Welcome back! We would like to to tell you all about the holidays that we have celebrated so far in Rwanda. After we came back from our site visit, October had arrived and all of the trainees were excited about the prospects of a Halloween Party. First though, I knew that I would have to have some sort of celebration for Chris' birthday on the 27^th. Our friends Scott and Amanda had found some birthday hats, candles, and what they thought was silly string but ended up being “fake snow” at a store on their way back from site visit. They brought it to my attention that it would only be fitting to throw Chris a surprise party since he is friends with almost everyone in our group. We knew it would be, difficult to plan, because I rarely was away from him. When the day came, Chris woke up and was a little bit sad because it would be his first birthday without a celebration, or so he thought. He put on his nicest clothes just to make the day a little more special and I even polished his shoes. While Scott and Amanda got everything ready at Peace Corps, I arranged for our friend Aaron to call up Chris and ask us to meet at the bar for an afternoon of boardgames. We met Aaron, ate brochettes, and played “Kill Dr. Lucky” and “Elder Sign.” Aaron then made up an excuse that he had to go to the hub to pick something up, so of course we went along. When we arrived, almost all the trainees were there for the party wearing hats and singing “Happy Birthday.” Scott and Amanda had even baked the cookie into the shape of Rwanda. Everyone was glad to get a small taste of home, and Chris had a great birthday after all! Anyone who knows me knows that I can't tell lies or keep secrets; I was so proud of myself because I think this was the first time in my life when I legitimately surprised my husband.

A week later, we celebrated Halloween! Chris was in charge of the music and he put together a playlist that included “Elvira's Halloween Party,” “Swingin' at the Seance,” and really any song that was even remotely halloweeny. We had “bobbing for oranges”, face painting, pumpkin carving, very cute costumes and decorations which were made out of paper. Scott and I made a pumpkin pie from scratch using the scrap eye and mouth pieces from the jack-o-lanterns as a trial run for Thanksgiving.

Thanksgiving was our largest holiday we celebrated during training. Everyone signed up for different food preperation duties. The day before, we sent a group of trainees to Kigali to purchase the supplies. That afternoon, we killed 8 turkeys (Chris killed a huge white one) and we started preparing them in brine. That night, Scott and I baked 10 pumpkin pies and the Turkey killing crew put the turkeys in a pit at about 2 am. The next morning, all the volunteers came and we started cooking mashed potatoes, banana bread, mac and cheese, sweet potatoes, apple crisp, deviled eggs, and green beans. It was so delicious and everyone had a lot of fun. Some of the volunteers made decorations and headbands for the rest of us. I am particularly pleased that now Chris knows how to kill and clean a bird, so now our holidays will be a little more special.