A typical week…

Baby Amy was one week old yesterday and she is doing very well.  She is gaining weight and doing all the typical one-week-old-baby stuff.  Ok, that means she eats, sleeps, cries and poops.  Unfortunately for me, she has chosen 2:30 in the morning as her “fussy” time of day, but as this situation is only temporary, I can handle it for a few weeks.  She is a very nice looking baby, and I used to work in a new-born nursery, so I know that not all babies are cute, despite what your mother may have told you.

It was a very typical week here, apart from the 2:30am fussy baby.  Some of the older kids get up at 5:00 and start making the morning porridge and everyone else it up by 6:00 or so.  The little kids get a bath, outside, no hot water and put on their school uniforms.  The older ones are doing chores during this time, anything from washing the floors and bathroom to sweeping the front yard area.  They all have their porridge by 7:00 and the 7 little kids head off on their walk to school.  The other kids finish chores, put one uniforms and the whole place is quiet by 8:00.  OK, not exactly quite, Whitney is 3 years old and will not attend school until next year.  The twins are 18 months old and busy doing toddler stuff now that Babirye is walking all over the place.  And baby Amy, who is sleeping because she was up and fussing from 2:30 – 4:30. 

I go and pick up the 7 smaller kids from school at 12:30 or so and we all head over to another school to collect 2 more younger ones who get out at 1:00.  We all head home for lunch.  The road we need to walk along is very busy with car/truck/motor bike traffic and I have adopted a very simple technique to keep them in a single-file line walking on the side of the road.  I tied a regular clothesline rope with 10 loops, spaced about a foot and a half apart.  Each child holds on to a loop and I hold the last one.  In this way, each child follows the one in front of him/her while holding their loop.  It works great and looks very sharp as well.  We get all sorts of smiles (and a few laughs) as we make our way safely down the busy road.

After lunch most of them take a nap.  The older kids start arriving back home in the later afternoon so that everyone has returned by 6:00.  Little kids bathe again at 5:00, singing and Bible reading at 6:30 (today it seems to be taking place earlier), and dinner about 7:00.  It’s dark by 7:30.

OK, none of this sounds very exciting, but we have no modern conveniences, although, I did purchase and electric kettle so I can make coffee without having to boil water over the open fire, so everything takes way longer than it would at home.  After breakfast we start making lunch so it will be ready in time.  Laundry is done by hand and hung out to dry.  Water is obtained from a giant “rain-catcher” tank in the front, but, thank the Maker, the water in the pipes to the bathrooms started up again last week!!  This is a huge, big deal because now the toilets flush and the sinks work.  OK, you have NO idea how nice this is.  In the early afternoon preparations for dinner begin.  The dinner dishes are done the following morning as they are washed outside and cannot be properly washed in the dark.  I go to bed about 9:00 for obvious reasons.

I am going out to the western part of the country for a few days starting on Monday to look at the various animals again.  This year I am adding a “Chimp trek”, hoping the “trek” part of the adventure is going to be manageable.  These few days away will give the director a chance to take care of baby Amy, so of a trial run for when I leave in a few weeks.

Hoping everyone reading this is doing well.  Best wishes to you all.

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