easter!

the past few days at Arbre de Vie have been the best yet! 

we had a great weekend celebrating Easter together.

i can promise you i will want to spend every single Easter at this place, with these people.

it was the best!

friday morning was laundry day for Tata Jill. i hadn't done one bit of laundry since i arrived a few weeks ago and it was definitely time for the clothes to get a good scrubbing. thursday, ashley suggested that a few of the girls come over to my house and help me. they were thrilled at the idea of coming over friday morning and i promised to make them a cup of coffee!

(viviane & delphine getting ready to start handwashing my clothes)

they did the best job. and were done in an hour. i hung everything up all over the back porch, my room and the front walkway. then bought them a pop, even though i'd made them coffee already! they worked so hard and deserved it all. i am certain it would have taken me approximately 6 hours to do the work they did in 1...

friday afternoon the kids got home from school and then we were busy trying to get everyone going to camp, out the door. the churches in the area were having a big campmeeting in the town next to Sakete. about half of the kids from Arbre de Vie wanted to go, so ashley shuttled them all over there. all the girls sleep in one big open tent. all the boys sleep in one big open tent. everyone meets together for the services in another big open tent. i was sad they were all going to be missing all the Easter fun we had planned at the orphanage, but they were excited about their weekend away! they all had a great time.

after getting back from taking the older kids to the camp, katinka and i painted egg shells with the children. katinka has always done this as an Easter tradition in Germany, so we saved the egg shells from the cakes we made last weekend for all the birthdays and the kids loved painting them.

when i got to the centre saturday morning, one of the boys who lives near the orphanage and comes over quite a bit was there...proudly showing off his latest kill. 9 squirrels and rats...he killed them with his hands. i guess meat is meat, right? 

(doussou, charle, hubert & adolphe showing off charle's game)

jon looked happily at his boys and said, "i am so proud of them right now!" only a papa in Africa would be happy when his boys' friend brings over dead squirrels and rats to show off...oh Africa!

saturday morning we all gathered together in the gazebo and ashley did a lesson about good friday. she shared about Jesus' last night with His disciples. we had a time of feet washing and communion. 

there was an accident right down the road from the orphanage in the middle of our Bible story, so we all ran down there to help. a father and two little kids were injured while riding on their moto. it was pretty chaotic. was definitely a little shaken up after all of that. i was just standing there, holding a bleeding little boy who couldn't understand a word i was saying to him...while i was being screamed at in french by all these bystanders of what to do and where to take him. i looked up at Jon and said, "you're just going to have to tell me what i need to do with him...because i have no idea what's happening right now." i didn't even realize the father had been hurt because i was over with the children the entire time, trying to get them in a car of a passerby who had stopped and was going to take them to the hospital. not sure what became of all that, the kids were bleeding, but both seemed relatively okay. the dad had a nasty head wound and was pretty out of it. all that to say, i don't have an pictures of us taking communion because we did that immediately after helping with the accident. wasn't thinking about pictures at the time!

before dinner, katinka and i did some crafts with the kids! i had brought over some Easter treats and activities with me from the US. we made cross necklaces and also dyed Easter eggs!! the kids had never dyed Easter eggs before, so this was really special. it was amazing to see their eyes when they pulled the egg out of the cup and it was a different color. i love seeing things and experiencing things for the first time with them. it is the best.

(alice working on a necklace for her mama)

(florent and hubert)

(teaching the girls how to dye their eggs)

(a mama and her girl)

(damien loved everything about dying the eggs!)

(jeanine, me, & katinka)

(adolphe)

(doussou)

(femi couldn't get enough of the dye)

(the boys and me)

(the boys loved when their fofo seraphin joined them)

(the finished product! thank you Doug & Linda for the dye!!!)

after dinner saturday night, we had another story time for the crucifixion. ashley did an excellent job talking with the kids and then we wrapped up "Jesus" to enter the tomb. the kids then put together a sketch for the entire crucifixion story.

(being carried to the tomb)

(the guards)

(sweet alice making sure "Jesus" could breathe with the paper on his face!)

sunday morning we celebrated Easter and had the best time!! the kids sang. and danced. and played their drums. ashley talked about the resurrection and then the kids found eggs that were hidden around the property to help tell the resurrection story. we had lunch and then all the kids went to their rooms while jon, ashley, katinka and i hit 290 plastic eggs all over the property!! we also hid the 55 hardboiled eggs too. since half of the kids were still gone at camp, that meant there was plenty of hunting to do for the children who remained! they had a blast running all over, finding the eggs and then enjoying the candy that katinka and i had stuffed inside each egg saturday night.

(singing on Easter morning)

(on your mark. get set. GO!)

(looking everywhere for those eggs)

(florent found the jackpot. YESSSSS!)

(clement)

(damien showing off his loot)

we played lots of games with the kids the rest of the afternoon. i have taught them how to play the card game, spoons, and to say they love it is absolutely an understatement! we all have the best time! but it gets pretty viscous when a spoon is up for grabs. you better watch out! we had a relay with the plastic eggs up in the field. then played egg boccee ball. we had the best turkey for dinner and then all the kids gathered around in the gazebo and watched Toy Story 3 on my laptop. jon and ashley bought popcorn and popped it for everyone.

games?

meat?

candy?

movies?

popcorn?

spending the day having a blast with the most special people i've ever known?

best Easter ever.