WEEK16: Elephants & Hobbits

(December 10th-16th)

Sooo...I am a few weeks behind on the blog posts! My apologies! So you'll be seeing about a month's worth of weekly updates in a row. ENJOY!

MONDAY

“Feed the Children” at Dagoretti- Everything was going great until Kate and I were deserted with the kids and they decided to run through the grass piles and throw it everywhere. I think the phrase “All hell broke loose!” perfectly describes the end of our work shift.

TUESDAY

We helped at the dispensary packaging medicine. Most people would probably find this boring but I think it is kind of fun! (And from the picure on the left...you can see how Kate feels about it! haha)

WEDNESDAY

In the morning, we went to the kitchen and were put to work rolling out cookie dough and cutting out random shapes to bake. The convent kitchen reminds me of the Keebler Elf cookie factory at this time of year. We are literally making hundreds and hundreds of cookies for Christmas! What I am wondering is who on earth is going to be eating all these cookies?! Sooo many cookies!!

After helping in the kitchen, we went to the dispensary and packaged more medicine for a few hours.

THURSDAY

“Feed the Children”. Patty and Solo have become my little buddies now that Rosa has moved to the next cottage for the toddlers. They are such funny babies! It amuses me since when Kate and I first started working at “Feed the Children” Patty was very shy and didn’t like me trying to hold her. Now she barrels her way through, around, and over babies to come sit in my lap. She has become a bit of a “nudge” (aka nuisance) but it’s great to see some of the shyer babies becoming more interactive.

Zumba was cancelled which was a nice break. After lunch, Kate and I went down to the Early Learning Center where Teacher Lydia was having them do puzzles and play with animal cards. Since there is only so long that you can entertain kids with puzzles, I made a game out of naming the different animals on the learning cards.

FRIDAY

“Cottolengo”- The kids were actually pretty good! There was one older boy who I haven’t seen before who was causing trouble among the toddlers but other than it was an all right day. When the kids got antsy waiting for lunch and during potty time, I had them doing a “Simon Says” kind of copy-cat game. My original intent was to distract them by making a fool of myself. However, it was fun watching them imitate my actions.

SATURDAY

Saturday was so much fun! Harris met us in Karen and we all went to the elephant orphanage! Unfortunately, the side we picked was not a popular spot for the baby elephants, but we did get to touch one which was awesome.

After the baby elephants, we went to the mall about a half hour away, got lunch, did some market shopping, and saw “The Hobbit”! Eating at the food court was like dealing with the people at the Masai Market. The minute we sat down we were surrounded by at least 5people pushing their menus in front of us, trying to get us to buy lunch from their restaurant. Typical Kenya. While watching “The Hobbit”, the projector turned off about 20minutes into the film. It came back on after a few minutes….once again….typical Kenya.

SUNDAY

Kate, Harris, and I just hung out in the apartment since we were tired from all of Saturday’s adventures.