......Still on our way!!

Traveling to Kenya can be quite an ordeal.  It is generally two 8 hour flights with a layover somewhere in Europe.  This team flew from Chicago to Detroit and then on to Amsterdam. Easy Peasy - no problem - right?!  Well, except it was only a 45 minute layover in Detroit.  And the plane from Chicago left 20 minutes late.  Still no problem, we could make it to the gate in 25 minutes!  Then we were ready to head off on the runway when we circled back.  The captain came on to let us know that a plane had possibly lost a tire while landing and the debris on the runway prevented us from leaving.  So after waiting another 20 minutes we were finally on our way.  Now we only had 5 minutes - probably not enough time to disembark and make it to our gate!  If this was going to happen God was going to have to work it out!  When we landed in Detroit the captain made an announcement that they were holding the Amsterdam flight for us!  Praise God!  We walked onto a plane loaded with seated passengers.  Their glances at us were not completely friendly, but we were singing hallelujah!!  We were sure we would have smooth sailing from here!  But when we approached Amsterdam, the captain announced we were not being cleared for landing because of the heavy fog.  So.....we circled!!  After about 20 minutes, the captain announced that although the weather wasn't much better, we had been ok'd for landing so he THOUGHT we would be ok and he was going to "GIVE IT A SHOT"!  Not exactly the confidence we wanted to hear!  When we finally landed, we were left with just a little over an hour until our next flight was to leave. Luckily for us, that flight was delayed by about 20 minutes so we were able to freshen up and walk a bit before taking the last leg of our trip!  The Nairobi airport was still rebuilding after a huge fire in July.  But the new part they took us to was very nice and very organized!  We were sure our luggage could not have possibly made the plane with the almost nonexistant layover in Detroit.  And again we thought, if it's going to happen, God is going to have to do it!  Then to our surprise we started seeing bags on the luggage carrousel with big yellow circle Global Impact Team tags.  We sailed through customs, found our driver, Francis, and headed to the van to load up.  We brought a lot of supplies for the baby centre, so we had a lot of bags.  We were seated in the van and luggage was piled all around us.  But again, we weren't the slightest bit uptight as we were now in KENYA!!!!  Only one more day and we would get to see, hold and love the precious little ones at the Baby Centre! 

We are on our way!

This team of 5 ladies led by Jamie and Jolinda Lengacher are excited to be headed to the baby centre! They will serve God in a variety of ways with the main focus being on loving and assisting in the care of the little ones currently residing there.  Please pray for safe travel throughout their trip. As well as their willingness for God to work in them and through them. 

*love the excellent "photo bombing" done by Pastor Don!!

Where the babies live...Crawler Fence and Toddler Playground

Posted on Missionary April Hershberger's blog today:

     Last week we had a group here who did an amazing job on putting up a fence for our Wing B kids. It is a beautiful area for the kids to play in, and is now even more safe since so many of the kids are walking and crawling all over the place. We are so thankful for the teams' hard work on getting this project finished.

 The group also helped to repaint some of the children's outdoor playground equipment. They painted their slide, the swing sets and the monkey bars that were put in a few months ago.

 

2012 04 Team Picture

October 2011 Team Picture

Update from Kenya Team

Things are going well here in Kenya. We are enjoying our time with the kids. As always, they are such a joy to be around. We have 9.75 beds built and boards for shelves are cut and painted. We are hoping to have the shelves put together tomorrow...or I guess I should say Floyd is hoping to have the shelves put together tomorrow.
We went to Salgaa today. We visited several homes. Such a meaningful time! We listened to their stories, laughed, cried, and prayed. Awesome! Then we went to the group meeting. The meeting started with singing by the Kenyan women....very cool to listen to! Then I shared and then Judy gave her testimony. Several of the Kenyan women shared afterwards how Judy's testimony ministered to them. A few of the women have started making jewelry, baskets, decorated gourds, beaded doilies, etc so we had a chance to purchase their things. On our way home, we stopped at the Baby Centre well and farm to take a look around. A great day for us!

We have arrived!

We made it! Our flight from Amsterdam to Nairobi was delayed by 2 hours, but other than that everything went well. All of our luggage arrived, too. They dedicated 36 babies at Ngata AGC this morning so we were able to be a part of that. Was awesome! Everyone is doing well...a little tired...but very excited to be here. We'll try to post pictures tomorrow.

The October Team left this morning for Kenya. They were excited to start the journey and looked forward to getting there so they could begin to love on those babies!

June 2011 Team Picture

Sunday - One in the Spirit

We headed out to the church on the Salgaa plot today to help with Sunday School. We joined the congregation in the church for a time of prayer and worship. The children were all singing when we came in and that was so awesome to hear! The worship team then lead us in singing. Some songs were in English and others in Swahili. But even though we could not understand all of the words, we enjoyed praising God together. One of the songs we sang had the phrase "We are one in the Spirit. We are one in the Lord". And we truly felt that way! The Kenyans again made us feel very welcome. After that we went with the children out to their Sunday School Class. The ages of the children were from infant to around 13 years old. The team shared their skit about forgiveness and then Coach Ummel summed up the skit telling the kids about God's forgiveness and because He forgave us we need to forgive each other. Ally Jenkins and Brittany Lengacher each shared their testimonies and did a great job! Then we passed out the same coloring pages we used at the slum orphanage. Again the kids spent a lot of time making their pictures look perfect. We had planned to play Duck, Duck, Goose with the kids, but the skit involved using soccer balls so several children requested we play "football" instead. We soon realized we needed to have an older kids and a younger kids game. Still some of the younger ones of the older kids got knocked down trying to kick the ball. It was such a joy to see the kids running around, smiling and laughing. Many of them rarely if ever touched the ball, yet they still enjoyed the game. Some of the older girls just wanted to talk, so they stood in the middle of the field and asked questions while the game went on around them. It was a very enjoyable morning for both the Kenyans and the Americans.

June 2011 - Saturday (con't.) - "Baby Abraham"

When we got home everyone was anxious to get downstairs again to see the babies. Baby Abraham, who had just returned from Tenwek, was awake and alert. He is looking really good after his illness and we were so thankful!
It was easier for the team this time to remember names and to start to form attachments to all of the babies. Already some are thinking about how hard it will be to leave on Friday!