Visiting Return Ministries Uganda and a Surprise

Early Monday morning, the 17th, we headed to the airport to fly to Uganda.  I was sad to be leaving Kenya, but there were people in Uganda that I could not wait to see.  I was excited!

We landed at Entebbe and made it through passport control and got our visas.  Pastor Samuel from Return Ministries picked us up from the airport.  We were headed to spend some time with and feed lunch to the children at Return.

Some of them sang for us. 

This little one was getting in to all the clapping! 

That little one in the back of the line could shake it like nobody's business.

We helped serve all the kids their rice and beans.

This dude is a character!  He remembered me from last time I was there.

After everyone had finished eating, we played.  We brought pipe cleaners to use for a craft that went along with a bible story.  But... there were SO many kids and most of them were little, so we just decided to forgo the bible story and let these little ones be creative with some pipe cleaners.  They were definitely creative!!

When it was time for us to go, we headed back to Pastor Samuel's house to do some shopping.  They have a little shop where teams like ours can buy handcrafted items, and the money raised supports their ministry. If any of you purchased any of the paper bead jewelry from me, this is where it came from.  

I cannot find any pictures of my shopping experience.  ;-)  I was WAY too busy shopping to snap photos.  Then, something amazing happened while we were there.

(If you are still with me, thank you.  I know this is long.  I just LOVE reliving all of this!)

This little girl...

...is Ruth.  The same little beauty that is in the picture over there in the sidebar.  -------->

Back when I got the itinerary for this trip, the first thing I did was look to see if I was going to see Ruth.  I had been too afraid to ask.  I knew I would be beyond disappointed if the answer was 'no.'  It turned out that our schedule this time would not allow for a visit to Royal Hope Academy where Ruthie goes to school.  Ruth lives with Rebecca, and I knew that Rebecca was in the states and not going to be in Uganda during our visit.  I was pretty sad.  For a long time.

Finally I decided that it couldn't hurt anything for me to contact Rebecca and just see if maybe she could send someone to meet me while I was there so I could send a few fun things for Ruthie.  I. Love. Rebecca. She said she would arrange for Michael (a man she works with) to come and pick up what I would bring, but she didn't know if he would be able to bring Ruth because of some testing that was being done at school.

I was completely OK with that!  By the time this day got here I did not at all expect Michael to bring Ruth with him.

I was busy shopping (remember? yeah, back to that.)  -I tell really LONG stories.  :-)  The men that I work with hate it. (I can talk about them here, because they would NEVER be still reading.)

So, I was shopping and Michael walks up to me.  When I recognize him, I thanked him for coming and turned to go to the van and get the bag I had for Ruth.  I wasn't looking for Ruth.  I thought he was alone.  And there she was, peering out of the van window.

To say I was thrilled would be the understatement of the year.  :-)

So I got to squeeze Ruth.  What a wonderful day!!

 She loved her Princess Tiana doll.

 I don't know how many times this child told me 'thank you!'

There might have been a dress-up dress that matched Tiana's and some princess stickers and some princess pencils and who knows what else in that bag.  ;-)

It was a good day.