Christmas Eve Party at New Day!

Does it seem like we are always having parties?? We are. :) Today was our big Christmas celebration for the New Day kids. (Tomorrow we will focus more on our own family, although we will watch The Nativity Story with the New Day kids and do some village visiting of widows in our church, taking them cinnamon bread!) We started the party with 4 tables, led by Darbi, Blu, Debbie, & Carolyn. Blu's table was the Christmas story (using a Nativity scene) and then a visit to our goat pens to see a manger. Carolyn's table was The Legend of the Candy Cane complete with candy canes and candy cane cookies. Darbi's table was the story of Papa Panov's (we called him Papa Wes!) Special Christmas Day, and then we talked about kindness to others, drew names, and made a Christmas card for the person's name we drew. Debbie's table was the Christmas story from the perspective of the manger animals and a coloring page. The kids loved it, although they were a BIT distracted by their full stockings!! Each child received a full stocking (overflowing actually!) from their sponsors in the USA. We started with the youngest up to the oldest and watched them all open presents. It was a 3 hour party and we're pretty exhausted, but it was so much fun, and our kids are really starting to understand the meaning of Christmas! Blu tells the Christmas story at his table

Baby Jesus in our manger :)

Caedmon in our manger (he picked his own clothes for the Christmas party - camo shorts, a green silk shirt, a black tie, dress socks and shoes, and slicked hair) :)

Around the manger

Teacher Carolyn's table

Making Christmas cards for their brothers/sisters

Debbie's table

Axer loved her new shoes!

Ben was the funniest one to watch open his presents. He very deliberately showed all of his friends each part of his gift, but when he pulled out a new pair of underwear he was caught by surprise and VERY embarrassed! They immediately went behind his back and a huge smile appeared! :)

Teacher Carolyn made sure each of my kids got a present too!

Christina loved her pop up Disney toy!

Cynthia loves clothes and LOVED this new outfit!

Francis's tractor was the envy of all the boys!

Gertrude loved it all but REALLY liked her new book!

Misheck loved it all and had a big smile with each part he opened! He couldn't WAIT to get into his legos!

His sponsors made hiim an awesome photo album :)

Muchoni loved this #8 Brazil soccer jersey! He also LOVED his Spiderman pillowcase!

Mweene didn't know what to think, but he did think his new xylophone was great, as did all the other kids!

Phillip got quite possibly the coolest car in the world - everyone gasped as it made noises and the headlights lit up!

Joseph is the kind of kid you could give a sucker and he'd be SO happy! He liked his new toy car and train!

Kelitah loved her new baby doll and also liked the giraffe puppet she got! She was also REALLY interested in her new book!

Sisi is SOO shy so it was painful for her to have to sit in front of everyone and open everything! :) She enjoyed seeing a picture of herself in the photo album her sponsor made her!

Sisi also LOVES clothes and loved her new dress!

A BIG thank you from all of the kids at New Day for the sweet gifts! Merry Christmas from the Luyando (Love) and Lukondo (Joy) houses!