Thursday, January 24, 2013

A New beginning

Happy New Year everyone! We have been busy and it is time to bring you all up to speed.

At the end of November, the school term ended and all the girls moved out of the dorm and went home to spend Christmas with their families. Before they left, we had a "dorm family" Christmas celebration with the girls that included a dinner we all prepared together, a secret santa gift exchange and a late-night showing of that wonderful Christmas Classic "Elf"


We stayed on campus and eagerly awaited Lizzy's arrival for a Christmas holiday of our own here in Kijabe. The weather was not vey cooperative as we experienced more rain than anticipated and the evenings were damp and cold. And this is supposed to be our warm, dry season! We did not care as we just spent time together as a family and that is okay with us.


On Christmas Eve we participated in an RVA outreach to people in our local community. We delivered Christmas hampers filled with necessities such as flour, oil, sugar, salt and other items that are used regularly. We visited with familes and prayed for the upcoming year for their specific needs. With all the rain we had experienced, it was a joyfully muddy experience!

The dorm was eerily quiet without our 12, 8th grade girls running around. The maintenance department took care of that though as they decided to do some much needed work in both our living area and the dorm.Workers showed up every day at 8:45 AM and worked through the day scraping, sanding, painting and replacing floor tiles. We cleaned every night trying to keep the dust to a minimum then we realized we were fighting a losing battle but it was a battle we needed to continue since we were living amid the work. Thankfully, that is all behind us now and we are simply dealing with the normal dust issues that come with living at RVA.  :D

Lioness sitting on her kill (zebra)

Best Friends: Cape Buffalo and Rhino grazing together.
 
We did manage to take a day trip to Nakkuru National Park and take a game drive to see the amazing wildlife that lives there. Thanks to Brian Wagner, math teacher and game park guide extrodinaire, we had a blast! I have posted a complete picture catalog at www.mclavertyfamily.smugmug.com  If you have a minute, feel free to enjoy the pictures we managed to capture in the park.
                                      Elan: World's largest antelope

Our Christmas holiday was wonderful as we were all together to enjoy it. It was fairly uneventful and Julia found the pickle again this year! We enjoyed visiting with staff members and their families that came to visit. One boy told me he would keep an eye on me in the arcade store as he did not think I was responsible enough to handle the store! I hope that I can grow into that responsibility some day.  :D

The new term is now underway. With the Kenyan elections scheduled for early March, most activities  and sporting events have been front loaded this term. If the election does not have a peaceful outcome, we will be able to stay within campus limits and still function as normally as possible. Our administrative team is doing a great job of keeping us in the loop of contingency plans and safety precautions.

Thank you for continuing to pray for us. We appreciate each and every one of you!