Waithera!

My house girl - she is so sweet, has two young girls and does a great job cleaning my house and washing my clothes every week...this skirt was in a bag of clothes I knew I would never wear again...God is so good! He blesses me so much and allows me to be a blessing to others.

BIG DENT!

Big Dent is the name of the website being developed which will enable people in the US to sponsor our clients to receive small business loans. Small Gift, Big Dent...

Pam Greer arrived last week with a mission team from the US. She has been working with the developers of this website and was asked to spend much of her time in Kenya with us in micro-enterprise learning about what we do and teaching us about the website. Here she is explaining different aspects of how the website works.
Listening attentively are Peter, Priscilla and Esther...the room is dark because we have the projector on...
There it is! One of the screen shots...projected onto the wall...
Later a member of the mission team came in to snap pics of pam and our staff, so I shot some as well! Left to right are; Tahia - a college student from Chile visiting for a few weeks, Priscilla - one of our loan officers, Pam, Samuel - office manager (and my boss!), in the foreground is Francis - another loan officer.
Esther (head of our department) and Peter (office worker), jumped into this photo and Virginia (another loan officer) is in the foreground. The buckets on the ground are lunch...you can see Virgnia's plate in the pic...looks like beans, rice and cabbage.

And I discovered that Tahia has a sense of humor!
Esther and Pam spent much time together...
...Pam learning about Mifos (the software we use to track our clients' activities)...
...and Esther learning about Big Dent...
We were so happy to have Pam with us during this past week. We had several fruitful discussions and definitely made headway in progress toward getting Big Dent up and running. The best part is that we uncovered potential challenges that we can, hopefully, divert. I just love collaborative efforts!

And - Pam is a great person so it was fun getting to know her. I trust she will be back and have already told her she must stay at least one night with me so she can have the Kenya experience on public transportation!

I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE kids!

Our recent client training was held at a church which has a day care. I could not resist shooting pics of these cute kids!

Check out the attitude in her pose :)
I was definitely a distraction, but their teacher did not seem to mind...at least I hope she didn't!




This little girl loved picking things off the ground...remember this pic...
Washing hands before morning tea...

...stopping for photo op on the way!





Remember the photo of this little girl picking something up from the dirt...look at her feet!
She is emptying her pockets of the rocks she so diligently picked up earlier!
Praying before tea...too cute!
Playing after tea time...



Same girl, day 2...using cups discarded after our tea time...
Free play!
I love this photo of all the kids playing but our 'little girl' picking up rocks!
Oops! Teacher caught them with the cups and directed to toss them in the trash bin...
...it took a while, but she finally did!

The big kids take care of the little ones...

They are fascinated by something back there...not sure what!

It was such fun for me to watch these little ones playing, learning, praying and eating...

Starfish Board (NOT Bored!) Meeting

On the 22nd of January the board members for Starfish Charities met to review 2010 and plan for 2011. Starfish Charities was started several years ago as a result of a vision God gave to my friend Rhonda for the Maasai people. Her vision is to help the people have a better life today, be prepared to step into tomorrow while at the same time preserving their rich heritage.

Left to right in the photo below are two Maasai pastors, David and John, and our Chairman Pastor Paul. David and John, along with Jeremy (who you will see below) and Peninah (who was not present) are vital to our ministry as they are Maasai living with their people. They each have a heart to help their communities.
Here is Jeremy! It was his father who donated 15 acres of land to Starfish Charities and asked Rhonda "to do something good for my people." And she is! One thing I admire about Rhonda is that she is not a 'one man show'...she enlists the help of many people as they express a desire, and have a unique gift or talent.
In the foreground is the tea and snacks...notice how longingly Jeremy is looking at it? Paul is telling him that since he was late, he cannot have tea :(

Apparently Jeremy got caught in the midst of a matatu (public vehicle) crack-down and the vehicle he was on was escorted to the police station!
Paul is an excellent chairman and John is watching closely as he is the vice-chair and may very well be elected chairman next year! Paul keeps the meeting moving...
...and adds a bit of levity throughout! Here is Rhonda, also enjoying our time together.
Many ideas whirled around the room - it was exciting to see these pastors be so enthusiastic about their people! Some of the planned activities include; literacy classes for men and women in 5 different Maasai communities, a medical camp in April, and a community fair in August.
Now Paul is graciously sharing his farming experience with Jeremy, who has an idea to start a tree nursery as an income generating activity for Starfish. The operative word here being "start"...slowly by slowly as they say here.

Paul is 'encouraging' Jeremy to buy seeds and to get the project moving...trying to light a fire under him...you can see by his smile that Jeremy is receiving the chastisement with a good attitude :)
He actually brought his bag of seeds with him! These he has purchased to plant on his property - Jeremy looks mighty interested...
..."see Jeremy, these are the seeds I bought..." Jeremy plans to harvest indigenous seeds from the area around the property, which is a great idea but Paul is encouraging him to also consider buying seeds, for more variety.
Rhonda is definitely interested and Paul is willing to share so she has brought a few small plastic containers to hold some seeds in...
...Paul is pouring from the bag into the cups...


After a productive and energetic meeting, we sit down for a hearty lunch!
Rhonda is an excellent hostess as she serves up beans, rice, chicken, sukuma wiki (cale) and chapatis...yum!
David goofing around!
...and yes, I was really there! Here I am enjoying lunch...I even had seconds!
David, Jeremy and John.
Paul "officially" hands over the seeds to Rhonda/Starfish Charities.
After lunch Jeremy checks out his new motor bike. It was actually donated to Starfish and Jeremy has decided to buy it.
It will be a great help to him for getting around out where he lives.
It is a bit dusty, but a really nice bike.
It was such a good day - lots of laughter, good fellowship and lots of work accomplished. I am looking forward to an exciting year of ministry with Starfish!