Day 8 - Friday June 18

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Hello

Today was another good day here in Machakos. Started with breakfast and devotion from Linda Halbert and then headed off to work on the chapel. A few of us stopped by the local preschool and dropped off a couple of buckets of school supplies and stuffed animals for the kids. This little preschool was the very first project we worked on here our first year at Scott. We refurbished this little building and gave them all sorts of teaching materials, which are all still hanging in the exact same spot where we put them several years ago. They were very appreciative.

We then headed down to work and a few of us went to hold babies at the orphanage again. Jon and I went into town to meet with the Principal of the School for Disabled and realized that the President, Vice President and Prime Minister of Kenya were all in downtown Machakos today. There were a ton of people around but we never saw them personally. We met back up for lunch and then went out to about 8 different schools. Today, I had Shannon and Meagan with me and we went to Machakos Academy Primary school. We did a puppet show for them to the Max Lucado story You Are Special and then did a few songs with them and shared the gospel message. They seemed to enjoy it. The other groups went to several different schools and I haven't heard all of the stories yet but I know everyone came back encouraged.

Right now we are all in the lunchroom and trying to play the movie The End of the Spear for them...having some technical difficulties so I came in here to do the blog while they work on it. It actually looks like the lights just went off in there so that is probably a good sign that they got it started. We have invited lots of local people to join us for the movie so there are quite a few in there.

We heard from Mary Ndungu late last night that the other team is doing well with the exception of KJ. Apparently, he is lactose intolerant, but chose to drink a big thing of milk anyway. Not sure why but his sister says he does it all the time. :) Hopefully, he is feeling better by now. I know that Salem was going to go and preach today in the open air market and I'm sure we'll hear some amazing stories about that. Also, Mary and Camille were taken to the top of the hill in a Land Rover to speak to the women. She also said that the group is extremely tired because the work on clearing the land has been very difficult. They have dull machetes to work with and apparently about 3 inches of shale rock on the top layer they are having to dig through to put post holes in for the building. I hope they are taking lots of pictures because according to Mary they hope to have put an entire building up by the time they leave. Not sure how that's going to happen but I'm sure they can do it! Sorry that we don't have up to date info. from them. We usually don't get to talk to Mary until later at night, which is after I do this blog. So I will have more updates from them by tomorrow.

Our group will be going at 10 am to do a groundbreaking ceremony with the Springs of Hope Orphanage to see them begin work on fencing their property so that they can begin putting in the pump to their well and then start the various buildings. We are very impressed with their director, Mary and she has given our students the highest compliments how they really seem to care for and interact with the babies and children there. On the way to the orphanage this morning, Kevin King kept saying "I don't really want to be with the babies because I'm not good with babies" But he quickly scooped up a little one who was crying and ended up holding that baby the ENTIRE time. I'm not sure how they got him to put the baby back down. :)

That's all for now because I love this movie and don't want to miss it! Goodnight from Machakos. To my sweet Marshall, Mikayla and Marie - We LOVE YOU tons and are missing you so much!

Sincerely,

Jenni Millet