A Weekend with the Ladies

Friday and Saturday I attended a women's meeting for the Manenakela association. I took two of my good friends Amai Mwachamota and Amai Chipboa to help with the teaching. There were 35 women that came from 4 different baptist churches. The theme for the meeting was faith. I taught on Daniel and on Jesus calling the first disciples. I also did a couple of different faith activities which the women really enjoyed. I so enjoy all the singing and dancing but most of all I enjoy seeing them understand the Word of God. During a testimony time, one woman shared that she had never been to a witch doctor until this past year. She was broken over this and started crying as she told her story. She repented of her sin and had giving her husband her charms for him to burn. By the way, her husband is the pastor of the church. Sometimes even Godly people do bad things, but now she is committed to living her life by faith in Jesus alone.

Chimusanya Baptist Church

The women bath in the morning and in the evening since we are in the hot season. Those with little ones give them a bath also. This little was finished with her bath and just playing in the water to stay cool.

Here are some of them women inside the church waiting for lunch.

This is one of the faith activities we did. I had four women blindfolded and they raced along an obstacle course with only one person on their team yelling directions at them. The women had to know the voice of the one telling her what to do and try to block out the other voices. The purpose of this was for the women to realize that we need to put our faith in God alone. There are many voices in our lives telling us what we should do(God, friends, Satan, the world). We need to learn to discern the voice of God so that we will stay on course.

This is the area where the women cooked.

Amai Mwachamota taking a short nap between lessons. This is also where we slept at night.

My little buddy, Joe.

Creature in the night

Check out this spitting cobra which Kevin killed tonight. Kevin evidently walked right past it when our Australian Cattle dog grabbed it in her mouth. Justin saw it and hollered "snake!!!" Sydney dropped it. Then she was trying to get at it behind some tires so while Sydney distracted the snake, Kevin was able to go in for the kill. It is amazing to me that as many times as we have had snakes in our yard I'm never the one that finds it! Of course, that is just fine with me!

Rift Valley Academy

We were able to spend about 24 hours at RVA. It was a great experience for us because we got to meet Zach's teachers and even sit in on his Chemistry and History classes. We ate several meals in the new cafeteria which is very nice. We were able to meet his friends and see who he hangs out with. We went to Sunday night live which is a praise and worship time which is student led. His dorm has a pool table so we were able to play pool with him too. We met his dorm parents and spent some time with them. It was just a fun time and we are thankful for the opportunity to have been there.

This is the welcome sign as you come in the entrance. It says, "RVA Welcomes You to Buffalo Country."

Isn't this a beautiful view?

This is the main administration building.

The bottom half of this building is Chui dorm where Zach will be living this year and probably next year too.

Zach outside of his dorm.

This is Zach with his dorm dad, Matt King.

This is the King Family. Matt and Jan have 4 children. They have been serving at RVA as dorm parents since 1997. Please pray for them as they have this awesome responsibility to help take care of all these boys in this dorm.

Giraffes are my favorite african animal

After our conference we went and picked up Zach from RVA and went into Nairobi for the weekend. We went to a local mall and watched a couple of movies, shopped, and ate at Java House(a coffee house with great food). We also went to the Giraffe Center for a couple of hours. I just love giraffes! They are my favorite African animal.
The Giraffe Center was founded by Betty and Jock Leslie-Melville in 1979. This was in a bid to save the endangered Rothschild Giraffe, which had lost its natural habitat in Western Kenya to agriculture and there were only 130 left in the wild. They captured a baby giraffe to start a program of breeding giraffe in captivity at their home in Langata - home of the present centre. Funds were raised and four herds were moved to four parks namely Lake Nakuru National Park, Mwea Game Reserve, Ruma National Park and Nasalot Game Reserve. Today the Rothschild Giraffe population in Kenya is about 500.
Sorry, I'm putting so many pictures but it was hard to choose which ones I should use.

Up on the platform we were handed food for the giraffes. You just had to hold it out in your hand and they would reach and lick it right out of your hand.

Zach's turn.

Zach's first kiss!

Definitely not my first kiss! However, a first with a giraffe though. Their tongues sure our long and rough! I don't even like for a dog to lick me, so this was a big step for me.

This species of giraffe is different from other species because their lower legs are white.

This is a femur bone from a giraffe. Isn't it huge?

A Time of Reflection

This past week while we were in Kenya, Kevin and I attended a Focus On Leadership Conference. A couple of months ago we had to take several tests and have people who knew is well answer questions about us. Their part was totally anonymous so we couldn't tell who said what. Then at this meeting we got the results of all this information. It was definitely a time of reflection for us both. Here are a couple of definitions of reflection:

Result of meditation; thought or opinion after attentive consideration or contemplation; especially, thoughts suggested by truth.

The reverting of the mind to that which has already occupied it; continued consideration; that operation or power of the mind by which it is conscious of its own acts or states; the capacity for judging rationally, especially in view of a moral rule or standard.

Yes, it was a little difficult to hear what others really thought of me but as I looked at that and then compared it to all the tests I took it all came out to be the Truth of who I am. It was a great conference and one that I have come away from with goals and action plans to change in some areas. Then there are areas that I need to continue doing just as I have been.
One of the tests we took was called the Meyers Briggs which is a Personality assessment. I took this test about 7 years ago and I was a INFP and Kevin was a ESTJ so we were totally opposite. This time I took it and when I saw that I was now a ESFJ I looked back at the front to make sure I had the right test. Yes, it was me, I had changed. I guess after all these years of living with Kevin I am becoming more like him. Ha Ha! If you don't know what these letters mean, E stands for Extrovert, S-Sensing, F-Feeling(big surprise there, huh?), and J-Judging.
"ESFJ's typically are friendly, tactful, compassionate, and sympathetic and place great importance on cooperation and harmony. They are loyal and conscientious. They persevere and get things done in a timely, orderly, and caring manner. They work to see what is worthwhile in other people and draw that out. Even when there is conflict, they believe they can find common ground and harmony. They like being sociable and talking things over with others."
It was also fun being with friends from around our region and meeting new people. I am so thankful for the opportunity that we had to go to this conference. Hopefully, it will make a real difference in our lives in how we lead.

This is the building we ate our meals in and checked our email. There was also a coffee shop here that we enjoyed in the evenings as we visited with our friends.

Our friends Daren, Shawna, and Lee enjoying fellowship.

We are back from Kenya!

We just got back from Kenya late last night. We had a great time at our conference and visiting with Zach. While we were there Hannah stayed with the Cooks and Justin stayed with The Bolthouses in Lusaka. They both had such a good time which made us feel more comfortable with leaving them for one week. Below are some pictures of Hannah playing with Kelsey so you can see some of the fun things she was able to do. I don't have any of Justin but he had a blast too. He got to swim everyday, ride a motor cycle, and fly in a small airplane. The Bolthouses are with Flying Mission and have several small planes. Justin would like to be a pilot when he grows up so this was a real treat for him. Thank you so much Niki and Sue for caring for our children this past week.



Tache House is an orphanage where about 16 kids ages 8-16 years old live with their Auntie Elizabeth. Most of them attend school during the day, and then they come back to the Tache House where Elizabth takes care of them. On this day Niki and the kids joined the youth group for a ministry time there. They all brought activities to do with the kids. Kelsey & Hannah had planned a coloring activity for the smaller ones, and then they wanted to paint fingernails, but only one brave soul was willing.

Kelsey is taking a dance class on Tuesdays so Hannah was able to join in with her. She had a lot of fun.

These are all the kids that were at the guesthouse one day. They all have so much fun playing together. This is part of the new play ground equipment that the Cooks have had built at our Baptist Guest House.

It has recently started the hot season in Zambia. Niki took the kids to the pool one afternoon for some fun in the sun!

Hannah and Kelsey are using the same curriculum for school and were on the same lesson so they were able to do school together while we were gone.

Niki, Kelsey's mom, said that she did have to make sure that the girls were listening to their teacher on the dvd and not talking so much. I know that must have been a tough job for two 7 year olds.

Mug & Muffin

Back when I was in college and involved with Campus Crusade for Christ, we had what was called a Mug & Muffin. So over the last couple of years I have hosted one on several different occasions for those missionaries that live close by or happen to be in town. Everyone brings their own mug and we have a brunch with muffins and either tea or coffee. Then we have a short devotional, pray, and enjoy fellowship. This morning when I got up to start cooking I got about half way through and then the power went out. So, we got to use our outdoor oven again to bake a quiche and had to heat up water for tea and coffee on the cadac burner. Linda Miller, a missionary who is about to retire, gave the devotional from John 15 and talked about some of the things that she had learned over her missionary career in Zambia about love and friends. It's always fun when we can get together with like minded believers but especially if they are women!

back row: Lee, Mary, Linda
middle row: Lindy, Amy, and Suzie
bottom row: Niki, Hannah, and Kelsey

We enjoyed muffins, banana bread, cinnamon rolls, and a quiche.

Niki

Lindy and Amy

Kelsey and Hannah just played the whole time while we met. They enjoyed going out in our rabbit cage and holding the babies.

What's cooking?

As you know, we have been having a lot of power outages all over Zambia for the last year or so. It seems it always goes out when it is time to eat. So, we bought some propane burners a little while back that we can use to either grill or heat up something. However, I have not been able to bake anything until now. A few weeks ago we had Tito(our worker) knock out part of our grill so we could make an oven. For these last couple of weeks each time the power has gone off I have just happened to be finished cooking(which is unusual). Tonight however, it went off before I had finished. So, we cooked in our outdoor oven for the first time. We had an eggplant casserole. We discovered we have a few kinks to work out before the next time though.

Tito making a hole in our existing grill structure.

view from the outside

view from the inside

The finished product. Yum!