Building, painting and playing

Let the digging begin! Our team of 5 plus two kenyen workers dug out the base for the school office yesterday. Which means today my back is killing me! Imagine using a hoe to level out enough room for a school office with third world tools in the hot sun. That is what we were doing. But needless to say we got it done! (Yes my family members, that blonde girl in yellow did manual  labor thank you very much). With the base done we need to lay the foundation and build the room. This is a very important project because without the office the school will not be licensed to run. We only have $1,000 dollars so far in our project fund and need $800 more!! Please if you can donate anything click in my link below so we can directly get the money to continue our project and continue to run the school at Rapha!

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Today we spent all day painting the inside of the girls dormitory. I thought when we were going to paint, it would be easy because of the lovely tool, a paint roller. Well dear friends they do not have paint rollers in Kenya which means we painted with little paint brushes. Yet we did it and now the rooms are bright yellow and cheery. I will post final pictures once the girls are moved in and the curtains my mother and Penny spent hours sewing by hand. Tomorrow me and Sami will be moving in as well! I'm a little nervous to be living at the center because I will be without some of my normal "comforts" such as running water, toilets, and showers BUT I am very excited to be living with the kids. A lot of the kids don't want me to leave at night because they want me to sleep there. I know my relationships with the people and kids there are going to be much stronger which I am excited for. 

Today it was raining so we had to stay inside after painting. Sami and I went to go play with the little boys and ended up having a dance party. The boys have so many great dance moves and we had a blast dancing around! Afterwards we played Simon says which was a great English teaching tool as well for the 5-10 year old boys. Every time someone didn't listen to Simon, they all jumped up and down and hugged me since I was the Simon and screamed with joy. It was a great great time that made me remember why I am here. To have all their little arms hugging me with huge smiles and giggles flowing was a little slice of heaven. 

we love Rapha!

Working away! 

Cutting kale with the girls! 

The kids obviously love my hair 

The boys post Simon says 

The rains in Africa really are quite beautiful 

Karibu! Welcome to Kenya

Day three in Kenya! Yesterday we went to visit the kids for the first time and it was great! We had so much fun playing with them all. We picked up the older kids from school about 20 minutes from the school. We walked back with a massive mob of students eager to follow the "muzungus" or the white people. Some of my favorite memories are simply walking hand in hand with the children and just being. It was surreal to be back in the same place from two years ago. I will be updating with progress pictures of the home later. The second story of the girls dormitory is built , the classrooms have been remodeled and the kitchen is twice the size. Tomorrow we will be painting and starting on construction work. Today was church and it was a blast. The kids sing their hearts out and dance and worship the Lord with everything they have. The whole room was filled with worship and I could feel the Holy Spirit in that space. It's amazing how we can feel the presence of the Lord anywhere in the world. The rest of the afternoon was spent playing soccer with the kids and making friendship bracelets with the older girls. It was a sweet time to be with the older girls as we got to sing together, tell stories and craft. The girls are all very sweet and have such love for one another. I had the brilliant idea of getting cornrows/braids for my time in Kenya. It took a total of 3 and 1/2 hours of tedious pulling, yanking, braiding with 2-10 people working on my massive amount of hair. It was a fun project for the girls but my scalp definitely took the beating. The final project is very.... Interesting. We shall see how long it lasts. Overall I'm so happy and blessed to be here. Seeing the kids made me realize how beautiful and simple life is. The kids are totally content to just sit in the grass, play with one another hours on end and just be. I'm so excited to see my relationships with the kids deepen and grow within the next month. The kids here are fighters , survivors and lovers with their own individual stories that I have the privilege of hearing. 

"Be still and know that I am God, I will be exalted amount the nations. I will be exalted among the earth"-Psalm 46:10

Kenya Day One: traveling mercies

We made it to Nyharururu today after a 22 hour travel day yesterday. We landed in Nairobi and to my great dismay, both of my bags were lost in the flight from Amaterdam to Nairobi. I was so anxious and worried because the donation bag and all of my clothes for the next month are currently in the void of the international airports. Please pray they make it to Nyharururu which is 3 hours from Nairobi. It was no coincidence that I was doing my devotions on the plane reading about spiritual warfare. Then when my bags were lost, I realized that the spiritual warfare is already starting. I kept reminding myself that God is in control and will always provide for me. All the time God is good and right now I'm just focusing on the positives from His blessings. I thank God that me and Sami are the same size, I thank Him that we are all safe, and that I get to see all the kids tomorrow! We had dinner tonight at Thomson falls lodge with our group of 6 people including the owner and founder of HEAL and meet up with the director of the Children's home. It was so great to see her and talk about the changes that have taken place over the past two years. It is truly amazing to see how God's hand has been over the Rapha home. I just can't wait to go see the kids who have been asking about us every day, wondering when we would be coming to visit them. The anticipation of tomorrow, when we will finally see the kids, has been building for the past 6 months!! I just want to hug and kiss all their cute little faces already!! In short please please pray my bags make cit, and for my personal  perseverance.