It Takes a Whole Village

We spent this week working in the village of Dadaab on the ground work for the playground project to be completed in September with the short term team coming from Prince Edward Island. It is said that "it takes a whole village to raise a child", this is certainly the case in Dadaab as the community pulls together to provide for vulnerable families and young children through the local primary school. With out having to be asked, men began to show up and lend a hand as we cleared the ground, dug holes, assembled and raised the steel structure.

Chief Shukri Abdi Farah (Chief of the village of Dadaab), Andai Jackson (CBM coworker), and Hussein Dualle (director of TUDO)

Some of the men who helped in completing this first phase of the playground.

Great News!

Enjoying a sunny Sunday afternoon.

We have some great news -- we are officially fostering Ava!
This was our first leg on the road to adoption. Now that the adoption agency has approved us as Ava's foster family, we begin a three month fostering period that proceeds any court application for a legal adoption.

We recieved the news on August 16 (Emma's birthday). To celebrate, Ava got her ears pierced (If you look closely, you can see her little golden studs). She is a bright and joy-filled little baby. She has mastered the wave, and loves to playfully roll her eyes and giggle!

Hello Children's Convention!

A special HELLO from the Kennys and the Carlines

to the Children's Convention meeting this week in Atlantic Canada!

We are thrilled that you are all looking at our blog today as you learn about the work of Canadian Baptist Ministries in Kenya. We hope you have time to look back at the entries of the past year and to see a bit of what our family has been up to. If you have any questions or comments, post them on the blog and we will be sure to respond to them right away!

This is Eastleigh, a Somali ghetto in the city of Nairobi, Kenya. We work here with the Carline family helping Somali refugees who have fled the conflict in their home country. Together with the Carlines, we run a language school in the Eastleigh Fellowship Centre. This is a safe place for Somalis to learn to speak English, gain computer skills and participate in sports programs.


With most of our classes being filled with men, Erica has begun a Friday "Girls Time". It is nice for the women in our classes to get out of Eastleigh and to enjoy the freedom of being in a group without the pressure of so many guys around. They get together to improve their English, take part in special activities and to just have the pleasure of some"girl talk".

The Carlines and the Kennys

(Back to Front)

Paul, Aaron, Katie, Kelly, Ava, Erica,

Kara, Emma, Kenan, Kelvin, and Tristan

Thank you for praying for us!

Brunswick Street UBC

Rev. Terry and Brenda Atkinson enjoying lunch

with their short term mission team on their last day in Kenya.

We had the pleasure of enjoying an evening with a group of 27 people from the Brunswick Street United Baptist Church who have been serving in both Kenya and Rwanda over the past three weeks. It was so encouraging to learn a bit of what God has been doing among them through this experience!

Birthday Girl!

Today is Emma's sixth birthday! It is hard for us to believe that six years have already gone by since that early morning in Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia (after a day of blue berry picking) when we rushed into Halifax to the IWK hospital (We nearly ran out of gas in the middle of the hour long drive, but made it all the same!).

Today we will be meeting the Brunswick Street group for supper, so we will have Emma's party on Saturday with all of her school friends.

Emma with her big brother on the way out to school.

First Day of School

Tristan and Emma climb onto the school bus

Emma spots the bus coming down the street. She was a "little" excited!

Waitng for the bus

Ever since we arrived Emma has wanted to get her hair braided so yesterday while Tristan was at a friends playing, Emma and I spent the afternoon at the mall hanging out and having her hair done. It took a little over an hour but she was so patient. They gave her a Coke, put on Shrek and she was set! She loves her hair and hopes that it will last forever!

Tristan and Emma headed back to school yesterday after a way too short break. We all had the "first day of school jitters"! When they got home, Tristan and Emma both reported that they love their new teachers and were glad to see their friends again.

This year they also started taking the school bus; what an adventure! As you can see from the photos, Emma was very excited about the bus! She was the first one out the door and down to the gate. Our guard, Samson, was pretty excited about the bus stopping as well. He went onto the bus with the kids! Aaron and I will be starting class in September so in order for us all to get to class on time the bus is necessary this year.

Also, this week we will be meeting with the group of twenty-seven people here from Brunswick Street Baptist Church, New Brunswick. They are here with their pastor Terry and Brenda Atkinson working in Kenya and Rwanda with our national partner churches.

Good bye/ Hello

I don't think we will ever get tired of seeing these amazing animals;

we are in constant awe over God's imagination and beauty.

This Masai giraffe was surrounded with about 20 of his friends.

Emma is growing so quickly and gets more beautiful with each passing day.

She is turning 6 on August 16th.

Ava peeks back at Daddy as we take a stroll at the Bannister's ranch.

Ava loves to be outside. Friends gave us a little baby backpack;

she loves to be up high to see everything that is going on!

This past week we were without water in Nairobi so we spent the last few days at the ranch of Tim and Diane Bannister. Not only was it nice to shower but it also gave us a chance to connect one last time with the group of ladies here with Canadian Baptist Women. On Friday, after we said good bye to the ladies we headed to the airport to welcome home our teammates, Paul and Kelly Carline. Their flight was on time and all luggage arrived with them! They said that this was the first time that had ever happened.

This was the last weekend of summer vacation for Tristan and Emma; they head back to school this Tuesday. They are excited to reconnect with friends who have been away over the break.

Women's STM

Over the past three days, we have been enjoying some time with a group of Canadian Baptist Women who are in Kenya with Marilyn Smith and Lois Mitchell. The group has come to look at issues concerning women and sustainable water in Kenya. We brought the group into Eastleigh so that they could learn about the development of a water treatment system by our friends at Eastleigh Pottery, a ministry of the Presbyterian Church of East Africa, and for them to meet some of our female students at the Eastleigh Learning Centre. Two of the girls from our classes came and shared their perspective of life in exile here in Eastleigh.

It was wonderful to be able to share meals together and enjoy time with these joy-filled women. It was especially good to be with Lois and Coleen, our good friends from New Brunswick. We said good-bye this evening as the ladies will be leaving the city for the remainder of their journey. We hope to see them all at least one more time before they return to Canada this coming Friday.

Erica and Ava with our friend Lois Mitchell

Ava enjoying some lov'n!

At Eastleigh Learning Centre where we teach English to Somali refugees.



Emma reuniting with our good friend Coleen Steeves

from Midland, New Brunswick.

Hell's Gate

Hell's Gate National Park -- Kenya

Inside the spectacular Hell's Gate gorge!

Wes and Erica ready to set out at the trail head

with two very happy little passengers

We wanted to share with you an amazing adventure we had on our day off this past week when we joined some friends for a day hike in Hell's Gate.

About an hour and a half outside of Nairobi in the centre of the great rift valley, lies Hell's Gate National Park. The park is named after the unusual geothermal activity that creates hot springs and steam vents throughout the steep-cliffed canyons and gorges carved throughout this portion of the great valley. We went to the park for the first time with our friends, the Enns family. Arriving around mid morning, we first hiked together through a breathtaking gorge.

Coming out of the gorge, we hiked down through a narrow fissure to the riverbed below. Along the way we met steaming waterfalls created by hot springs. At several points along the way, the four adults needed to pass the children down through the steep crack. At one point, we needed to stand in stream of hot water falling from above us, in order to get the kids safely down. Needless to say, we were drenched... but it was a ball!

Once in the riverbed at the bottom of the canyon, we hiked for over an hour mesmerized by the incredible rock formations. Our friends knew there was an easier way out of the canyon than going back through the fissure, so we continued to push onwards in search of the trail. After a while, we were getting frustrated and desperate knowing that our cars were getting further and further behind us. Wes and I continued to scout ahead for a trail up the cliff face, but to no avail.

But the Lord provided us with an angel: after fruitlessly scanning the shore line for a trail to take us up and out of the canyon, a little Kenyan boy appeared out of nowhere walked bare foot down the river. He only spoke Kiswahili, but with our two days worth of Swahili training under our belt from last summer, we learned that his name was Joseph and that he could lead us to a Ranger. With his help we found some of Hell's Gate's incredible natural steam vents, and a goat trail out of the valley.

Following the goats out of the canyon, Joseph led us to a local Masai village where a Masai woman brought us out to the park picnic area and car park. It was an unforgettable day and one of the best family adventures we have ever had!!

Erica and Ava approaching a Masai village

The Dad's were all wet after passing the children down
through the "steamy" water fall.


Mommy and Ava in Hell's Gate Gorge

The Sharing Way

Erica with Bruno & Kathleen Soucey and Sam Matisia

We had the joy of taking part in a bit of the Sharing Way meetings that were happening here in Kenya last week. The Sharing Way, is the relief and development arm of Canadian Baptist Ministries. TSW works to address issues of poverty and humanitarian crisis as part of commitment to serve our global neighbours in Christ's love. It was wonderful to meet our colleagues working throughout East Africa and India; among the group were our fellow maritimers -- the Souceys!

They will have been serving in Rwanda one year this September. There son Ben, has hit a major growth spurt (for all of you who have met the Souceys, you will be interested to know that Ben is nearly a head taller than he was last summer). I (Aaron) had the fun taking Ben hunting for clothes in the outdoor markets. Ben also joined us for a morning of classes in Eastleigh, where he thought the cratered roads were comparable to those of Kigali, Rwanda.

We also had the pleasure of spending some time with a short term mission team from Duncan, British Columbia. Their pastor, Mark Buchanan, was a part of Erica's first mission trip to Kenya, back in 2004. It was great to see and hear of their experiences serving the among churches here in Nairobi province.

A few Updates:
Please be keeping us in prayer today as we are having a home visit with the Adoption Agency. They will be the ones to decide if we can foster Ava.

Good News/Bad News. The Bad News is that Erica's "dependant pass" is stuck somewhere in the complicated "process" of Kenyan immigration. It could be weeks or months before we receive it and are able to complete our alien registration. The Good News is that our contact in the Immigration department has graciously extended the visas in Erica, Tristan and Emma's passports for an additional three months! This is fantastic -- we're all legal again.

Finally, we are excited to be seeing friends from New Brunswick this week as Marylin Smith, Lois Mitchell and Coleen Steeves are all here in Kenya as part of a special missions trip concerning water and women's issues in Kenya. They all arrived safe and sound last Friday, and we plan on meeting them tomorrow evening and again on Friday while they are in the city.





This little vervet monkey was spying on us during the Sharing Way meetings. He was very interested in our breakfast, and would also jump down on our landing and peek in our windows when ever we left our room. Had the kids been with us, I'm sure he would have a name by now.