Family challenge

The last week has been dominated by "back to school", sorting pencil cases, finding (and already losing) lunch boxes, naming sports kit and reprogramming body clocks to an earlier all family start to the day. So far so good (if you ignore the back to school bugs that the kids have succumbed to) and everyone has been happy to see friends, catch up on news and meet some new people. We marked the end of the first week with a back to school disco, where Matthew opted to swim rather than dance and Katie tried to lead the girls to move like jagger on the dance floor.




And then we packed the car and headed off for a family challenge. This is a charity fundraiser organised by friends to support Kamili, a mental health charity. Teams of up to six (only 2 of whom can be grown up) compete in a series of challenges over the weekend with points awarded for effort and being supportive to each other as much as for performance. Everyone camps in a beautiful spot full of Zebra and giraffe next to lake Naivasha and the challenges are scattered all over the place so there's plenty of walking and cycling around and general fresh air as well as some orienteering and a chance to catch up with friends around the course.

Our first challenge was getting all the camping gear, 3 bikes and one reluctant child into the car - a few basic essentials for a night away.




We are now pretty good at putting up our tents and Matthew can pretty much do his alone until it comes to getting the pegs in the ground.







And then it was time for the challenges. 15 minutes for each challenge and 15 minutes to get to the next one. The afternoon saw us picking up balls whilst staying as a human chain, matthew and me describing a miro picture to the others for them to replicate, playing a numbers based version of twister, trying to lift a pot out of a large square without it touching the ground, and building a seaplane from kinnex. Something for everyone. There was a point mid way round where chocolate biscuits and bananas were essential and I suspect when we pore over the detailed data that's due to be on line later in the week (and which the boys can't wait for) we will see the performance enhancing capacity of chocolate.

After a chilly night under canvas and a stove cooked breakfast we were ready for day 2 where we got the wet and muddy challenges with katie coming into her own stemming water flowing out of a large pipe and balancing on a slack rope over the water and Matthew came into his own in the mud.


Jamie was our able manager reading out instructions and plotting our route on the map. All three kids loved the soda tasting challenge and Tim could have done without discovering that the thing he'd tried to identify inside a closed box was a desicated mongoose - I got a coconut shell! All in all it was a great weekend, for a good cause and we even got a medal to show for it. We are now just wondering how it might translate to a park in south west London.........

Full House

We have just waved goodbye to some friends who have been visiting Kenya and us for the last couple of weeks. It has been great fun and the kids have really enjoyed having a full house for the last weeks of the holiday and taking our friends and their 2 young kids to see the sights. We've seen elephants and giraffe in Nairobi, hippos and flamingos and all sorts of other birds near lake Naivasha and elephants and much more with Kilimanjaro as a backdrop in Amboseli. We've also done loads of swimming, some catching up with Nairobi friends and Matthew fitted in a 4 day cricket tournament, narrowly losing in the final (held at a very faded former international ground which was just great for him). Tim and I also managed to get on with the daily chores, go to work, complete school uniform shopping and keep the house stocked with food and drink. Its been busy!

Naivasha & Amboseli View photos You are invited to view anne's album. This album has 19 files.

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Up until now most of our visitors have just been passing through and stay for a few nights, either as part of their work with Tim or to have a weekend break once the work is done. All our visitors provide a good excuse to go to some of our favourite places again and for the kids to talk about Kenya and make the most of having different people to read bed time stories or play sport with in the garden. We in turn make the most of our guests by stocking up on UK news and treats and asking for volunteers to detangle Katie's hair - a task she has deemed both her parents incapable of.

I grew up in a house full of visitors and enjoyed meeting new people and big, noisy mealtimes. But I also know that isn't for everyone and its important to let people have space to do their own thing. that's of course much easier here where even if we are in the cooler part of the year kids can be outside most of the day. Having a huge 8 seater landcruiser also helps with outings as everyone just bundles in. And there are always people around at home so no-one has to go if they just want to curl up at home and read. The help at home also made me brave enough to suggest our friends' kids stayed with us for a few days whilst their parents went to see the wildebeest migration in the Mara. Tim opted to go away for work and I had an insight into life as a mother of five - it was relatively straightforward all things considered but after 48 hours I knew that we were right to think 3 is enough for us.










Anne