Very Green Missionaries

Life here in Kijabe is many things. One thing I have added to that list is "green". Now I am by no means a tree hugging environmentalist. My environmental philosophy goes something like this: I care for the creation but worship the Creator. Anyway, no doubt about it life here is considerably greener than our old life in the US. A few examples:

We have no heat and no a/c. We have a fireburning fireplace for the cold months (which is essential because, yes, there are cold places in Africa and Kijabe in July is one of them). It never gets hot enough to want or need an AC.

My refrigerator is slightly bigger than the one in my dorm at Brumby Hall at UGA. But you know what? We manage. We get creative with packing things in there and it is fine. Our oven is also tee-tiny. It does have 4 burners and can hold exactly one pan in the oven. But it also works fine for our family.

Our hot water heater runs for 2 hours in the morning and 2 hours in the evening. We have warm showers and enough warm water to wash out dishes through the day.

We grow some of our food in our garden and buy a lot of our food locally.

We have a car that we drive occasionally. We drive it locally due to the steep terrain and the logistics of shopping and walking along dangerous roads with three little kids. But when we drive it locally it is never more than a mile round trip. Rhett walks to work each day. We drive further to Nairobi a few times a month.

We do have a washer but no dryer. Which means that all of our clothes get hung out on a line to dry each day. Don't believe what those advertisements say about being "April Fresh" and "Windy Breeze" scented. If you are lucky your clothes smell like nothing. If the wind is blowing in the wrong direction there is a long list of unpleasant things your clothes can smell like.

So you see, I have enough carbon credits stored for the next little while to do exactly as I please. (I don't actually believe in carbon credits by the way :) So if you happen to run into me in the US and I'm driving around in an exceptionally large vehicle, idling at the drive thru with the windows down and AC cranked up just know that I'm working on that carbon credit balance and things are all good.

A blog worthy event . . .

In my lack of blogging I've missed a few milestones. One, in particular, I needed to go back and document for our family. Back in May Ford learned how to ride a bike!



Normally, this is a huge deal for any little kid but considering the fact that he was 3 1/2, had his sister's rickety bike and a 20 x 20 concrete pad it is a small miracle.

Gus's thing is playing ball - Ford's is his bike. It is fun to see them doing things that reflect their own desires and interests. Ford spends a lot of time riding in circles around our little basketball court. Finally Rhett just said he thought he could do it and took his wheels off. I thought he was crazy. "He's three! He has to continually turn because the concrete area is so small - that's too hard! He needs to learn to go straight first!" I stood there making a million excuses why he couldn't do it while Rhett quickly removed the training wheels and Ford started riding his bike. So much for excuses!



We were all SO proud and jumping up and down from excitement. He was Mr. Cool just riding his bike like he'd been doing it for years. I love this boy.

'Round here

What have we been doing?? Who knows! We had a steady stream of lovely visitors for a while. Rhett climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro (which deserves it's own post) and other than that our days have been very normal. This is a busy time of the year in Kijabe because many people leave during the long school break so Rhett has been up to his eye-balls with work, being on call (a lot) and teaching responsibilities for various things. So what does "normal" look like? Here are some photos from the last few months . . .

I celebrated yet another birthday! I pray this year is the best one yet!



Gus woke up for the last time in his crib . . .




And took his first nap in a big boy bed . . .



We play with sticks in the dirt . . .



And we climb trees - oh, boy do we climb trees . . .











I wonder where they learn how to climb . . . oh yeah - they have good teachers!



Ford eats as much passion fruit as he can handle . . .



We play "muddy river" and get a little dirty . . .



So we build a little bridge . . .



We turn roller skates into pets and take them everywhere . . .



We turn rakes into horses and race around the yard . . .



We bite on sticks for some unknown reason . . .



We bite on sticks because our big brother did . . .



We love our dog, Kuli . . .



We drink chai with our outside worker, Jesse . . .



We spot the most amazing birds in our yard . . .



Gus has this reaction to his first day of potty training . . .



But is getting the hang of it!



Claire read Green Eggs and Ham so she got to eat some green eggs of her own . . .



The boys drink more chai and eat more passion . . .



Claire prefers hers black (with sugar) like her Mama . . .



And when you are learning how to use the potty and you don't have a dryer it can get a little complicated . . .




So that is us - every day. Some big stuff and a lot of little stuff that makes up our life. It's wonderful.