July 5th

From Lynn:
Today was a day of extreme emotion for me. Working with the children in the clinic caused me both great sadness and joy. The children with the more serious conditions left my heart heavy and I prayed our treatments would reduce their pain. At the same time, many of the other students needed little treatment and were much healthier because of improved diet and medical attention over time at the Mercy Care Center. Your support for this school is making that possible and is saving precious lives. That gave me great joy!

From Purnell:
Thank you for your response baby brother to our blog site! It is great hearing from you since it takes FOREVER here to open and send email. SLOWER than dial up. I tell ya. I wish you all could see the preschoolers scream and run after our van each morning when we arrive at Mercy Care! They make us feel as if we are ROYALTY! Today the various classes took turns painting the bottle caps that they flattened with rocks yesterday. When their paint job passed my inspection I said, “Perfect!” or “nzuri,” which means good. With a one word praise, you would have thought that I had given them a thousand dollars! We are preparing the caps for hand painted earrings or pendants to sell at home for the school. Yesterday, Claude, Lynn and I painted the back wall of a classroom. Tomorrow we will paint a mural of the students in class on that back wall. Try to imagine painting, or for that matter, learning in a 12x14 foot room with one small window and 22 students!

From the Browns:
Today went smoothly except for Lee Ray being sick. After clinic the group went to the Giraffe Farm and Karen Blixon home. Tonight we went to our favorite Indian restaurant! God is good! We are so thankful for Betsy. I told Patrick the good news of more money for the secondary school and he was thrilled!

From the Greenes:

Dad has recovered from a day in bed. We think and hope he just ate something bad. Today was good, but there is so much mixed emotion in that clinic. It is so beautiful to see the smiles on the children’s faces. But it is also so hard to realize how many have aids, scabies and ring worms. Thanks for all your prayers!