Rehema Ministries/dba In Step Foundation, Kenya

Update 2012, Jenny is changing so much and really seems to be opening up.

Arrived November 2008, Jenny was a very bright 3-year-old who could tell you exactly what happened to her. She and her aunt were walking down a long rural road when the aunt told her they were going to play a game. She told Jenny to walk straight ahead as fast as she could without stopping and without turning around to look back. Nobody knows how long or how far Jenny walked before an old man found her and took her into his home. She knows the first names of her parents, but she doesn’t know where she is from. Efforts to trace them have been unsuccessful.

Arrived April 2008, Joy was born April 1st at the District Hospital. Her mother immediately ran away. It is beginning to be a familiar story that several of our kids share. The hospital kept her for one week, hoping the mom would have a change of heart and come back for her. Joy is very healthy, bigger and stronger than most children when they arrive. She took to the bottle immediately, as if she had been taking it since day one.

Arrivied September 2008, Ruth was approximately a week old when we were called to pick her up in. When we got home, one of the workers asked if she had a name and announced that her name would be Ruth (Carla calls her Baby Ruth, which no one but Jeff and her knows is funny). “My little chocolate Baby Ruth!” She was a beautiful baby! She looked to be healthy and full term. She was abandoned in one of the IDP (internally displaced people) camps during the post-election violence.

Arrived July 2006, James was brought to us, along with his sister Jessica. He was approximately 6 months old at the time and had been abandoned by his mother four months prior. The old man who found them was not able to properly care for them, giving him nothing more than a few bites of bread soaked in water each day. When James was brought to us, he was very near death. James suffers from a variety of health problems, including seizures and developmental delays, probably due to the malnutrition and dehydration that almost took his life. Despite his rough beginning, James is one of the happiest kids you will ever meet. He will be with us his whole life.