37 Weeks!

I guess this comes with every pregnancy but the excitement and anxiousness is really settling in! Obadiah continues poke me in the ribs and occasionally punch his father in the face as Kyle talks to him. I really am starting to feel like he has no more room to grow in his current home, but what do I know. We could not be more excited to hold our son and are trying to practice patience because we know that he will only come in the Lord's timing, not ours.  Making it to this 37 week point seems like quite the milestone, now we just wait. 

He is Risen!

This was the second Easter that we have celebrated in Uganda and it is crazy to think that we have made this place home in the last year. As we approached this holiday and thought about its huge significance for humanity and for our lives, we knew we wanted to celebrate with a feast like the ones we traditionally have with our families in the states. We had it in our hearts to have a ham for Easter dinner but were not sure about the adventure we were about to embark on. 

You can't just go to the store to pick up a ham to pop in the oven. Kyle and Trey had to go down to a butchery warehouse, draw a picture of a pig and describe which cut of pork they would like. They arrived home with this:

There is much that goes into making a ham. First we had it in a brine for about 5 days, then it had to be smoked for about 6 hours. Kyle and Trey spent a good part of the day manning the grill-turned-smoker. Trey looks so funny in that hat because he is trying to avoid getting sunburned. 

The final step was to bake it and glaze it before we sliced it up. 

Was it worth? Very much yes, it was delicious!!  It tasted like real ham!

We did not just consume this alone, we had invited some friends, Anne and Shannon, to enjoy dinner with us. Both Anne and Shannon have moved to Kampala in the last six months. Anne is from our home church (RMCC) and Shannon works with an organization called Kidz at Heart. I failed to get pictures with our lovely guests! I blame it on being pregnant...when you are 8 months pregnant you can blame almost anything on pregnancy. I did manage to remember to get a few pictures of us (I will be 36 weeks tomorrow).

After we ate we got to spend some time with little Zion. He loves to smile these days and most times we can get some real good smiles out of him. 

We had a wonderful day, it would have been just as wonderful with or without our feast. The service at UCF was a great celebration.  We are blessed to be a part of this wonderful community of people.  One song we sang today is called "Its your love" by Hillsong,  the chorus is:

And all the praise and glory to God

We sing Hallelujah sing Hallelujah

For the King has carried the cross

He is risen from the grave.

Today we celebrate that our Savior, through the resurrection, conquered sin and death. We hope that as you celebrate Easter, in whatever fashion, you remember this truth. 

Good Friday

On Good Friday this year UCF did something a bit different. Everyone was invited to church for games  food and fellowship. I am not sure what the final numbers were but we had a great day hanging out with our church community. There was a lot of food to prepare. 

 There were about 12 people peeling potatoes, as very few people in Uganda will eat the skin on a potato. Most of our friends find it odd that we eat/enjoy potato skin. 

Being 8 months pregnant, and it being a warm day I choose not to participate in the games.  They were fun to watch and it seemed like everyone enjoyed them. 

In the video below, Joseph is yelling out the names of 4 different fruits that represent a direction the team must run in. 

Kyle played some soccer and basketball. 

My friend Martha insisted on taking a picture of me and my ever growing belly.

Kyle and Krispus. 

We finished off the day with some water games and laughed so hard as we watch our friends fall on the wet plastic. 

This Week at UCF

The construction continues at church as funds keep coming in for the new, permanent building. On March 3rd we had a "grand giving" for this project and the congregation brought in about $12,000. More money keeps coming in and we are so excited to see how the Lord is moving people and providing. In the 11 years of its's existence, UCF has never raised this much money but it is exciting to see those that call this place their church home make sacrifices so that this structure can go up. 

 On Friday we had our normal Bible studies at church and Kyle took some pictures during game time. This semester we are joining the guys and girls group together for games before we get into our study. 

On Saturday we had another Discipleship Training Program (DTP) and although Kyle was feeling pretty sick this weekend he managed to get through the teaching that he planned. 

Erin's mom is visiting for about two weeks and came into to town on Friday, they came to DTP for a little bit and many of our friends were so excited to meet Barbara. 

This week Kyle began to teach on the practical aspects of  Discipling. Many of the leaders at UCF attend DTP and are learning specific ways to encourage, train and walk alongside other believers. 

We continue to try and balance our excitement for Obadiah's arrival with the normal things of life that we have going on. As of today I am 34 weeks along! 

Piggery

On Saturday Kyle and I took a day trip to the village to help our friend Francis transport some materials that he needs for a project. Kyle has visited this place before and blogged about  his time here. 

Francis is trying to start a "piggery" and needs to do some construction on the pig-pens. 

This is what he has so far and Kyle was glad to help with a few things while we were there on Saturday. 

The guys were grateful that Kyle brought along his tools so they did not have to use a panga (a machete) to cut the lumber, which would have taken much longer. 

These are Francis's pigs, he hopes to sell some of the piglets in a few months and keep the rest to supply the piggery. The price of four of these piglets is equivalent to one month's salary for many of our friends here. 

As Kyle helped with some of the construction I visited with some sweet ladies. A few of them were curious about my hair and spent some time braiding it. 

Of course there was a traditional meal prepared for us and we tried to help when possible. Kyle took part in butchering the chicken and learned more about a chicken's anatomy than most people need to know. 

After being here over a year now, there are still parts of the traditional Ugandan meal that are hard to put down but we are able to manage most of what is served, we even enjoy a few aspects of it.  

As a guest, Kyle was again served the gizzards of the chicken, that he removed just a few hours before. They are no more tasty the second time around but Kyle is a champ and was able to eat a piece of it before handing it off to someone else who enjoyed it more than he. 

It is good to take a trip out of the city for many reasons, like reminding us how simple life can really be. 

We are grateful for the friendship and generosity of Francis and his family, we pray that his family will come to a saving knowledge of Jesus just as Francis has. 

Women's Day

Today is women's day in Uganda (many other countries celebrate the holiday as well) and so most people had the day off work and most educational institutions did not hold classes. Instead of having our regular bible studies today we had a special day to celebrate women.  

We started our time off by making a craft. We showed them how they can take toilet paper tubes and make beautiful shapes out of them after they are cut and glued together. 

Click images to enlarge

We had about 35 college women show up

Grace showed the girls how to make pancakes

Many were eager to learn and got to help make them

We set up foot washing stations to conclude our time

The girls really were excited to scrub each other's feet and pamper one another

We had a lot of fun and we were reminded of the women around the country and the world that are not celebrated or given the opportunity to do some of these fun things. Many of our Ugandan friends are surprised to hear that the US doesn't celebrate Women's Day, so if you are a woman and in the US, I hope you feel special today. 

Because it is woman's day and I myself am a woman I thought I would give you some bonus pictures of me! You will have to thank Erin Allen cause she was the photographer here and told me I am not taking enough pictures while I have this belly. Enjoy! 

Labor of love

Kyle and I love mexican food.  I am not sure if either one of us has ever tuned it down, it is the type of food we had at our wedding reception. Mexican food is hard to come by in Uganda and over the last year we have tried several ways to maintain our mexican food intake. For a while we were paying this small restaurant to make tortillas for us for about 15 cents a tortilla (the rest of their food did not compare to the quality of mexican food we could make at home). When they went out of business we looked elsewhere to acquire tortillas, but they wanted to charge us about 50 cents a tortilla, which, when we are making our own chips really adds up.  In the last few months Kyle and I have been making our own tortillas, and although time consuming, they are delicious. A few days ago when I decided to double the batch I usually make, I thought I would document the process to share with you. 

About 6 pounds of flour yielded 101 tortillas!

Some were turned into chips, by baking of course, I am trying to watch my figure ;)

We left most as tortillas and will freeze them so that we can enjoy some more mexican style dinners in the coming week. Unfortunately, we will have to go through this process again soon, but I can tell you it is very much a labor of love.