Good eats!

C4KK now has kitchen space to hold bulk items

and that’s exactly what’s been done.  Today I thought I’d give you an approximate break down of how much food C4KK uses on a weekly basis.  The amounts will vary depending on how many kids are there….right now the 10th-11th graders are away at school and in February 5 more kids (the new 9th graders) will be leaving for secondary.  But in April all the secondary students (9 kids) will be at C4KK so amounts will increase.

Tea leaves – .2 lbs  The kids have tea every morning for breakfast and Ann makes tea 6 nights a week after dinner.  This is “British” tea, meaning they make it with milk, water and tea leaves

Milk – 5 gallons  This is mainly used for tea purposes.  The kids normally drink water with their meals or juice if Ann purchases it

Bread – 25 loaves  They will eat 5 loaves per day for breakfast and a couple of days Ann makes donuts instead of having “loaf” (that’s what they call bread)

Wheat flour – 26 lbs  This is used for making chapatti (which they have once a week) and the breakfast donuts

Eggs – 90  They will begin to have eggs approximately 3 times per week for breakfast

Rice – 29 lbs  This is a staple food and is eaten about 4-5 times per week

Soy pieces – 3 lbs  Soy is a new item for the kids and they really like it and I like they are getting another source of protein

Spaghetti – 12 lbs  No pasta sauce for the kids, they simply boil the spaghetti and add tomatoes, onions, etc. for flavor

Beans – 26 lbs  They either have red or black beans throughout the week.  Githeri (another staple food) is normally served on Sunday and it consists of beans and maize

Maize flour – 21 lbs  This flour is mainly used for making ugali (flour and water cooked together to form a cake-like consistency)

Maize – 11 lbs  Used in githeri

Green grams – 9 lbs  A veggie much like a pea, but smaller.

Meat – 7 lbs  Ann purchases beef (bone in) once a week for the kids.

Sugar – 18 lbs  This seems a bit high in my opinion and we are working with Ann on bringing the consumption of sugar down.

Then throughout the week there is the purchase of onions, carrots, potatoes, garlic, ginger and other spices and veggies.  Also from the shamba (garden) they get tomatoes, sukuma and cabbage.  Ann will also begin purchasing fruits, she’s partial to apples, for the kids to have during the week.

We are estimating the food we purchased in bulk to last at least a month and that (along with the cost for cooking the food) was approximately $890.  Which, of course, doesn’t include the fresh stuff (i.e. fruits).  As we move forward we’ll get a better grip on those costs and at that time I can give you all a better monthly estimate of food costs for C4KK.  If you’d like to help with this monthly cost, either with a one-time  or recurring donation, please visit our secure donation site to set up your gift (please choose “Children’s Shelter (C4KK) and Farm Project” from the Allocation drop down list).

Thanks everyone!

Stocked kitchen!

Now that the kitchen is almost complete (cupboards and drawers are being fixed as we speak) it was time to stock it.  We worked with our friend in Tala, Sumil at Sunny Lucky, to get bulk items and he always gives us the best price.

The kitchen is now stocked for about a month…that, of course, doesn’t include the daily needs of fresh items like garlic, ginger, potatoes, etc.  But as we get the crop rotation going in the shamba they won’t need to buy sukuma, cabbage, tomatoes, spinach and soon bananas.

getting stuff organized (that's Mary in the photo, Ann's helper)

Bags of beans, sugar, flour and maize

Milk, tea, spaghetti, flour, salt, soy pieces and green grams

Haul it all in!

Jacinta and Doris arrange the dishes

I brought magnetic letters recently and this is what the kids have done:

They also have enough clothes washing soap, bathing soap, toothpaste, valon (a lotion they use on their skin) and shoe polish to last the month.  Thank you Lord for the providence of a month’s supply of food and non-food items for the kids here at C4KK.  It looks great looking into the full cupboards!

Was that today!?

As I was going through my photos this evening I picked a few to put in this blog post about what we did yesterday (Sunday).  After looking at them I began thinking “we didn’t do that yesterday we did that today” at that point I knew it had been a long day!

To catch you up though we did deliver mattresses on Sunday.

It was looking to be an uneventful Sunday but after arriving at Romans (this is his home and where we stored the mattresses until they were needed) we needed to call the chief of the village in regards to one of the kids from an orphanage.  He had run away in fear of being beaten because he had told the truth to the news media and the chief.  By the time the chief found a temporary home for him and he was settled it was late in the day.   Late but something important was accomplished!  You should have seen the relief on this boys face after arriving at his temporary home!

And that brings us to today when we picked up the gate for the children’s home property and beds to go with those mattresses.

The gate is secured onto the truck for transport

Gate and beds are ready to go

This is where the gate will be installed and a cement drive will also be poured

While we were bringing in the gate and beds Lewis was helping dig the pit for the bathrooms on the property

Then it was time to set up the beds - 2 bunk beds in one room makes for a very tight space and this is the entire apartment!

Ahhh now we can sleep tonight :)

 

This was a very quick update but I wanted to get something to you (that’s also my preparation for you that I may not be posting tomorrow!  It looks to be another long day).  Along with these deliveries and bed set-up we went into town for supplies.  Anastacia, at one point, looked at me while she was picking out lunch containers for the kids and said “it’s a whole new life, isn’t it?”  Yup Anastacia it is and may God get all the thanks and glory for it and may we always seek Him above all else in this new life :)

Christmas party…part II

The last post gave you information on beginning preparations for the Christmas party last Saturday and this post will continue with those preparations.

Veggies were chopped and set aside for cooking…

Serah chops veggies like an expert!

Ann coordinates "her" kitchen!

These 2 happy faces helped with various jobs…water for the kitchen, firewood, desks moved etc….

As more kids arrived they were put to work setting up the chairs…

Next time you’ll see more kitchen work…boiling, cutting up chicken, frying and mixing large cooking pots of food and tea!

Christmas party…part I

Since I’ve already put you off for a couple of days on getting you information and photos on the Christmas party last Saturday I decided to bring it to you in pieces…doesn’t everyone love the suspense!?  We took so many pictures and I didn’t want to over stimulate you at one time with all the wonderful folks who helped and attended the party.

Preparations began actually a few months ago with fund raising from North Point Ministries in Midland, MI for gifts for all the kids.  This process took us about 2 weeks to get all the outfits (shorts and shirt for everyone) and Rose helped us with this…

Rose is a mom to a sponsored secondary student...she is hoping to find a home (right now Rose lives with her sister's family) with the money she's earned from this project

Then several days before the party it was organized to have 70 chicken slaughtered and prepared for cooking…

Thanks Nzomo for prepping the chickens and delivering them Friday night!

chair rental…

Thanks Roy for delivering Saturday morning and thanks Richard (pictured) for organizing

ordering soda and setting up delivery for Saturday morning…

a parent from Nice View owns this store

and scheduling rides for the kids at Mercy to come to the party…

2 matatus for all the kids

That brings us to Friday when veggies were bought during the day, then Friday night food preparations began.  Sorry I do not have any photos of them cooking ALL NIGHT LONG…but they did a fantastic job and yes they looked very tired Saturday morning but still had a smile on their faces to greet everyone!

Saturday morning Chuck and I arrived at the Academy around 8am and the movie room was set up…

Chuck and Lewis bring the movie equipment to the "movie room"

Desks were brought into the "movie room" for more seating

Wambua and Richard hang our movie "screen"

Thomas, our gate man at the Academy was our bouncer for the day (side note-he was helpful because we had heard several groups of kids who do not attend Nice View were planning on coming for the free food and one child actually came in a Nice View uniform and she isn’t a student here.  This was a Nice View function and we wanted to make sure we had enough food for the sponsored/orphaned students) had his table set up just inside the gate…

Thanks Thomas for being our #1 bouncer!

During this time the kitchen was rocking…

everyone worked together like a well oiled machine. Thanks group!

and the cooking smells wafted all around the compound…

everyone was hungry by the time lunch was ready

The next party post will show more details from the kitchen…what an experience and a far cry from the food preparation areas in the US, but I have to say a big thank you again to Jane, Ann, Serah, Richard, Christopher and Wambua who worked tirelessly Friday night and all day Saturday chopping (food and firewood), cooking and serving all the watoto (kids) who came to the party.  God provided EVERYTHING for the day to run smoothly…the people, funds, food and friends.

Tala style shopping

Today Pauline and I went shopping for items for the Nice View Academy staff & sponsored kids Christmas party to be held this Saturday.

First stop was purchasing bulk items like flour (for chapatti), oil (again for cooking chapatti), milk (for tea) and sugar (50kgs!)

outside of the store

inside the store

items being loaded into the car

Next stop was the coke store where we ordered the soda to be delivered on Saturday:

Then we stopped at our only real grocery store for paper plates, spoons etc., unfortunately they didn’t have enough (no Party City store here) so it was off to Nice View to deliver the items and check to see if they had any plates, cups and spoons:

Richard and Wambua unload the food

Success on the plates, cups and spoons (ok these aren’t the spoons being used to eat with but to cook with).  Sorry I forgot to get a picture of the spoons but I think everyone knows what a spoon looks like, right?!

Checking out what we have available - from left: Pauline, Wambua, Christopher, Sarah and Richard

various colors of cups

various colors of plates

cooking spoons

Then Friday will be market day to purchase items such as tomatoes, cabbage etc.

The gifts are wrapped (thank you again North Point Ministries in Midland, MI for raising funds to purchase the short sets) and the “chicken guy” will have all the chickens slaughtered and ready for Ann & Sarah to cook.

Now to fine tune the schedule…but hey it’s Kenya so let’s just say “it will work!”

Shoes, shoes and more shoes!

Thanks to donations received recently students in need at Nice View received school shoes today!

Here are a few examples of the condition of their old shoes:

he's wearing a new pair!

Getting the shoes ready for the kids to start trying them on:

Ooooo which pair do I choose?

Waiting in line to try on shoes:

Hey we didn’t get our shoes…no worries the guy returned later with all their shoes!

and here are some of the new shoes:

wearing the new shoes, holding the old ones

wearing the new shoes, holding the old ones

wearing the new shoes, holding the old ones

Our thanks go first and foremost to God for the work He sets before us and gives us what we need to accomplish the task.  He moved people, and you were obedient to help, donate and coordinate efforts for this shoe distribution day to be a success.

Thank you’s also go out to:

teachers for allowing us to take kids out of class to get their shoes,

Jane (Class 1 teacher/house mum) for getting the list of orphans together who needed the shoes,

our dear friend (I would love to mention her name but she would want me to emphasize it was God who directed her words it was nothing of herself…simple obedience) who mentioned shoes and collected the necessary funds,

donors who sacrificed funds for the kids,

Bonface (the shoe guy) and his helpers for coming to the Academy with the shoes,

Gideon for being very accommodating with this “interruption” in school,

students who stood in line quietly – even with the excitement of getting new shoes.

We reminded students to thank God for His providence, He is showing His love for them through your efforts…thank you!

Promised photos

To start things off I’ll show you where we ate lunch while in Nairobi on Thursday.  We ran into a friend (God must have wanted us to meet because this was a miracle to run into her) Veronica and she wanted to treat us to lunch…thanks Veronica!

First you order how  many kg’s of meat you want and the type (beef, goat, chicken at least I think there was chicken available).  Veronica ordered for us and she got beef, goat and a mixture for a total of 3kg’s for 7 people.  After ordering you sit down and wait for the butcher to bring out the meat, which he cuts at your table:

It was my first experience at nyama choma (roasted meat) and if you read my earlier post a bit of a challenge for me.  However I did find it tasty and thanked Veronica for the new experience!

Now for the photos I promised last Thursday

For most of the kids who even had mattresses this is what they looked like – some just rolled up in a blanket and slept on the wire.

Now they’ll have brand new foam mattresses!  Thank you donors…you know who you are and so does God!

Here are the “mattress helpers”!  They worked together to count, haul and stack the mattresses so now they are ready to be handed out…photos of that coming soon since we are handing them out today!

Then we delivered exercise books (like composition books) to Stella, the head mistress at the Academy.  The wind was blowing them out of the wheelbarrow so we got someone to help out.  She may seem a bit shy but she was extremely excited to help!

Then I was off to visit Class 8 to get a class photo…please pray for these students as they prepare for their final exam.

Chuck handed out sweets to the Class 4 students (he handed out to the lower classes the day before) but these little ones were trying to “encourage” him to give them another one.

Lunch time and pals were hanging out.

At the end of the day the bus was filled to capacity for it’s final run (out of 3) for the day.  This bus is VERY old, it is usually in the shop daily for repairs (just the other day the water pump needed replaced) and has rolled its odometer 3 times!  Needless to say the Academy is in need of another reliable bus.

Once the campus had settled down from the school day, the girls began hauling water to their dorm area for bathing.

It was a busy day but a good day.  We thank God for everyone who helped and continues to help Saved By God’s Grace, when He moves you to donate that helps us to work on the next item on God’s to-do list for the children here in Kenya.