Johnson Family Lately

• Logan started PreK at New Hope Academy and loves it. She goes three days a week from 8-1.
• Lilly starts the 4 year old program at Mustard Seed on Wednesday. She will go to "school" on Wednesday and Friday from 9-1. She is very happy with her teacher and excited for me to take her to school and leave (that's what she told me).
• Josie started taking some steps a week or so ago. She now likes to practice all over the house. The "big girls" are so proud of her. Our dear friends from Louisville came to visit with their sweet boys CJ and Ashton. Josie walked for Amy! We had a great time visiting and not such a great time watching Kirk's previous high school Trinity whip up on Brentwood Academy in football. Ha!
  
• Kirk is coaching 6th grade football as the Offensive Coordinator at Brentwood Academy. He is really enjoying coaching again and the games are so fun to go to.
  
• I am working at the YMCA two days a week. It is really nice to be able to bring the kids to work, get paid and reduce our membership.
• We took the kids to Chattanooga this weekend for a short get away. We had a lot of fun at the aquarium. Lilly liked the penguins and butterflies the best. There was one butterfly that really liked her and did not want to get off of her shirt. She said he was tickling her. Logan liked touching the stingrays that were "slimy" and the penguins and sharks. I liked the sharks and enormous turtles and everything else that lit their faces up with amazement. I also enjoyed food: Mellow Mushroom, Starbucks, Sticky Fingers and Ben and Jerrys :)
• Logan and Lilly ran in the Franklin Classic Labor Day 1k kids race today. They were so cute! It was a little chilly and rainy but they were determined to go. I was running with Lilly and Logan and holding their hands. Logan let go and took off and I didn't see her again until the finish line. Kirk said she looked like she was going to throw up she was so tired. Lilly alternated between holding my hand and running, holding my hand and walking and sprinting all by herself. She said next time she wasn't going to hold my hand, she was going to practice racing at home and she was going to beat Logan. I am excited to see this. I was certainly impressed that she didn't ask to be carried and she didn't quit. They were both reward with ribbons and a pancake pig out at Cracker Barrel. I am thinking we will be doing more races in the future...I hope!
• Lilly turns 4 in two days. I am a little wowed by that. She is still her silly self and very much the wild card/goof ball of the family. She is also taking so much interest in Josie and being a great big sister to her.
• Logan is going to be Jessie from The Toy Story for Halloween, Lilly wants to be "Spidergirl" and Jo-Jo is going to be an elephant. I have decided to be Pocahontas.
  
• Logan goes to dance at Strong Tower Church where we are going now. She does this on Monday nights. I am thinking in the spring we will get Lilly started on soccer and see if that sticks. She really enjoys it and I hope by the spring she will be ready to play on some what of an organized level. Kirk and I may even coach her.
• We are now looking forward to our Illinois reunion weekend with 3 of Kirk's college roommates and teammates and all of our kiddos (girls really). We are blessed to have 12 little girls amongst us and one lone soldier boy named "Nicky" who will be charming all the ladies when he gets older. Ha!
  
• We are also looking forward to watching football, the weather not being 100 degrees, getting involved in the kids school and church, watching families grow with dear friends having babies soon, friends coming in town, Grandma and Pops coming for a visit and maybe even a trip to the beach if we can swing it.
  

You have to laugh or you WILL cry

• You have to laugh when you plan a great and fun bike ride in your neighborhood and half way through it (with neighbors watching) your kid throws up everywhere
• You have to laugh when you are diligently repairing the kids swing set only to get more chigger bites than you can count....in areas that shouldn't be mentioned.
• When you give a 5 and 3 year old their choice in deciding which back pack they want and they choose a purple cheetah print and a Madagascar lunch box to go with it.
  
• Thinking your precious one is asleep only to find that she has inked every part of her body with permanent ink from a stamp that she found in her dad's office.
• When everyone in the house is sick at the same time
  

More Africa pics

July 10

July 10^th

We are still in the air as I am typing this. Thank you God I can see land below....American soil...yeah!! We flew throughout the night stopping in Rome for gas. I slept most of the way and watched a few movies. We are actually supposed to land an hour early at 7:30am instead of 8:30. My flight to Nashville leaves around 4pm.

This is the last day of my Africa blogging! Thank you for reading this and sharing in my journey by supporting me either financially, through donations and or prayers!

I am sooooooooooooooo looking forward to being home and sharing with you all that I saw, did, and was touched by. The Lord is certainly moving mightily in Kenya and Uganda. He is raising up leaders with integrity and a great commitment to the Lord and hard work. Here are kids that have nothing but the riches of his kingdom. To him be glory both now and forever.

Amen

July 9th

July 9^th

Early to rise and off to Nairobi to do a little shopping before our long flight back to the states. We have some Kenyan shillings we need to get rid of!

It was a tearful goodbye. We bought pineapple for the kids. They haven't had that for years. We all received so many letters from individual kids at Fiwagoh. My little buddies were Isaac, Goffrey and Ngugi. My older buds were Duncan, John and Duncan. We lined up all 180 kids and gave each one an individual hug so no one got left out. There was several tears shed. We were so thankful to Pastor Benson and his wife Florence for their love and care towards us.

We stopped at the Great Rift Valley and took some pictures of the valley below.

We drove to a jewlery making factory name Kaszuri and watch them make the beads. Jewelery from this factory is being sold in Boston and other American boutiques. It is mostly single mothers from Kenya making the jewlery for a sustaining income.

On the way to the airport we stopped and shopped at the Masai market. This place is crazy if you have white skin, even if you don't. You can't even think straight with men in your face wanting you to buy all their products. You also have to bargain with them which can be annoying and lengthy. Kirk would be proud of me. I got one product down from 6,500 shillings to 2,500 shillings. That is the difference between 76 dollars and 29 dollars plus he threw in a toy for my kids!

We are now at the airport. We had a super long line to go through security, another long line to check in and another long line to go through customs. We are now waiting at the gate.

We are about to fly to Ethiopia which will take 2 hours. We then have a layover in Ethiopia. We fly out of Ethiopia at 10pm and arrive in Washington D.C at 8:40am. We are going to be tired but too excited to care. I hope they have mexican restaurants in the DC airport! I miss mexican food, icecream and everything with sugar and diet coke!!

As usual on this trip...God intervened. We drove for 2 hours to get to Nairobi. Our flight was supposed to leave at 5:30pm. It was delayed until 7:15pm. It takes two hours to fly to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Our connecting flight left at 10 which means they start boarding internationally an hour earlier. Once we got off our flight from Nairobi we had to sprint to get to our next flight to get home. Ethiopian Air does not fly to DC everyday so we were very upset at the thought of staying a few more days. Once we got to security there was such a long line. Thank you God that the security guys knew we were going to miss our flight and let all of us going to DC jump in front of security and then continue to run from there to catch our flight. There were 5 of us that were left behind. All of us were on the plane just waiting and praying that they would get on and at the 11^th hour they did. They closed the doors and we were off. The plane was not going to wait any longer. I can't believe it was that close!

Embarking on our 17 hour flight home......

July 8th

July 8^th,

Today has been relaxing. The kids were overjoyed that we came back to stay 2 more nights. They were so smiley at devotion this morning. Pastor said so many of them could not concentrate on school yesterday and were crying.

We did not have a plan for the day. We wanted to help wherever we were needed. The children attended school until 1. Some of us went to the market to buy food and donated supplies to the orphanage. Some of us cleaned and I baked and cleaned. I stayed with Pastor Bensons wife Florence and cleaned her kitchen after we ate breakfast there. She and I also made rolls together. She was laughing because they kept sticking to my hands. She said my hands were too soft and that I needed more flour. Mine still never turned out like hers. We carried 6 pans down to the oven. We loaded the stove with charcoal and baked them.

It was a real beautiful day. We packed up all our things to get ready for the airport tomorrow. I took a nice little nap. We broke up in to groups and we talked about the story of Joseph. This is such a relevent story to them. God brought Joseph out of prison and made him ruler over many and saved millions of lives. God has not forgotten one of these children. He brought them from the brink of death living on the streets and used Pastor Benson to do this. These kids are so greatful, especially the ones that remember where they have come from. Not one story is the same. Parents have passed away, they have abandoned or abused their children, they have been left in the care of relatives who could no longer take care of them, and the stories go on....

We will never forget the stories. Duncan is the oldest boy here. His mother died when he was young. His father was an abusive alcoholic that abandoned him at the age of ten along with his 2 other siblings. They were given food by the neighbors until they got tired of it and called the authorities. They were picked up and taken to a Remand Home (Juvenile detention center). The government does not know what to do with the abandoned and orphaned kids so they take them to Remand homes. This is also where kids that have committed crimes go. Thankfully, they were rescued and taken to Fiwagoh. Duncan is everywhere here. He shows love to others without ceasing because he says that he was shown great love when he first came here. I have seen him running errands, caring for the smallest child here, preaching, baking, cleaning, hauling luggage. That is a thankful heart and one that does not forget where he has come from.

Teresa is one of the older girls here. Her parents died when she was young and her grandmother was struggling to care for her. Her aunt convinced her grandma that it would be best if she lived with her. Here is a real life Cinderella story. Teresa was forced to do so much work at the hand of her aunt. She never let her go to school or sleep on a bed, she had to sleep on the floor. The aunts 2 daughters were given royal treatment while Teresa was kept as a slave. Three years she lived like this before the grandmother found out and brought her to Fiwagoh.

Every child here has a story. It breaks your heart to think of the scars they carry with them. God redeems his people and he created each of these kids for purpose. If they carry on in the footsteps of Jesus they could be the vessel that saves thousands of lives like Joseph and probably like Pastor Benson and his wife. We are so thankful to be here and to be a part of these precious lives. They all wrote us letters that we have and have prayed that we will write them back. I do hope we can continue in relationships with these awesome kids and that their faces and stories will never leave us.

July 7th

July 7^th

Today was impossible and I was ready to call it quits...I think we all were.

We had a very tearful depart from Fiwagoh this morning and headed to Grace of God chidlren's home.

First of all, we were told it was only a 2 hour drive at the most. Everytime our sweet driver Daniel called them they said we were 20min away. 4 hours later we arrive. The pastor met us at the gravel road and he drove us a long drive down to the school on a dirt road. He said if it rains that it is immpossible to drive on. Guess what......thunderclouds started to loom right as he said that. Come to find out the people at the church thought they would take us on the scenic route. Yes, Kenya is the prettiest place I have ever seen. However, the roads are terrible and we could have done without 2 extra hours of driving.

The whole thing was disorganized from the beginning. Visting Orphans has never sent a team to Kenya so they do not have reliable relationships with some of these contacts. We really don't know what to expect at any of these places we are visiting and staying in Kenya and we have been very fortunate so far. This was quite a bit different. FYI...we all know that outhouses are gross but outhouses in Africa are pretty rough. We have had to use them more than we anticipated. The kids at this orphanage/school did a little singing and dancing for us while they served us lunch at 2:30. It seemed like the whole town came out to see us. As we were in there it started to downpour. Our driver told us that we needed to leave if we ever wanted to get to our hotel in the daylight and more importantly, not get stuck on the mud road. We felt awful at first because we just arrived, ate their lunch and now we were leaving. After we spent some time with them, we saw that God protected us and was watching out for us. This place seemed “off” from the beginning. There was even the question as to whether these kids were even orphans or if it was just a government run school. It was the first place I felt like our skin color was a dollar sign to them.

They reluctantly let us leave. Our bus driver did an amazing job on that awful muddy road and I was almost in tears a few times when we were sliding and tipping. I thought for sure we were going to tip. There is 22 of us plus our driver. All of our luggage is strapped to the top and so it makes it pretty top heavy on these bad roads.

3 of the church members drove in our bus with us to the town of Eldoret where they booked a hotel for us. Seriously? This place was scary. There were people everywhere and I did not see one woman. The hotel was so disgusting and the way to access it was through the scariest back alley I have ever seen. The people with us were shocked that we didn't want to stay there. We all spoke up and said we wanted out of here ASAP. We are such a target wherever we go. Even if you didn't see 22 white women on the bus, you could just look on top of the bus at our luggage and know we were from the states.

Our strange friends would not take no for an answer. They said things like....”what is wrong? Do you need to stay alone and not in a large hotel? We will find you a new one nearby”....and my personal favorite....”we already paid the deposit”.

They couldn't get it through their heads that we were scared and putting ourselves in a dangerous spot and that our luggage was surely to get stolen. Not to mention the fact that we were all women staying by ourselves. They didn't tell us that this city is also known for a lot of fighting and public disturbances between two different people groups that don't like eachother.

The last visitors they had were in 2008 so they were desperate for us to stay. If we skipped out on the nasty hotel and went to search for a new one, that one could be nasty too and then we would have nowhere to stay and it would be dark (never wise to venture out at night but especially in Africa). We all made the decision to just go back to Fiwagoh. They were still not getting it. “If you go back to Fiwagoh that will be such a long drive for you to come back in the morning”. We are not coming back. Then the pleading began. We threw some money at them and then their care for us actually seeing the children dissipated. That was like my 12^th clue that I didn't trust these people. We had a bag of donations for them but it was on top of the bus. We realized then that they were sticking around until they got it. They said they would drive with us to Fiwagoh so we could unload our luggage and get it for them. Nope. We pulled over at a gas station and got it down for them and they can keep the luggage it was in.

Pastor Benson graciously said we can stay there tonight and tomorrow night. This is such a blessing. Now we can just go straight to the airport Saturday and not stay at one more unsure place. Fiwagoh has been the nicest place and we are hoping to be able to bless them tomorrow. We are going to go shopping for food and cleaning supplies. While the kids are in school we are going to clean their bathrooms and hopefully have some fruit waiting for them.

We have been driving longer than anticipated and I think we have driven at least 6 hours today. What a waste of time. We could have been hanging at Fiwagoh and helping out where we could. It is now 9:15pm. We are all so excited to see the kids at Fiwagoh but hope we are not keeping them awake. Last time the older boys grabbed our luggage and ran to our rooms. We are so thankful we would sleep in what we are wearing and deal with luggage tomorrow.

We are 5 mintues away and the police pulled us over to check our bus. One guy went in the back and flirted and another one talked to our driver in Swahili. He asked him for some tea. Apparantly, he was asking for us to give him money and that is the code words police use. Our driver assured them that all our money was above with our luggage. Then he asked where we were staying so he could come on the bus and go with us! What? Our driver Daniel told him we were all lesbians and did not like men and that is why we are all traveling together without men! He quickly walked away and let us go. This place is lawless when it wants to be. I will continue to be praying for the leadership of this country, of Uganda and Africa. Without the raising up of Godly leaders, this continent will never change.

All of the kids are still waiting up for us and it is now 9:30pm. We are all so tired!!! I would pay money to be on a flight back home right now. I am missing my family. Good night.