Nyeri, Kenya

After traveling for over 40 hours, driving through the gate to Belwop was surreal… that’s the only way to put it.

We had looked at the children’s pictures, studied their faces for months, prayed for them, and heard others talk about them. We were so excited to meet them for the first time, but I (Niki) was not prepared for the emotions that overcame me (thank you Veronica for the hankerchief I needed that day!)

 As we drove through the gate to Belwop we heard the voices of 18 beautiful children singing a song called ‘Welcome’. It was amazing…
Click here to read more and see pictures

After many tears, hugs, and greetings we settled into the living room to get to know eachother. After a bit we distributed the gifts from our care package ~ coloring books, crayons, story books, toothbrushes, puzzles, and lolly pops!

 (Left to right: Josephine, Stella, Judy, Julianna, Pauline, Zipporah, Caroline, Vivian, Mary, & Salome)

(Left to right: Sharon, Peter, Hope, Martha, Rose, Irene, & Mishek)

 So thankful to be here!

 Hope (6) showing Ty her colored picture (these kids were amazing little colorers!)

 These first couple hours were spent just making our way around the room trying to get to know each child while coloring with them and reading story books.

 Ty with Peter, Irene, & Zipporah

 Niki doing a puzzle with Josephine (right) and Salome (left), holding Vivian

 Veronica showing us the food at Belwop. Beans, rice, ugali, and flour are the primary products purchased in bulk then vegetables are purchased weekly to be added into the recipes. Meat is rarely eaten at Belwop because it is very expensive. Fruits are a dessert to the children.

 We loved this!… This is the time-out room where Veronica lovingly teaches and trains the children to behave appropriately and lovingly towards eachother.

 Look closely and you’ll notice this old bath tub is being used as a little garden for onions (nothing is wasted in Africa!)

 The children led us in a couple games to get to know their names ~ this was so challenging to us! But by the end of the week we had their names and faces finally matched up in our minds 🙂

 They also learned pretty quickly that white people ain’t got rhythm or any dancing skills!

 I’d anxiously waited to see this little one… this is Moses, the newest member to the Belwop family. Found abandoned behind a bush only a few days prior to our arrival. There will be another blogpost about the amazing transformations we got to see in this little guy!

 Ty loves throwing kids in the air and they LOVED IT!

That evening we settled into our first hotel ready for a good night’s sleep 🙂 … buuuttt… a couple hours is all we ended up getting because of our happy hotel staff who liked to play music and visit until 3am and it’s a very small hotel so we could hear everything 🙂
Stay tuned for Day 2!