And We Just Keep Growing....

In two days we went from 112 children to 114 children.

On Monday, July 23rd, Jeff got a call from the children’s department. There was a two year old that needed to be placed at In Step.  We didn’t know about this until he got home and dropped off a new little face at the front door.

Here is Bravin Ekiru.

Just after he arrived at the home. 

Bravin’s mother had died and his grandmother just couldn’t take care of him any longer so she brought him to the children’s department.  He’s a very friendly little boy who has the face of a man with many years of wisdom and really cute chubby cheeks.

He fit right in at In Step; he wasn’t bothered by the dinner chaos and sharing a table with 112 other siblings. He was so happy with his food; I don't think he realized he wasn’t alone. J  He’s adapted to the routine very quickly and has a ton of new brothers and sisters to love on him now.

Then the very next day, Tuesday, July 24^th, Jeff came home from town and asked Carla if she wanted to go to town and pick up a baby. I just about fell off the chair, “Yes, we’ll go. We’ll go!”

Carla and I got in the car and drove to the children’s department to pick up our next new addition.

His name is Jason Wangolo.

About a week after being at the home. 

Jason’s father died some time ago of AIDS. His mother died about two months ago of TB and was also HIV positive.  Jason’s mother was the third wife to his father and the first nor second or fourth wife wanted to or couldn’t take care of him.

Jason is nine months old and very malnourished, as well as positive with TB. When we got in the car to drive home, he started to scream, not cry, scream. He didn’t want the bottle; he fought me; he’d arch his back. He was mad. I rolled up his shirt sleeve to find his fingers; if he didn’t want a bottle, maybe he’d want his fingers. He found them and started sucking on two of them (so cute!). He managed to fall asleep for about.....oh, five minutes and then started to scream again. Carla and I couldn’t even talk to one another, it was so loud.

He wouldn’t eat; he wouldn’t sleep, nothing worked. We had to use a syringe to get some milk down; he had to eat. He was SO exhausted. I had taken him into our room so that I could try to get him to sleep.  I rocked back and forth while he screamed. I turned to Sean and said, “Let’s just pray over him.” 

So Sean laid hands over him and we just prayed. I asked for curses that I felt had been said over him, be broken. Sean prayed that God would comfort him so that he could sleep. We prayed that he would eat so that we could get him to gain weight; get him healthier. 

A little while later, I had him in the rocking chair; he fell asleep for awhile. When he woke up; he didn’t cry. He actually started to smile when some of the kids came around and were talking to him. He still wouldn’t eat though.  Overnight though, he managed to take most of a bottle and then this morning, he took a full bottle from Sean.

We’ve been monitoring Jason closely over the past two weeks. He’s now talking, smiling and has even learned to hold his own bottle. We have him rolling over now (with a bit of help sometimes) and he only cries (which is just little whimpers for the most part) when he’s really hungry or overly tired.  

All I can say is, “Thank you Jesus!”

Much Love,

Meredith