Living in a tropical climate, we have learned that it is important to deck the halls early. Luckily I grow up in a family that decorates the day after Thanksgiving. We have continued this tradition as missionaries here in Ghana. Our decorations make their debut the end of November and stay around until New Years... though we might even extend this if we can manage it!
This year we had our greatest challenge, two Christmas trees. The second year that we were in Ghana, our Christmas tree (a ultra slim blue spruce pine from Target's after Christmas sales) was sent to us and it has been the center piece of our Tropical-Winter Wonderland ever since. This year we are able to buy a massive Christmas tree from a local store. It towers to a height of ten feet (I had to talk Patty out of the 12 or 14 foot models, since they would not fit in our apartment).
The girls jumped out of bed at about 5:30 in the morning jumping on our bed wanting to decorate. Out came all the boxes. Luckily because of a trick that I have learned (thank you Mr. Allen) there where no tangled lights. This is very important, though we do not put them outside I do want the house covered in lights. If we hung out all those different color lights outside, all the neighbors would think we have started a bar, since they are the only people that do that here in Ghana.
After getting up the two trees and stringing lights the girls put on my Santa Claus outfit they bought me last year for Christmas. Thy must have thought I needed to loss some weight. Just before lunch we started all the Christmas music. Thanks to Amazon mp3 online we where able to get all the classics this year, like: "All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth", "Santa Baby", "I Yust Go Nuts at Christmas", and "Michigan Christmas". Once we hit the play button these tones ring through the house from Thanksgiving to New Years.
We try to mix in our local flair with our Western Christmas. The girls love when we decorate our two elephants as Mr. and Mrs. Claus. We even bought a large hand carved Africa Father Christmas.
The center stage of our family room is my wife's collection of Nativities. This photo is of a Ghanaian Nativity that we bought in the capital. Currently she has 17 different Nativities, they come from Ghana, Lebanon, Kenya, America.
When we finally have the whole thing finished on Friday night, we are tired but happy. For the next month we get to enjoy the tinkling lights and holiday cheer. As our missionary friends told me last week, "there is just something special about Christmas on the mission field".
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