This month was full of birthdays and other fun during our daily lives here in Accra!
Sara Gail Turns 6!!!
I can’t believe just three short years ago I was sitting down to write one of my first blog posts about my little girl turning 3 years-old. And now, the time is just gone and she is a smart, funny, beautiful, grown-up 6 year-old! She is still not a fan of big parties, because she does get a bit shy in front of crowds, so we had just a small gathering of close friends at the house. She did have a very specific cake request, though: she wanted a cake with all six “cutie marks” from the show My Little Pony. Now, when I was little, having the artistic mother that I am lucky enough to have, my brothers and I could get any decoration we wanted on our birthday cake, baked and designed by our mother. I, myself, did not inherit my mother’s artistic genes, but I was still determined to try my hardest and make the designs as close to the real thing as possible. Firstly, I had to bake the cake. I didn’t want to make a full two-layer cake because I knew it would just be too much cake for the amount of people we were going to be having over. So, I had to improvise on the shapes and sizes of cakes that I baked. I tried to make my cake tin smaller using some tinfoil, and it worked to a certain extent.
Next, I had to do an initial “crumb layer” if I wanted to be able to decorate the cake the following day. Luckily, I can easily find Betty Crocker frosting here, so it wasn’t too complicated a task.
For the day of the party, and Sara Gail’s actual birthday, my best friend came by and was able to help me finish decorating the cake. I am not very familiar with frosting cakes, so she helped me put another layer of the frosting on. Then, it was quite a task to get all the different colors I needed to decorate the cake. In the US it’s fairly straight forward, you just buy the little tubes of frosting you need in the various colors. Here, all they have available, in all the stores that I checked, were just tubs of Betty Crocker frosting in various flavors. So, we decided to take separate portions of the frosting, dye it with food coloring, then use a piping top and tube (or plastic baggies when needed) to prepare the different colors. While my friend was preparing the colors for me, I used a toothpick and did my best to draw out the designs of each cutie mark on the cake. Then, once everything was ready, I started piping the colors onto the cake to make it just as Sara Gail had dreamed of it.
In the end it did turn out to be quite a time-consuming endeavor, with me having spent most of the party getting the cake ready. But it was all worth it to see the look of joy on Sara Gail’s face! She absolutely loved it – and it tasted pretty good too!
My Birthday
Of course, every year I watch my babies get older, I get older right along with them. And, it just so happens that my birthday falls just shy of two weeks after Sara Gail’s. We didn’t have a huge celebration, and it’s nearly impossible for Varun to plan surprises of any sort for me when I spend ninety percent of my time at the house, but he tried his best. On my actual birthday he decided to work from home and I had a meeting at the school in the morning, so while I was out of the house he put up some balloons and streamers to surprise me. I spent most of the rest of the day sewing a new project for myself which I almost finished in that one day. We took a break in the middle of the day to go out for lunch together at a sandwich shop we’ve both been wanting to try.
The rest of the day was pretty relaxed with the girls coming home after school and allowing me to continue work on my sewing. The next day was Saturday, so Sara Gail had gymnastics, as usual, but she was also invited to a birthday party herself by one of her classmates. Even though we were having a few friends over later that evening ourselves, we decided to quickly stop by the other birthday party. The girls ended up having a great time, and Varun and I met some really nice people, who we will try and make plans with again. Once we got home, we spent most of the afternoon just relaxing and watching movies together until our friends came by.
It was great to catch up with our friends, and the girls were able to play with friends too. Varun even went so far as to make a cake for me and the girls were more than happy to help him decorate it. It was a wonderful gesture that I greatly appreciate – and the cake tasted amazing!
Botanical Garden
This month, the girls had a long weekend and an extra Monday off from school, so I decided to venture out to a playground that we haven’t visited much. It is actually a beautiful botanical garden which offers a lot more than just a playground, but it is a bit of a drive from our house, especially when there’s lots of traffic. Plus, even though it is a nice playground, there is little to no shade, so during the day it gets unbearably hot for any sort of outdoor play. But, I made a point of taking them there for this particular break from school and they loved it! Sara Gail was thrilled to have all kinds of things to swing and hang off of, and Abigail was having a fun time trying to keep up with her sister. Their favorite, by far, was the rope course. And it turned out perfectly because we got the place all to ourselves!
I made sure to come prepared, so after an hour or so of play the girls took a break to have some lunch, and take a quick rest in the shade.
Once they finished, they were off again climbing, running, jumping, and playing. Before we left to get out of the heat, I encouraged Sara Gail to try the big climbing net. I’m not sure how else you would describe this, but I would have loved to have climbed one myself when I was younger! Sara Gail was very nervous at first, but then she absolutely fell in love with it!
All in all, it was a nice time getting the girls out of the house and exploring more of this wonderful city!
School
Despite the one extra day off this month, school went on as usual. The only downside to having spent the morning at the Botanical Garden was the residual blisters on poor Sara Gail’s hands.
So, we spent a few mornings letting them heal by playing in the kitchen on the playground.
But Sara Gail can’t stay away from the monkey bars for long! This girl is going to grow calluses soon from all the swinging and climbing she does. In the meantime, I don’t feel fully equipped to handle all these blisters she’s getting!
Abigail is even starting to try her hand at some more adventurous climbing, after seeing all that her sister can do!
This month, the school decided to run a Spirit Week for all the kids and teachers, which is why you can see the girls dressed up a bit in a few of the photos. Unfortunately, I didn’t think to get more pictures, but the girls were able to go into school in their pajamas one day, with crazy hair another day, with the school colors on the third day, and the Friday was a fun dress up day. It was a great way to make the kids feel more involved in the community, and the girls loved wearing their PJs to school!
Sara Gail has also started a fun new project in her class: a pen pal program with a school in Japan! Since the postal service is nothing to speak of here in Ghana, the program has been run virtually. However, the school makes a point of making it as realistic for the kids as possible. Once the school receives correspondence for one of the children, they print up the letter, put it in an addressed envelope, and even have it hand delivered to the classroom and the child needs to sign for receipt! It is just such a fun way to teach kids about mailing letters, even if most people don’t communicate that way anymore. Sara Gail loved getting mail delivered to her!
The rest of the month was the typical drop off with playground and classroom fun. I just love getting to see these girls learn and grow in such a wonderful environment!
Swimming
After the fiasco that was the swimming team at the local Olympic-sized pool, we’ve found a new venue to do swimming lessons for Sara Gail. It is a bit on the pricey side, but it should help her continue to improve her strokes for when she is able to try out for the team at her new school in the fall. Fortunately, these lessons take place at the girls’ school, so it’s really conveniently located, and Sara Gail even gets to take the lessons with a close friend of hers, Abigail’s friend is his sister and taking lessons just before Sara Gail. So, Abigail has a friend to pass the time with during her sister’s lessons, and I have my best friend there to chat with too. Most importantly, Sara Gail is very comfortable and happy with the coach, and is continuing to improve and blow me away with her technique!
Abigail is still taking a class at her school once a week, and she is loving it! I’m sure one day soon, though, I’ll need to supplement her lessons too to accommodate her burgeoning skill!
Hair
As with every month, day, week of the year, I had plenty of fun finding new and creative ways to put the girls’ hair up and out of the way every morning before school. Their auburn locks are just so gorgeous, and I have so much hair to work with! Sara Gail just has such a huge volume of soft, thin hair to put up, and Abigail’s hair is gaining in length every day!
And, yet again this month, despite the mishaps and missteps in the past, Varun insisted that I trim his hair at home. He just doesn’t feel comfortable going into a salon right now. But each time, it’s either late at night, or I’m extremely nervous. I have never been comfortable with doing hair. I’ve barely been able to manage doing interesting this with my own hair, and I’m just having fun discovering things to do with the girls’ long hair. But men’s hair especially – I’ve avoided doing the smallest trims or cuts like the plague! And, once again I messed up royally on Varun’s haircut. He had recently bought new clippers that he wanted me to use. He told me there was no comb that I needed to worry about changing or keeping on it, I just needed to run it through his hair. Little did I know that I wasn’t even holding it the proper way – which does matter! Needless to say, poor Varun had to deal with yet another terrible haircut, while I remain mortified and terrified for his next needed trim.
Food
I had some more fun with food this month, firstly by getting the girls into a typical American meal: Burgers, hot dogs, and fries. To be fair, those are sweet potato fries, but the concept still applies. This isn’t the first time the girls have had burgers before, but, unfortunately, I can never seem to get the patties right for them to really enjoy it.
Of course, we had plenty of Indian meals this month too, with the girls eating like true Indians using only their hands.
I’ve also decided to branch out a little bit with the girls’ school lunches and let them take sandwiches for lunch. I am still sure to pack at least 4 different vegetables into each sandwich, but I’m trying to make it fun for the girls by using different cookie cutters for fun sandwich shapes. This does leave lots of oddly shaped leftovers, but I’m trying to figure out how to use them.
I did get to go out to eat at least one other time this month. Varun has been encouraging some friends of ours to bring back a Breakfast Club-type gathering back into place since things have started to settle down from the initial shock of COVID. Of course, Varun was away for work during the first breakfast/lunch out, but the girls and I were still able to make it. I chose to have a typical West African meal. I cannot remember the name, but I know that it was a lot of chicken with onions and olives – and it was delicious!
Finally, as far as food is concerned, we seem to have ants taking over our whole kitchen – much to my annoyance. I really don’t know what more to do to keep them out of our house at this point. So, every weekend morning when I start getting the coffee ready for Varun and I, I am faced with this lovely sight of ants drowning in our water for coffee.
Sewing
In addition to the new shirt I decided to make myself on my birthday, I worked on another small sewing project over one weekend. I have been wanting to make new pillowcases to put on our couch in the living room. So, I had bought new pillows and I thought I had measured everything out properly to make a nice, quilted cover. But, as does happen when I get excited and rush a project, I didn’t quite prepare all the pieces properly, and I ended up sewing one square on in the wrong direction, and it is a little big for the pillow. I will need to get a zipper to finish this cover, and take a bit more time with the measurements on the next few covers.
Home Time
As with every month, we are still left with plenty of time at home together. Varun decided to take some time to build some Lego crafts with the girls, since Sara Gail had gotten a nice set for Christmas. All three of them loved it and had a great time building new, fun things together.
We also took some time to break into one of Sara Gail’s birthday gifts – a packet of science experiments involving beauty products, specifically a kit to make your own nail polish, lip gloss, and perfume. Since Varun is more scientifically inclined than I am, he made sure to help Sara Gail with this fun project.
I decided pamper the girls a little this month with a little mani-pedi at home. I also agreed that each of the girls could paint my toe nails, one foot each. Obviously they each had to pick a different color for their foot, but it was still a fun little thing to do with them. I may even ask that they paint each other’s nail’s from now on!
I’ve also been trying to keep up their skating skills, as well as my own! It is quite a task to get them all ready for skating, but they both love it, and Abigail is really getting good at it!
But, most of the time at home is spent with the girls playing their own creative games together, tapping into their artistic side, and dancing to the music in one of the movies that they have now watched a million times.
My favorite downtime activity for the whole family, though, is Carrom. I know it’s a game that Varun loves to play, and although truly needs a lot of patience to get through a game, I know he loves sharing it with the girls. I’m thrilled that they’re getting to learn this game, and that I get to play it myself too! Of course, they do tend to fight about who will play on Daddy’s team, because as of now, Daddy’s team always wins.
I wanted to end this month’s post with a clarification to the picture I showed you last month, of the woman carrying an old Singer sewing machine on her head.
I recently described this scene to my cleaning lady and she told me why these people are carrying this around town with them. Apparently, when a woman, or a man, is carrying one of these machines on their head, they are making sure to go into neighborhoods and apartment complexes of local Ghanaians. They also bring with them a pair of scissors, which they use to click together to make noise. If a neighbor or someone in the area hears that noise and has clothes that need to be repaired, they can flag down this person with the sewing machine who will then be paid to repair it. Basically, they go from private home to private home repairing clothes with their own sewing machine. I really liked hearing this story. It sounds so cool, and it certainly would never be something that could or would happen back in the US!
Well, with that neat little local quirk this month’s entry comes to an end. Come back next month to read more about how much my girls are growing up, over here in Ghana!
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