Check out the size of these avacados!

Traffic jam!

Baboons along the side of the road.

These large termite hills are all over Kenya and Uganda!

Pastor Micah & Grace and UCF




Helen and Sula (their yard/house helper) playing soccer in the back yard.



Auntie Becca!  (Grace's sister) She has such a joyful contagious spirit!



Sweet Reba with our kids.

Tips from the pro...Pastor Micah teaching Jonas how to beat his sister at checkers.

Joyful servants.....Grace and her sisters have the fruit of the Spirit joy that spreads to those around them!

A lineage of servant's hearts...Penny, Becca, Helen & Reba!  The aunts, mothers, nieces, cousins work as a fluid team to host the many teams and individuals that stay at their house.....always with a smile on their face and full of love!

Joey chatting with Penny while making chipates.

Alea's Baptism!!!!

Back in March we were driving home from ballet and out of the blue she said "Mom, I want to get baptized in Africa."  Tears of joy streamed down my face!  We hadn't talked about it at all other than the week before her AWANA lesson was on Acts 8 when God sent Philip down the road to Ethiopia and he ran into the Eunich riding the chariot who was reading the scroll of Isaiah. Philip hopped in to explain the meaning to him and out of the nowhere a pool of water appeared in the desert and the Eunich wanted to get baptized! Alea had made a little diaroma of that story to turn into her AWANA leader.  Well Alea said God sent her a message that she was supposed to get baptized in Africa!  So we were just waiting on God to arrange the time and location for us.  We weren't sure if it would be at one of the church's we were visiting or what, but God knew our shy, quiet Alea would prefer a much quieter location with a much smaller crowd and no microphone to speak into (she gets very tongue-tied speaking in front of groups). Our wonderful new friends at Musana Camp provided the small "cloud of witnesses" and beautiful Lake Victoria (parasites and all...don't worry mom, we picked up the treatment from the pharmacy when we got back to the big city of Kampala) provided the perfect baptismal. 

Our small cloud of witnesses (a few more were out of the picture)

 

So for our families and dear friends back home who had to miss her baptism, here was the "order of service":
1.  Joey read Acts 2:37-41
"And Peter said to them 'Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins and you will recieve the gift of the Holy Spirit'....."
2. Alea shared her testimony
"I accepted Jesus into my heart 2 summers ago at my grandparents' camp.  I love God and want to be more like Him.  I want to be baptized so I can be transformed by the Holy Spirit."
3.  Anissa was supposed to pray, but couldn't stop crying, so Joey prayed.
4.  Joey and Alea waded out past the seaweed to a deep enough spot and shouting above the waves, Joey baptized her in the Name of the Father, the Spirit, and the Son.  They stood there hugging and crying for awhile before wading back.  Jonas ran out as they were coming back to meet them and hug Alea.
5. We all stood on the shore when they got back and sang "Our God is bigger, our God is stronger, God you are higher than any other, Our God is healer, awesome in power, our God, our God...."  (that was the song of her choice, very special to us...we sang it every day  at Kids Club in the slums)
6.  Then the kids all swam for about an hour!

Musana Camp on Lake Victoria

Onlly Jonas could get a chicken to snuggle with him!

Bananas were being harvested everywhere around camp!  This is how you see them even in Kampala, the big city being sold in streetside stands.  Uganda is famous for their bananas....they have 6 or so different species that are used for different uses.

We learned that a banana tree only produces one single bunch of bananas (ever), then it must be chopped down and a new tree planted.

More bananas!

Hiking thru the sugar cane "garden".  What they call gardens in Uganda are big tropical jungles for us! The locals just chop down a section of the forest and clear the land, then plant their crops...sugar cane, banana trees, sweet potatoes, or cassava.

Exploring the camp (i.e. hiking thru the jungle ;)

One of the camp's cook's little girl Jovia, stole Alea and Jonas' heart.  I loved how her name sounds like the English word "jovial" because she wouldn't stop smiling! 

Jonas and Alea kept Jovia entertained while her mom was winnowing beans.

A hut we passed on the walk down to the lake (the camp sits high on a cliff and it's quite a trek down and back up).  The little girl's name is Robinah....a very common Ugandan name.  One of the girl's we sponsor and one of the camp's staff are named Robinah.

There is a fishing village that sits right along the shore and the trail to the camp's swimming spot leads right past it.

These baby goats were adorable!  They were jumping and "kidding around".  Yes, Jonas managed to catch one before it was all said and done.

Jack fruit.  Pastor Micah has these by his house...very common around Uganda.  They can grow even bigger than this!!

There are men that smash the rock by hand into gravel to be used for construction around camp.  They do this all day from 7am-7pm every day!