Birthdays, banana cookies & bracelets!

This past week I received the best gift. Two faculty from IWU flew into Zambia to visit with us for the week. These ladies brought packages and letters from our families. When the gifts were distributed, it felt like Christmas – Zambia-style! Scraps of paper and tape quickly cluttered the floor, as we all ripped open our packages to find candy & notes from home! My mom knows me so well – she sent a whole pack of instant coffee from Starbucks. My lovely friends from school sent a homemade CD of video messages from all my friends in Marion. Literally the best gift ever. I miss everyone back home so much. But I know your love, support and encouragement makes it possible for me to be here in Zambia. I hope reading this blog bridges the distance between home and my experiences here. Since the last post, our team finished our stay at Zimba. I included some pictures of the Zimba Mission hospital we spent many of our mornings in clinical. Here are some highlights of the past week. 

Zimba Mission Hospital, where we spent many mornings in clinical. 

Last Saturday our team visited the home of this wonderful lady, Naomi. Her granddaughter cooked all of our wonderful meals at the Zimba Mission house. 

Naomi and her beautiful great-granddaughter Ruth. 

Group picture at Naomi's house with some of her family members. 

Our cook's name was Gertrude, and she and her family also lived at the Zimba Mission. Gertrude was so good to us - she used American recipes for our entire stay in Zimba. She kept a constant supply of cookies to snack on at all hours of the day (and night!). I collected a recipe from her because these cookies were my absolute favorite. It's definitely sharing worthy.

Banana Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

3 ripe bananas (mashed)

1 cup oats

1/2 cup chocolate chips

1 heaping spoonful of natural peanut butter

Mix all the ingredients well. Plop spoonfuls onto baking sheet. Bake at 350 for 15 minutes. (Makes about 15 cookies)

Our final team picture outside our home in Zimba.  

 So I kind of made a reputation with the team - I love going to the market. In Zimba the market was literally right across the street, so why not go every day? One of the reasons I consistently went in Zimba was because of some of the friends we made there. Here's a picture with Atheia, she is such a talented seamstress! I'm pretty sure while we were in Zimba we were her biggest customers :)

This past week we celebrated both Kristen & Katie's birthday - Zambian style! What a joy to share in this special day with these girls.

As of Saturday afternoon, our team is back in Choma. All of the children across Zambia had off school today because of Teacher's Appreciation Day. I was so excited to watch the teachers congregate and march in a parade! 

After lunch some of the girls and I walked to the village close by to where we're staying in Choma. We met some of these friends at the Wesleyan Church just down the road. I took my portable speaker and held a dance party the middle of the soccer field.

 Today was such a full, but wonderful day. After all of the excitement this morning, we went to the orphanage we went to visit our friends we missed so much while we were in Zimba. One of the girls on the team taught me how to make these bracelets, and its my newest favorite thing to do with my free time. It makes the perfect little gift for our friends.

Until next time, I can't say thank you enough for all your prayers!!