Mattaw Children's Village goes to Kisumu!

So I've mentioned how a few weekends ago we took ALL our family to Kisumu for a field trip. Mattaw staff, children, teacher, Ian, Caleb, and our little family of four. It was a great trip! Here's the pictures...

First we went here...

Angeline never left Elisha's side...



It was like taking a nature walk and seeing fenced in animals along the way. We first saw lake Victoria...

And learned about how this plant was overtaking some of the lake so these genius' in Europe decided to import a plant to get rid of them. BUT instead their plant was even worse so now they are having the most difficult time getting rid of it so that fisherman can go out and fish and not be stuck out on the lake for days. Some people think they can come "fix" Kenya and end up making her worse. Thank goodness there's a God who's full of love and grace! We hope He will intervene and solve this for them.

All the children were SO incredibly happy that day. This was an opportunity they might never had been given had it not been for people like YOU who are sponsoring them and enabling us to fulfill the vision.



Saw some beautiful cheetah's (they were behind a fence)...



And walked down a trail with Zebras that were out in the open...



And a TON of Impala's, hints the name of this park...



We got to greet a monkey with a handshake...



And stand right up close to the fence to view lions....

There were no large pits on the other side of the fence to have added security that the Lion would not attack.

Oh and since we are on the subject, this seems like a great opportunity here to explain something to all you readers out there that haven't ever been to Africa. We do NOT live amongst wild lions here. I repeat: there are NOT wild lions just roaming around in Kitale! They are all , excuse me, many of them, are all in game parks, national reserves, and "zoos" like this one. There are very few rural places in Kenya that have lions out in the wild. Just not many places in Kenya. For sure not Kitale :). Ok, back to our normal broadcasting. Thank you for listening to this brief interruption!

And then we took a break to give the kids cookies and juice. And monkeys came to visit. And stole snacks RIGHT out of the hand of our kids....



Lucy was so sad and you can only imagine my reaction was to kill the little pipsqueaks. Don't mess with my Lucy!



Ok, so I didn't really kill them. But Elisha sure gave them a lecture about the whole event...

After this we left and went to the port. Kenya only has a small part of Lake Victoria. Tanzania and Uganda also share it. Most of it being in Uganda though. So there are a lot of boats that transport cargo and make trades between the countries. The biggest ferry in all the lake just happened to be in the Kenyan port while we were there! So the children got to ride on it. Unfortunately Elisha and Claire were in desperate need of a nap so before going on a boat, we went separate ways from our Mattaw kiddos. Our house parents and teachers took over from there. We went back to where we stayed one night and let the kids nap.

The Mattaw group continued on with a tour of Lake Victoria. They then went for lunch. They had fresh fish from the lake. Then they left Kisumu late that afternoon and headed back to Kitale.

It was a great trip and I can't thank those of you that sponsor one of our children enough! You are making a huge difference in a life of a child that once never had opportunities like this. Every child deserves to be a child! And sometimes that means a trip to the "zoo". :-)

In other news, I also have some pictures to show of our children receiving gifts from their sponsors. They are almost finished writing letter and we will send them out soon! Here's a sneak peak of Nelima getting a stethoscope from one of her sponsors to help motivate her in her dream to be a Dr. one day! That was incredibly kind of them! And what an encouragement to Dr. Nelima.