Christmas Joy is In the Air!

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Today was an awesome day! We had a lot of fun with the kids getting to do some special things!

This morning Heather and I cleaned our room up because Christine comes back tonight. We Dominican mopped and cleaned the bathroom and then worked on a few other projects up until lunch.

The afternoon was pretty free. We tried to take a picture with the kids having them spell out Feliz Navidad but it was too difficult to get them organized so we didn't end up doing that.

I then asked Nicol to put rollers in my hair. They use huge plastic rollers to straighten their hair and I wanted to see my hair straight here! So, Nicol put my hair up in rollers, which I didn't get a picture of because it all happened so fast. They have a dryer chair here like at a salon back home that was donated to them several years ago. So they decided to put me under the dryer to make it faster than just waiting for it to air dry.

Well, this chair is pretty old and the plug was missing from the cord. However, they still have the wires that go to it, so Nicol turned off the breaker, plugged the green and white wires into the socket, and then turned the breaker on and it worked! SCARY! We were doing this in the laundry room where Carolina was washing clothes and water was everywhere. I was sure someone was going to get electrocuted, but somehow we all survived. I had to sit under the dryer for 15-20 minutes which was quite warm and the bobby pins were burning my head. However, it was better than sitting in the sun for 2-3 hours waiting for it to dry! I felt like I was really at the beauty salon!

After this she took the rollers out and then with a round brush and blow dryer straightened my hair. Then she used a straightening iron and straightened it even more. Much more of a process than I thought. However, the best part is they put their hair up by basically brushing it in a circle flat around your head and then putting a hairnet on it. So, she did that which I wore until later in the evening. It looked pretty hideous. I have some pictures!

After getting beautified, I came back to my room to finish cleaning up and putting stuff away. We got ready for dinner, and then was time for the Christmas/Birthday party. I took my hair down from the net and it looked great. I didn't get a great picture of it but it was straight like at home but fell into my face from where it has been wrapped around my head. Wish I could fix it like that at home but I'm definitely too lazy to do all of that!

Every 3 months they have a birthday party for the kids that celebrated their birthday in those 3 months. This was the October, November, December party. Also, Cameron bought gifts for all the kids and so we had a Christmas party as well. Zuni, the administrator, worked on putting up the Christmas tree and decorating it, so to start the celebration of Christmas, Cameron plugged in the lights. We sang Feliz Navidad together, Pastor said a prayer that all the kids repeated after him, and then we sang Happy Birthday in Spanish and English.

They have the largest cakes ever that they make for the parties every 3 months! It was crazy insane, but I guess to feed 44 kids plus everyone else it has to be pretty big.

Arianni, who got stitches Wednesday night, has been afraid of me for the past 2 days because she thinks I am going to take out her stitches. So everytime she has seen me she runs to her room crying. Well tonight I sat down next to her twin sister at the party and she actually came over and sat in my lap! I was excited because I didn't think I'd be seeing her for a week! At one point she turned around and asked if I was going to take them out, just to double check!

All the kids got cake, which was yellow cake with pineapple flavor/small pieces. We got some too of course! Yummy! They like to give huge portions here! They also handed out ice cream, and they got little treat bags! What a great night for them. On top of all of this, Cameron gave each kid a gift. They loved them. The girls got little tea sets, beauty salon sets, hula hoops, strollers, and body wash for the older ones. The boys got remote controlled or cars that lighted up and moved around. They loved them! The older boys got basketballs and Odalis got Cameron's boom box he'd been using all week.

After the party ended, we headed to another one. The streets in town have a contest every year for best Christmas decorations. The street that the English Institute is on always decorates big time for the event and they were having a street party tonight. We headed over there with some of the older kids and hung out for about 1 hour. Jazmin, who used to live here, lives on that street so I got to see her for a little while. We just hung out, enjoyed the lights, and played with some of the neighborhood kids. It was a great start to the Christmas season, and really makes me excited for Christmas!

Tomorrow we are headed to Cabarete, a touristy beach town, for a relaxing get away! Should be fun!