Our mini vaca

 

Our night away into Nairobi for our anniversary was fabulous.

As I said before, we began our evening with dinner at Cafe des Arts.   They have a wonderful patio dining area that is covered by a large tent cover.  It is a lovely place to relax and enjoy good food:

Ian was pretty excited about his dinner, he even looks like he's glowing a little

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here’s an up close of his shredded lamb, slow cooked for 9 hours, then put into a patty that is refrigerated and then grilled just prior to service:

Lamb with mini roasted potatos

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I choose the spinach quiche (I love quiche) in hopes of saving room for dessert.  The dessert turned out to be pretty standard European dessert…a little dry and not quite sweet enough.  Next time, I’ll go all out on the dinner itself.  Here I am in a blanket shawl the restaraunt owner gave me when it began to storm outside:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We had a wonderful time, and we still enjoy being together!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then, we found our way to the Serena Nairobi which was wonderful.  I had to take a few pictures of our accommodations as this is the nicest place I’ve been a quite a while.  We felt pampered, and relaxed and renewed.  It was the perfect was to spend the rest of our anniversary.

Ian relaxing in the air conditioned room

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When we arrived in our room it was pretty darn cold so I started to hunt around for the thermostat.  It was NO WHERE TO BE FOUND!  Ian even had me look in the closet.  So, finally, I sat on the bed in defeat and looked over at the nightstand.  And what do you know?  There on the nightstand was the REMOTE CONTROL for the air conditioning!  Never seen that before!  It was great.

 

This is the fabulous bathroom that was pretty much my favorite part of the trip.  That gives you insight into our every day bathroom situations, because  a bathroom is not generally my favorite feature to point out:

 

The fact that there was cold AND hot water faucets was amazing and the granite and marble didn’t hurt either.

 

Here was the other half of the bathroom, which was equally as handsome:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And then the view of downtown Nairobi from our room:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The only question left to answer is:  When can we go again?

 

You can buy me with mail

I truly can’t believe the way you all spoil us with mail.

I love it.  It is really one of my favorite things.  The kids too.

So, thank you’s go out to these recent package senders:

Bonita May (mother-in-law with a flair for getting as much as she can into a flat rate box)

Carol Barnum (mom who gets the prize for the most random collection of things that are amusing and fun like a toy mosquito on a spring)

Vicki Moore (a co-worker of Ian’s who sent a wonderful package with something for everyone..I really should met you rather than just hearing about your “presentations”! )

and Anna Goodworth (for thinking ahead and sending the most adorable Gymboree outfit for Lucy’s birthday next month and fun stuff for Eli)

 

This isn’t to say that you have to send us stuff to get a mention in the blog, but you do get a bit of a sweet spot in my heart!

 

Doctor Update

Sorry that I wasn’t able to write yesterday when we returned home from the doctor and Nairobi.  We have been fighting random power outages for about a week.

So I had an appt. with a wonderful ob/gyn yesterday.  She was everything I had prayed she would be:  knowledgeable, empathetic, encouraging….

But she did confirm that I was in the process of a miscarriage, and sent me for an ultrasound to double check  and it came back in agreement.

It is hard to believe that we were in this position not even a year ago.   In God’s grace, he makes this load easier to bear having had that experience.  My heart was guarded during this pregnancy, and perhaps because of such, it makes it easier to process this loss  and continue on with all of the craziness that is everyday life…kids that need to be mediated, laundry, picking up the never ending  mess, food.

The OB/Gyn didn’t have an explanation for the 2 miscarriages in a row, but I will go back in another week for a repeat ultrasound to make sure everything is ok and then we will run blood tests….she has several ideas on what we might do to better support an early pregnancy so this doesn’t keep happening.  We’ll see how all of that goes.

Thank you to all of you for you prayers of support and healing for our hearts.  If you know us, you know that we love kids and I especially love babies.     Continue to pray that the physical aspect of this process goes smoothly and with less pain than last time.

 

Lake Naivasha

So, if you’re savy, you’ll have found Megan Steele’s blog that she is writing while here in Kenya and you can have twice the reading pleasure!  On days that I seem just too worn out to get anything onto the blog…it is nice…because she has often written one!

Anyhow, this is about a week late, but I thought I’d share some pictures from our Lake Naivasha adventure last weekend starting of course with a stop for coffee at Java House:

 

We then drove up from Nairobi through Limuru, a beautiful lush farming town:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From Limuru, we drove up until we reached the end of the Great Rift Valley http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rift_Valley_Province.  Truly, pictures do not do it justice, but here’s a go of it:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From there we approached the town of Navaisha where we made a brief stop so I could go to the bathroom….ahh, my first experience with a squat toilet.  Lovely.  I don’t have a picture of that, but imagine it on the side of a service station, with a raggedly old wooden door, padlocked from the outside (latched from the inside thankfully), with a hole in the floor, a pull handle and NOTHING else.  Pretty darn gross, but when you’ve held it for 3 hours, sometimes you take what you can get.

 

Ian and the kids then hid from the 7 cats at the YellowGreen Restaurant that ended up jumping up and stealing chicken off of Megan’s plate:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Then after lunch, off to the lake that we accessed from the Naivasha Country Club:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ok, so I’ve been working on this darn post for like 4 days now, and it really looks like this is all of the pictures that I am going to successfully load on here.  It was a beautiful trip and we had a great time.  Megan has a great picture of one of the hippos we saw on the lake on her blog.

 

Perspective

There are things daily that frustrate us.

Computers, waylaid plans, people who don’t do what we expect or want, whinning kids.

I was just reminded of what is truly important though…..not by anything an particular, but just one of those moments, probably the whispering of the Holy Spirit.

What is important:
Our loved ones, particularly communicating in some way that they are important and valued. By us and by God.

Finding the time to set aside the frustrations, taking a breathe, and just taking a moment to soak in all of the things that do go right.

To all of you, thank you for:
Your prayers
Your encouragement
Sharing humor with us
Doting us with cards and packages
What you do to support Orphans Overseas or the Salvation Army and in turn these people surrounding us
Living life a little more dangerously

 

An exciting evening for the kids.

 

Guess what Ian's watching....

 

Eli’s on the edge of he seat for…

...for moderately inappropriate adult humor clown guy at Eli's first Kenyan kiddie birthday party.

Tired out from a great party....loving the paper car mask.

Oh yeah..our other child..shee had a great time too.

So exciting, last week we were invited to our first child birthday party.  It was on Wed evening here in Thika for a boy, Jay, in the kid’s class.  It took us over an hour to find the place, it’s less than 10km from our house.  The directions were less  than detailed and we asked about 10 people for directions each of them pointing us in another direction. 

It was at 1 of the 2 athletic / social clubs  in town so you’d think it would be an easy place to find.  Well you, along with us would be wrong.  When we finally found the place it was down this tiny, dirt alley that you could never guess led anywhere.   Well it did, and we arrived about an hour and 15min late.  Didn’t seem to be a problem though.  We were warmly welcomed.   It looked like most of the people at the party were children, family or staff of the Imani School. 

The fesivities started with a magic show by a clown who at one point used some really inappropriate adult humor…but only Ian and I seemed to catch it thank goodness.   No Copperfield, but the kids enjoyed the show.  Then there was cake, a full meal, and some fun kid games.  We made lots of freinds and Eli got another invite to come to another boys house on Friday.  His new buddy Maanav.  By the end of the party, the kids were very tired, overstimulated, and just plain done.  We went home and put them right to bed, clothes, masks, candystains and all.  It was a great evening for them.  A tiring but good evening for us.  It was great to meet some friendly adults in our community who are well established and welcoming.  Most of these families are from India, but have been established in Kenya for at least 3 generations.  They are generally business people of some variety or another.

On Friday we had a playdate with Maanav at his house..it went great.  His mother Poonam was so welcoming, they have a beautiful home that you would never guess could exist here in Thika.  Huge back yard with regular cut grass, a swing, slide, teeter totter.  Very nice, and very refreshing to be welcomed to their home.  They live there with 11 family members total, so you can imagine that it  is a pretty large house.  Two brothers, their wives, 5 children and the grandmother and grandfather.  The grandfather designed the home…which would fit right in at Forest Heights there in Portland.  Travertine floors, granite counters, multiple stoves, fancy furniture/decor.  They have the most lovely garden with manicured flower beds that were done all up in different geometric patterns.  You name it.  And everything spotless and clean.  I know that we have the rich and the poor there at home, but the contrast here is so incredibly drastic, and it feels like we are attempting to straddle both worlds.  It is good though to have connections throughout the community to draw on.

Just for a little contrast to the party pics…here’s a lone Maasai watching the traffic jam at the roundabout.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Imani Bazaar, Weekend Exploring, and Back to Work

Eli trying to win a toy motorcycle.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NO luck...instead he won....Mastermind.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not too excited about his "win" we were able to exchange it for the motorcycle after all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Getting his face painted, everyone else asked for a ball or butterfly...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Eli asked for Spiderman and here's what he got. He was really happy about it even though this picture doesn't show it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Meanwhile…..the girls were at the fingernail painting booth.

 

There were horses to ride...that scared Eli to death. He did pet one though.

Saw lots of countryside like this.

Saw lots of markets like this.

Wow and way out here in the country. Amazing.

 

Our rustic patio set.

They were serious about the “door – to – door” service. We thought they picked up at the gate.

 

 

First van ride to school..Eli is so excited, Lucy is a little nervous.

So we had what resembled a fairly “normal” weekend here in Kenya.  We went to the kids’ school bazaar, which was as typical as you can get.  Booths, games, wares for sale, exchanging money for “tickets” to turn in to participate in the activities at the booths etc.  It was nice to arrive and have people greet the kids by name. 

Although there was one mishap and one “Captain Obvious” moment at the bazaar.  The mishap occurred as I stood in line to buy some tickets for the family.  The woman behind the table greeted Eli by name, and, since Eli had only been in school 3 days, and it wasn’t his teacher, I assumed that the person greeting must have been either his swimming teacher or the horse trainer.  I said as much, to which the woman replied, “No, actually, I’m the headmistress!”  Not the first impression I was hoping to make.  Then I followed it up with my “Captain Obvious” statement.  

A sidebar on “Captain Obvious” statements.  If you can’t figure it out, it is when you say something that is completely obvious to everyone else, and should be to you as well.  We learned this coined phrase from my brother, who may have learned if from his now wife or perhaps some of her college friends?

Anyhow, my “Captain Obvious” statement was this to the headmistress:  “Oh, I’m Eli’s mom” to which she replied, “I figured.”  Duh!  Not only did I walk in with him….but in the hundred or so people at the bazaar, Ian and Lucy were the only other possibilities for family, and what do you know! 

I’m going to have to work a little harder to make a better impression with the headmistress.  Although, in my defense, and Kori take no offense, she DID so look like a p.e. teacher!  You all know what I am talking about.

After the bazaar we just drove out of town and kept going.  Without a map, we just headed towards Mt. Kenya, which is north of where we live.  We enjoyed simply taking in the sights and sounds of something other than Thika and Nairobi.  We drove through farm land and more mountainous areas…all very reminiscent of what it looks like on the island of Kauai.  We stopped at an “Out of Africa Curio Shop” and were greeted by the VERY tourist prices.  We made our way out of there with just our very favorite items.  The shop keeper made sure to let us know multiple times that he was giving us his “resident price”.  We are sure it was a Wazungu “resident price”.  On our way out, he showed me to his disabled 8 year old son.  He sends him into a special school here in Thika.  He said that the boy had severe meningitis as a baby.  He said he “wasn’t right in the head”.  I met the boy…he appeared to have expressive language difficulties (although I am not a speech and language pathologist to formally diagnosis him).   I asked his father if the boy followed directions ok, he replied yes.  Such a different world.  I imagine this child would be in a regular 2nd grade class in the states with some speech and language support from special education.

Anyhow, with that, we made our way home with my moaning and groaning about being horribly carsick until I took a motion sickness pill, that just didn’t seem to work.  I crashed when we got home while Ian brought the kids in a mixed up some dinner.

On Sunday, we ventured again into Nairobi in an attempt to further furnish the house with necessities andin hopes of scoping out possible churches to visit.  We didn’t find a church, but the mall is filled with nonstop Christian music all day on Sunday.  I’m not sure if this is an everyday kind of thing or just a Sunday thing.  We’ll see this Wednesday when we go in for work and for a town hall meeting held by the US Ambassador at his home.   We scored some fun chairs from a roadside dealer for our patio, and I learned that my motion sickness pills are chewables….so they worked much better this time around.

We were back to work today….meeting  much of the morning to figure out next steps and to divy up the tasks needed to get this place really hopping.  Besides all of the regular tasks that are involved in running a program there are processes unique to Kenya and a new organization to learn.  Anyone got a guess about what “Impress” is?   Rather than making a good impression??  Also, decisions to be made about whether to have a “cooker” or a “jiko”.  What do you all think?

  

 

Where we were a year ago….

So, I’ve been asked how we ended up here in Thika.  I forget that some of you haven’t been on this journey with us from the start!

So for Donna, and perhaps others of you who haven’t been on this rollercoaster ride with us, I pulled a note that I wrote in early September reflecting on the journey that was leading us to come to Thika, Kenya.

It was a bit difficult re-reading and visiting again the emotions I felt the day I wrote this, but so it is.  This is the “note” as I posted it to facebook…where you can also find us!  For more info about Orphans Overseas and their work, you can check them out under the tab ”our cool hookup” on the main blog page.

As I write this, I am listening to:  Who Am I  by Casting Crowns.  A very appropriate song!

Really, we are moving to Kenya..

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Wednesday, September 10, 2008 at 1:28am | Edit Note | Delete

I truly do believe that we only see a small fraction of the total plan for our life at any given moment.

Case in point. In April, our next door neighbor offered us first dibs on her house that she was selling. This is the house that I covet (and yes, I know I should not covet anything, but this is my dream home). It is the storybook house in which I envision huge & noisy family gatherings at Thanksgiving and Christmas. Course it doesn’t have a great yard like our current tiny house, but that can always be fixed right? Anyhow, after agreeing that if the door remained open for us to purchase this house, we would, the door was slammed shut by the neighbor deciding she didn’t want to sell.

In June, I send an email out inquiring more of this Kenya project that keeps being brought up to Ian and I. Yet, in the back of my mind I remember the conversations I have been having with God over this huge life change. Since March I had prayed this sort of prayer…. “Ok God, so if you let me get pregnant, then no Kenya. If I don’t get pregnant, then perhaps Kenya.” We agree to talk with the organization more about the position in Kenya at the end of summer when things have slowed down….

In July, we find out we are pregnant, and I clearly remember thinking, “Ok, God, then no Kenya.”

In August, on Ian’s birthday, I am scheduled for my 10 week ultrasound. No heartbeat, no baby to be seen. Just an empty womb. I am by myself, left to absorb this heartwrenching news. On my drive home, I am sitting at a light signal and am struck by 2 birds (they look like eagles, but probably aren’t) soaring overhead and the phrase, “they will soar like eagles” and am put at peace because I am assured that my baby is safe and secure soaring with God, soaring like an eagle.

When I arrive home, a get a phone call asking for a time when Ian and I can come in to talk about Kenya. I hung up the phone, cried a lot, was generally pissy, stomped my feet in anger, and said out loud to God, “God, that was rude!” And thought about the cruel injustice of it all.

Later that day, the neonatal dude confirms that the pregnancy has a 90% chance of not being viable.

We accept the Kenya job on a Sunday, and I miscarry a few days later.

Wouldn’t have taken the job had they called even a day earlier, because I would have thought we were pregnant. It isn’t advised that pregnant women or newborns travel to areas that have yellow fever (Kenya). In what seemed like 1 day our lives changed dramatically….but we were allowed to see small parts of the plan that God has been working on for years.

It seems like only the start to an amazing journey for our entire family, and I am assured that there will be more babies/kids in our house…one way or another!

 

Pretend Play

Kids are such a reflection of what is going on in your family….the stresses and the joys.

When we lived in Portland, play centered around pretending to be animals…like our dogs Toby and Sherman, or grandmother’s dog Tukker. Right before we left, we had a lot of pretend play centered around traveling. Lots of “packing” and “airplanes”.

Today, Eli and Lucy played out front on our small patio. They were taking turns opening the metal security gate as the “night guard” or “night garden” as Lucy calls them. We have rotating night guards and also a day security guard here at Karibu. We also see guards everywhere we go…at home security gates, in the mall, on the road.

Yesterday, while grocery shopping and riding in a kid “car” shopping cart (yes, they have those here!) Eli pretended to be a Matatu (those crazy taxi type vans we talk about) running into people and things. His pretend was even peppered with shrieks and squeals as he pushed his way into the traffic of the store aisle.

Guess that’s just the world as they see it right now! Eli, bless his heart, got a new bike yesterday when we were in town and he informed me that I needed to drive him and his bike into town so he could share it with all of the other kids. Sweet boy.

 

 

 

One Week – Settling in and Making Friends

Anne and the kiddos resting inthe shade after our little walk off the compound. 

 

 

 

 

Eli has been cooped up and whenever we get out he climbs, runs, throws something,  or just plain spazes out. 

We Went for a little walk today and the kids made some new friends.

 

 

 

Eli Really wanted to play with one boy’s old tire and was heart broken that he wouldn’t let him.  Sometimes the best things are not the most expensive things…who knew a tire could be such a coveted toy. 

 

 

 

 Two worlds come together.  This was a great moment. 

 

 

 

This dude joked with us as we walked by asking me to come help him work his field.  I told him my back was hurting and hunched over…he laughed.  On the way back home Eli went and helped him turn some red soil, He liked it and invited me to his place in one of the slums next to our compound.  I told him I’d come by another day.

 

 

 

Here we are walking along the  main road leading to our town, Thika.  We’re on our way back from the day’s excursion and everyone’s hot and tired.  The kids love the rough terrain.  Lucy runs..falls…runs..falls…while Eli pretends to be a train or plane or who knows what motorized wild vehicle.  I guess I didn’t say much so far in this post, but like I said yesterday..the images speak better than I write.   BTW, our modem is so slow this took me over an hour to post so far.  It usually works best in the morning here so from 8pm on in Portland.  

Oh, we can’t wait to sleep tonight…we got the good bug nets all treated and installed.  That and a fan and we should sleep like babies.  Check them out…I just woke the kids from nap taking the picture.  These go all the way around the mattress and zip completely shut.  All for a whopping $10 – 15 each.  When I tried to buy them online before leaving they were something like $60…some things are cheap here….the $6 frozed 1.5kg chicken I bought yesterday was not. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There’s one more sweet image for the day that I’ll let Anne post and describe because I was inside working on the nets.  Heron, Lena, Anne and two security guards spotted a bug black cobra, momba… I dont know… a big snake of some sort (I guess it stood up like 2-3 ft tall to try and strike one of them).   There was lots of jumping screaming and laughing at each other while they bravely tried to kill it….it got away but no one was hurt.  Safe and sound in Thika.  We’re now sitting on our borrowed loveseat watching backyardagains dvd on the computer and the kids are begging me for candy.  Guess they’re feeling OK.  Ian