we do?
Well, first we needed a table. We didn't have one of those yet. Pastor Samson had a tiny one we could borrow. Then we needed dishes. We didn't have any of those yet either. (To go back to the story for another day, we were living with an African pastor at this point and using the few things he had.) Off to Melcom, our one and only department store at that time.
Now it was time to figure out what to eat. What does one eat for Thanksgiving if not turkey? We ended up with roast beef, which wasn't really roasted because I didn't have a stove. I guess it should have been called boiled beef roast?!? We also had mashed potatoes and Velveeta macaroni and cheese, because a dear sweet friend sent a box of the prefab stuff :) Lastly, we splurged on ice cream and cookies, and I mixed and layered them into something like an ice cream pie. Yum!
We made Indian headresses to wear for the day, too!
Now get in your mind that I was seven months pregnant at this time, we lived on the top floor of an apartment building, and our apartment had no fans. Oh, the memories! All the pics I have from this time are in the States. One of these days I'll scan them into the computer for a good laugh, but for now you'll just have to use your imaginations!
So there we were, thousands of miles from "home" and traditions and culture, celebrating Thanksgiving. And guess what? That is one of my fondest Thanksgiving memories. John and I look back and laugh and rejoice about all God has brought us through and brought us to since that time...

I'll continue with some more holiday memories next week, but until then, what are your favorite Fall/Thanksgiving memories?

Where have I been???

Well, it has been a crazy few weeks!
For those of you who don't know what is going on (at this point, I'm not sure who knows what!), I'll give you the rundown.
I started having some health problems about two weeks ago. The doctor I needed to see only comes to the clinic we use on Tuesdays. I'm sure that doesn't make sense to everybody, but that is how it is here. Not enough health care workers. Anyways, on Tuesday of last week John and I headed to the clinic. When we got there, we found out the doctor had traveled for a few weeks. After talking to the doctor and doing some praying, we decided it would be best ot head for Accra (the capital). We left at 5 a.m. Wednesday morning. We were able to get to my doctor there, and the line wasn't too bad!
Side note -- doctor visits don't work by appointments here. It is first come, first served!
He checked everything out, put me on two different antibiotics, two pain killers, and two vitamins. He then told me to visit the doctor here in Kumasi for the follow-up.
So today we headed back to the doctor in Kumasi. He was back from his trip and able to talk through everything with me.
The verdict -- I have to have outpatient surgery on Saturday morning. I will be put under for a short while. After I wake up and everything checks out okay, I will get to go home. A few days after that all should be well. The really good thing is that I was told that this procedure should make sure that this problem does not return.
So there you have it!
Thanks so much for the kind notes and well wishes I've already received. Please continue to pray for the doctor, the procedure, and my husband and family at this time!

Candy

Candy.
Who doesn't love it?!?

When first moving to the mission field I thought about a lot of things. Candy wasn't one of them.
After my first visit to the "grocery store", though, I started thinking about candy. A lot. About the fact that all the candy I had grown up with was nowhere to be seen. That they sold strange candy in Ghana. Flavored like ginger, menthol, or black licorice. Nothing fruity like Starburst or Skittles. Nothing minty like York or Andes. Nothing like Hershey's Kisses or Skor bars.
Am I making you hungry yet?
What was wrong with this place? Where was the good stuff!?! Then one day I saw a familiar package -- a Snickers bar!!!
John and I spent way too much money to buy the coveted delicacy, but alas, it was not a Snickers bar! Not really!!! It was from Englad, and in England their chocolate doesn't taste like American chocolate. It tastes like.....British chocolate, I guess. Not very nice. I was so disappointed.
After a while, we got used to eating very few sweets. Unlike Americans, Ghanaians have very little sugar in their diets.
Then one day, I found out about one of their little secrets......Anlo tofe (pronounced on-ra toe-fay). WoW!!!!! I'd been missing out!
It's really quite simple -- cooked sweetened condensed milk rolled with a little butter -- but it is delicious!







As easy as that!
Now that I've been on the field awhile, I don't think about American sweets much anymore. Oh, they are good, no doubt, but my fancy seems to run more to fresh Anlo tofe. And I know right where I can get some!

Blessings

I want to be a Proverbs 31 woman. Don't we all?!?
But, to do that, sometimes we have to choose to do what needs to be done over what wants to be done.
Case in point: Proverbs 31:27 -- She looketh well to the ways of her household...
That is my challenge today. I'd like to be blogging, but today I have some other responsibilities calling....

I hope to be here next week!