Jen's bday

     Yesterday was Jen’s birthday.  To celebrate the occasion, we dropped the kids off at the Galvez’ and took off for Kamsar.  Our date included eating out for lunch, spending time at the pool, and Christmas shopping.  There aren’t a lot of options for shopping here so we’re having to be creative.  The nice thing is that I will successfully complete all my shopping without having to set even one foot in the mall.  Yippee!

       It’s strange being in a country where we’re the only ones celebrating Christmas.  The grocery store owner is a Catholic Lebanese, so he had some decorations up, but there isn’t a sign of Christmas anywhere else.  One of my favorite traditions at Christmas is to drive around to see Christmas lights.  When we moved to Panama, Jen and I were hard pressed to find many lights.  We did find one good street in Clayton that really decorates, but other than that it was pretty sparse.  Well, I’m pretty sure Guinea will take the cake in terms of no lighting.  The nice thing is we do have a tree, and Diana gave us some lights to hang up.  So between 6:30 and 7 p.m. (when the sun is still out but it’s dark enough to see the lights inside) we turn on the lights and sit there, basking in the soft, warm glow, trying to ignore the warmth of the evening air.  All that to say that even though it’s not Christmas in Guinea, Christmas still lives in our hearts.  It’s all part of the adventure, I guess.

     Following our shopping, we returned to the Galvez where we had a pizza party in Jen’s honor.  Diana and Corrine did an amazing job of cooking up a buffet of pizzas, followed by cake and homemade ice cream.  Pizza is Jen’s favorite comfort food right now, and ice cream is an amazing treat as it’s super expensive in the grocery store and you can’t get it anywhere else. 

    So my wife is now a year older, though still just as beautiful and young in spirit as before.  Jen’s comment on the day was, “it was different, but good.”  I guess there’s not much else to say when you’re celebrating life on a continent thousands of miles from your birth country.  Then again, that’s why I’m the one writing the really long blog posts while Jen sticks to facebook, haha!

Happy Birthday Jen!  I love you!