Hakuna Matata

Well, we did finally get our things moved in (see previous post), and set to work trying to make the new place feel like home (pics of the house coming later). We didn't have too long to get settled, though, because we had another trip approaching quickly. You may remember that Jason, Sarah Claire and I made a quick trip to Kenya last July. Well, we headed back there toward the end of September, this time to stay a little longer--almost two weeks altogether.

Our first stop was a beautiful retreat center where we spent some time with lots of other American families. It was in the mountains (who knew Kenya had mountains? not me), surrounded by tea plantations, and the weather was delightfully cool and damp--two things that our weather in September is not. We decided to take advantage of all that green and have a photographer friend of ours take some family photos, which you now see all over this blog. All the header and sidebar pictures were taken in Kenya that week. And here are a few more, just for fun.

We may or may not have promised ice cream to whoever smiled the best during the photo shoot.

They all got ice cream!

While the adults were in meetings, the kids got to do all kinds of fun things with a great group of adults that flew all the way from North Carolina to be with us. They even took the kids on a field trip to an elephant orphanage and giraffe center one day, so we sent Lee Anna with her camera. Here she is before they left for the trip...

And here she is with the elephants! Her daddy wasn't really thrilled to see his baby girl that close to all those large creatures. Even baby elephants are still really big!

I will spare you most of the 62 pictures she took of the elephants, but here are just a few.

Their next stop was the giraffe center, a fun little place where you can actually feed the giraffes by holding out little pellets of food in your hand. Here's Lee Anna with her very tall friend...

and here are Sarah Claire and I when we visited the same spot in July.

Sarah Claire bravely walked up, took the pellet of food from the attendant, and let him hold her hand out to feed it to the giraffe. When he actually put his fuzzy little mouth in her hand, though, she quickly thought better of her decision. From them on, she kept her distance, and kept her hand to herself.

When we had walked away from the giraffe area, I said, "Sarah Claire, that giraffe ate out of your hand! What did you think about that?" to which she replied, "I cryin'!"

All these little Massai warrior statues were set up in a market area right behind the giraffe-feeding area. Sarah Claire got down on their level to check them out.

We ended our time in Kenya with a special visit to see some friends. More about that tomorrow...