Village Babies

So it took another 5 and a half hours this morning for them to finish my hair. Making it 16 and a half hours total, most of the time with two people working on my hair! Don't know that it was worth all that effort, but it's done now. It's so thick now, that even with both my hands I can't get my hands around it all. 

Thankfully we were back in time for lunch before we went to Budondo today. 

It was great! Our first stop was to visit a malnourished baby in one of the villages. While the guys talked to the mother, the village kids sang to us and poked our skin. We taught them how to high five and showed them pictures of themselves on our cameras. Most of the kids have jiggers in their feet, which is a real problem. 

This is baby Steven. He is one and a half and as small as a newborn. He can't even hold himself up and has the most pitiful cry. I just wanted to take him home with me. The mama asked if we wanted to take some sweet potato from her garden home with us. I didn't know what to say. We don't need sweet potato, we eat it several times a week and her baby needs food! At the same time, it was such a generous offer, I didn't want to offend her. In the end I made sure Johnson explained to her that I was very thankful and appreciated it but that it was okay, she could keep it. Hope she understood. 

(photo above and below from Nicole)

How to transport a live calf in Uganda? On a boda of course! :)

Johnson and our driver. Johnson always does the Budondo trips.

Another village we visited, with some of the kids that come on Saturdays for the kids club. 

Baby Robin (a boy). 

The babies don't wear nappies here and Nicole got a few surprise while holding him. All in a day's work with babies! :)

You can't tell boy from girl by what they wear, they'll even put a skirt on a boy in the village. We never have much trouble telling though as none of them wear underwear either!

Children carrying babies everywhere. 

Veneisha. 

Sounds like Alicia:).

Great big chocolate eyes always melt my heart. Taking in everything these strange white people say.

It poured rain for about 20min while we on the porch of a little brick house. 

Watching the "backyard" turn into a river.

(again, this child wearing a dress, is a boy)

I had wanted to bring something for the kids we saw but they always get "sweeties" so I wanted to do something different. After watching two kids fight over a balloon last week, I thought that might be a good gift. They were expensive but it was worth it and I have plenty for any other visits we do. 

More visits. Other than recognising some of the kids from the Saturday programs, some places we went to I still don't know what we were doing there. The men did all the talking in Lusoga, which isn't even the language they speak in Jinja so we couldn't even use the few words we knew of Luganda. Most of the visits though are simply to build relationships with the families and get to know them more. Everywhere we went we were greeted warmly, people kneeling and bringing out stools for us to sit on. 

Last visit; triplets who are malnourished. They are one years old and sitting in the mud with not an adult in sight. From left to right they are Gertrude, Evelyn and Samuel. They cried at the sight of us but we managed to quiet them down eventually, while the guys talked to the dad. 

These three photos are from Nicole's phone too. 

Me and Evelyn. 

Nicole and Samuel.

Katelyn and Evelyn. 

I loved getting out into the villages but it was hard to see so many kids with so little when the kids at Amani have so much. I get to go again on Friday. I'm looking forward to seeing all the kids again! 

It was nice to be back in the cottage tonight and put my boys to bed again. I missed my butterfly kisses last night. 

"The steps of a good man are ordered by the LORD, and He delights in his way."

Psalm 37:23