Good morning, Valentine!

My little girl has been looking forward to Valentine's Day for a week. I am not even sure how it became such a big deal to her, but it has. As she woke up this morning and called me from her room as usual.... "Mom?" ....her first words and thoughts were, "Mom, it's Valentine's Day today?" She was SO excited to wake up and see her door decorated! Unfortunately, the picture-taking me did not get any pictures of her Valentine's door. :-(  But I did get breakfast!

Happy Valentine's Day, baby girl!! I LOVE you!

The first in a barrage of Valentine's Day posts....for the boys!

Julia and I started putting together her Valentines last night.

As we talked, she realized that she could not wake up and give the boys their Valentines in the morning because they would already be gone to school. So, we had to hurry up and get the boys' treats finished so she could deliver them before she went to bed.

I don't know who was happier....them or her. No one had ever given them a Valentine before! And this was her first time to make and pass out Valentines. (We were in court for our first "big" hearing on Valentine's Day last year.)

She simply could not wait to go to bed and to wake up to Valentine's Day!

Welcome TWO new babies

Have I said lately how much I LOVE my job?! THIS is what I get to do....

After looking at land and dreaming about the exciting future of HCO, I am brought back to the reality of what we do here. We provide a home for babies who desperately need a home. We love babies in who are in desperate need of love.

This precious boy came to us from the Provincial Hospital down the road from us. He was abandoned there by his mother just days after he was born. He contracted meningitis at a few days old, and then developed hydrocephalus. Our manager, Angie, had known of him for several months and had personally fund raised to get money for him to have a shunt put in. This poor baby had been left alone in a government (aka: horrible, deplorable, disgusting) hospital for over four months, with no one to hold, love or care for him. In hospitals here, a mother or caretaker must stay with their child to feed, bath and take care of them. Nurses do not do any care taking whatsoever. Sadly, our little guy has spent the entire first four months of his life laying on his back, his head simply being shifted from side to side. He was not held, rocked, cuddled, or loved. Not at all. He was only noticed by the few visitors who passed through occasionally,  which is how I first heard of him. Now, this sweet little boy is healthy enough to be discharged from the hospital and is ready to begin his new life!

We named him Silas Jabali, meaning "strong pillar." We pray that this little boy will grow big and strong, and will one day be the strong pillar who will lead others.

Please pray for his continued healing and that he would quickly learn to love and bond. After missing so much in his formative few months, there are lots of hugs and lots of holding coming his way!!

And this is Elizabeth. Sweet Elizabeth has also been neglected during her few short months of life. Though she did have a mother to feed her and meet her basic needs, it is clear that she was missing so much. Her mother has been committed for neglect, after abandoning her a few weeks ago. Though an absolute beauty of a baby girl, Elizabeth is quite delayed in her development. Her muscles are extremely weak. Her poor little legs just flop about. At nine months old, she makes no effort whatsoever to weight bear on her legs. She is a very mellow baby who has obviously had little to no interaction or stimulation. She is perfectly content in any situation, indicating that there are no expectations as to what she wants or expects. She has obviously learned to self-sooth and be content in any environment. She is absolutely precious!

Please pray that little Elizabeth will gain strength in her body and life into her soul. Pray that she will quickly settle in and feel comfortable in her environment, and that she will progress developmentally. For whatever time we are blessed to have her in our home, may she soak up all the love that God has for her.

And, to add to that prayer list, please pray for our aunties as they not only care for the babies in the home, but also these two new precious souls who are in such great need of love and care. These little ones need lots of physical touch and love. Our aunties are more than capable and willing to do this, but they only have so many hands and hours in a day. May the Lord grant them all that they need as they care and love our little ones.

"Out of the Blue Clear Sky"

I love George. (George Strait, that its.) And today I found myself listening to George as I was driving out under the amazing African, blue, clear sky.

FPD #13: Blue

So why was I driving out under the beautiful blue sky, you ask? I have been LAND HUNTING!!! Yes, there are BIG things in store for His Cherished Ones!! There will be more to come on that later, but as a side note I will take this opportunity to ask you to please pray for us (especially me, personally) as we set out on this new {ad}venture. Pray that the Lord will lead us to the exactly place He has already prepared for us, and for discernment for me to recognize and hear Him in this process.

And, after spending five hours driving the hot, dusty, DUSTY, DUSTY, DUSTY roads, this exhausted mama's busy day was just beginning! I left the house this morning planning to return home immediately after our MMM (Monday Management Meeting) to get busy on my long list of tasks, including some fun Valentine's baking and making. Well, that five hour land hunt began with a call from the guy during the meeting, so we left after that.

Did I come right home, then, and get busy on my long list of tasks?!?!  Um....no. I'm telling ya, it was a BIG and BUSY day for me and HCO/HOH!  Stay tuned...... :-)

Too much of a good thing?

FPD #12: Inside your closet

Really? Why is this on the list? Who wants to see inside my closet? I don't.

My clothes are actually organized, but you can't tell by the edges hanging down. When I was looking at my closet, I noticed how weird my shoe stackers look. Why on earth do I have 20 pairs of the same kind of shoes?!

TOMS and Crocs. That's pretty much my Africa-wear. This place is DUSTY. The first thing I do when I come home from being out all day is wash my feet and legs. And any house keeper considers it part of their job to wash and clean shoes on a regular basis. That was weird for me, but I totally see the need for it. But washing and setting shoes outside to dry in this hot, intense equator sun is really hard on leather shoes. But, Crocs are perfect for that. Wash-and-wear! And same with TOMS. They are not leather, and they are easily washable.

And of all my Crocs, not one pair of the big, oversized ones that most people think of as Crocs. And I think there are a few cute ones. :-)

And TOMS, though I was resistant to the bandwagon trend of them at first, have become my favs!! Especially the super cute wedges! Totally worth it.

Makes me happy

Oh, yeah. It does....

(Catching up from yesterday. I wasn't able to get on and post. Can I pull the Africa card and say that it was just one of the TIK kinda days?)

FPD #11: Makes me happy

Really, this can make any day better. Well, almost any day.
One of the perks of this place is that I get my favorite drink from a glass bottle. And, oh, pulling that bottle out of the refrigerator and seeing the glass fog up, and then the bubbles fix up. Mmmm....yep, makes me happy!

Bubbles. Fizz. And in my fun cup from home....even better. You can ask Kris and my mom. I am a cup girl. Cups and bags. They all make me happy. :-)

THIS is why I don't do self portraits

Some friends and I went on a little day trip to Nairobi today. We got to pretend we were normal Americans, going to a place in Nairobi that is a very big taste of America. This is where we stock up on all things American. We planned to go to about four different places, but ended up spending the whole day at Village Market. In all the years I lived in Nairobi, I never spent so much time there!

As we were leaving, literally driving through the exit gate, I finally remembered that I was supposed to take a self portrait picture today. Well, there's a reason I don't do these! (And I know I could get creative and think of a different way, but the good ole hold-and-shoot self portrait is what we've got today.) Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I usually have a 10 pound camera in my hand. Not so easy to hold. Okay, it's not that big of a camera, but it's still not so easy to hold up with one hand. And it looks really goofy to try to take self shots with this big thing, especially when we were driving through the exit gate.

FPD #10: Self portrait

I tried to take a picture of myself and my friends Haley and Chia. First of all, it just wasn't right. That 10 pound camera thing. I tried to do some "test" shots to see if the settings were right.

 But then we weren't even able to see Chia in the "for real" pictures.

 (I'm not driving here, by the way. Our steering is backwards.)

 And then the big shadow on Haley's face.

So we just gave up.
But at least I'm not giving up on the February Photo a Day challenge!! :-) I'll be back tomorrow....

Karibu!

FPD #9: Front door

Habari ya asubuhi na karibu nyumbani kwetu! (Good morning, and welcome to our home!)

Just a few minutes on Pinterest and my front door is put to shame. But I do like "my people" that greet me at the front door every day. Kenyan doors are not really "pretty." They are definitely built for security, not aesthetics. How pretty can you make metal and bars?! Getting into a door means a lot of clanking, knocking, and banging of metal. No one can sneak into my house! To get from outside, to inside my house and lock the door, there are a total of 9 locks and latches. But it's "home," and I love it!

The Sun

FPD #8: Sun

I tried to find a positive in regards to the sun. I'm not loving it so much right now. But, with the avocado tree, it doesn't seem so bad for a moment.

It is SO hot and dry here. Seriously dry. And I am a West Texas girl saying that. And, I am West Texas girl who was home during the hot drought of this past year. Granted, it is not near that hot here. But the dryness is way more intense here. I can't explain it, but I'm sure it has something to do with the sun. Right? The only thing good I can find with the sun right now is that it is somehow helping my avocados grow!! (That has to be the case, right?)

It is mind-blowing how quickly things dry up here. I am glad tress don't die so easily. Everything else we plant is pretty much gone, or will be soon, but the avocado tree....it's still good! Yay! And when things do dry up here, it affects everyone's lives in very real ways. Water sources dry up and food simply stops producing, and it's not like America where you can still get food at any old store. People suffer in very real ways. They cannot feed their families. People starve. Animals starve.

The sun. It can be pretty harsh! But at the same time, it's life-giving. Isn't that true for so many tough points of our lives? But things rooted deep will continue to grow through the drought and dry times. And eventually, the rains come, God refreshes, and life goes on. And hopefully, we have grown through it.

(And had I known what I would write about the sun today, I would have taken pictures of the dry, dusty Nakuru so you could see how *uh-hm* lovely it is.)