Rift Notes from the Taylors: FAMILY FUN

Evan in our sweet new camp site in Aberdare National Park

Evan and friends get ready to serve dinner and surprises to the young lady Evan is asking to Banquet.

Ben, who lived with us the first 2 terms of this school year and Evan, head off to hike Mt. Kenya on their interim trip.

The "Extended Family" photo just before Nate and Janae head off to college in January.

Janelle enjoys the curlers that Aunt Ruth sent

Janelle was part of the Junior High Drama This past term.

Some of the Characters from the jr. High Drama.

Janelle at her 6th Grade Band concert.

Evan asked this young Lady by sliding down a water slide with roses in hand and music playing in front of most of the school.

Banquet askings are always a big deal and we often get to help students. This year we set this about a 20 minute drive from RVA. Then the couple had Ethiopian food and then he asked her to go to banquet.

Nate and Janae at the Senior Banquet...

Nate and some good friends at Midterm.

It was a family project to design and build our ginger bread house. It was lot of fun. Perhaps the most fun came as we tried to find a way to make a chimney towards the end. Lacking resources like tootsie rolls, we decided to get the whole family involved. Jazzmyn, our dog donated 4 pieces of her food for the chimney. It looked great. Don't worry, no one ate it.

Perhaps our trips on Piki's can go longer with the addition of saddle bags made by a local tailor. Old duffel bags worked out great. The reflective tape makes us even more visible which is key in Kenya.

Nate turned 18 on Nov. 25th. We had about 35 of his classmates up for cake and ice cream.

Evan turned 16 on Dec. 7. His love for South African Rugby team was supported on the cake.

A surprise opportunity allowed Evan, Amanda and Janelle to ride horses while were visiting a friends.


Greetings from Beautiful Kenya.

Highlights of Janelle's 5th grade year so far.
Winning a pinewood derby trophy with her "Big Sister" a senior who's parent's minister in Uganda.

Janelle performs with the 5th and 6th Grade choir in their musical ANGEL ALERT.

Janelle and her 5th grade teacher. Mrs. Hazard was a senior here our first year on staff.

Evan and Nate Both had birthdays recently. Evan turned 16 and is doing well in his sophomore year. He loves to ride his motorcycle and play soccer and rugby.


Nate Evan and several guys went on a hike in a forest. They rode their motorcycles there which was quite a challenge after all the rain. As you can see, the fishing was a bit difficult. This is a unique forest. Wild trout remain after stocking from many years ago, but they are really hard to catch.

Nate took auto mechanics really seriously. He's now become the local mechanic. Only 3 bikes are ours. He's done major work on 3 of these bikes and gotten them back on the road.

We've had a chance to visit families and a few places around Kenya. The birds here in Kenya always prove stunning.

Sunset below our football/soccer pitch.

Breakfast, (served at 10 am since our children traditionally sleep in on Christmas) was a special treat.

Nate celebrates Christmas with the Christmas Dog!

Evan tries on his new motorcycle neck brace he got for Christmas

We took a ride in a new style during a few days away from RVA.

Evan's Birthday was a a fun celebration, (especially since he was not in school like Nate's Birthday.) We went down the road from our house to a place we call the sand pits and had a few hours of picnic with another family and a good time riding. Evan put on a good show as did everyone. The boys to the right really enjoyed the show and some of our lunch. It was a nice get away. Janelle got some practice on the quad.

Nate also got to play in the jazz ensemble concert the same day as his induction which was also his 17th birthday. It was a fun concert with several Christmas songs featured. It's been a tradition since long before we came to RVA that even though it's Nov., we celebrate the coming of Christmas. The school closes this weekend and we won't be back until Jan so it's important to celebrate Christmas together at least a little.

Nate gets sung happy birthday by the audience thanks to his Dad!

Nate received his induction into the National Honor Society on his Birthday.

Janelle's car did well but not well enough to place in the top 3 for her grade.

As you can see, we make sure that pinewood derby is a big event. This year is the 40th year for the even with 143 cars entered for the day of races.

The car was modeled after the box car from Janelles favorite series, the box car children. She made the car complete with sliding door and Benny's cracked pink mug. She won a trophy for most unique design.

Well, owning our 1998 land cruiser for almost 10 years and it passing 127000 miles in Africa, it's time to do some major work on the suspension. We are grateful for the vehicle shop here at RVA that works on our cars. Our head mechanic is a man of real integrity and knowledge. Please pray that the 2 new employees will share his Godly vision and values, that they will work well as part of the RVA Team and that God will keep all our vehicles running safely. Pray for safety as parents and students travel in just 1 week as school closes Nov. 29

Janelle enjoyed RVA's costume carnival with her "Big Sister" (a highschooler here at RVA) They dressed up as Little Red Riding Hood and Grandma for an evening of games and snacks.

Notice the rain clouds coming???? Well, keep praying for rains to come. Even though it's out of season, we are asking for God to open up clouds and bring enough water for a good harvest in Kenya.

We took a weekend and went camping with some friends who are working with AIM AIR. Jason was one of my students while attending RVA and is now a father of 2. Sure makes us feel old when our graduates come back with families. We had a great time camping and enjoyed the fact that the hippos stayed in the river below our camp site.

Janelle enjoyed being the big sister!

Buying in Bulk may not always be wise. .... We decided to try to save money and buy our flour in 100 lb bag and split it with our neighbor. However, after we split the bag we got talking with our neighbor only to find that our black lab jazzmyn discovered the bag and decided to stick her head in and have a taste. As Janelle pointed out, Jassmyn is a white flower so we guessed she was trying to define herself.

Much of our school break was taken up with renovating our first floor with new tiles, and repainting. I'll post pictures of the finished product once we get the curtains and get them up. Getting to Nairobi has been a challenge since Amanda is doing soooo much to organize New Parent Orientation.

The boys got in lots of riding this vacation. Steve on the other hand is still not allowed to ride bikes or motorbikes due to the surgeries.

Evan and his friend who celebrate the finale of 8th Grade with a big dinner. The 8th grade class puts this dinner one with the help of their sponsors. It was a great evening with good food and entertainment.

Nate has been working with a staff member to learn bee keeping in an effort to save the forests near the school and to provide community development. With African honey bees, the full suit is a must.

We went to Aberdare national park with 2 of Evan's friends. I tried to teach fly fishing.
Evan and his friend were able to catch this Dikker by using a strobe flash light. After a quick photo, he was released.

On our way out of the park, we managed to get stuck in a surprisingly deep mud hole. There was also no way around the hole in front of the truck so we had to turn the truck around. Thankfully we had a winch and were able to get out. That is with the winch and 3 hours of digging and winching.

What an adventure. We sure pulled together well and worked hard together. In the end, we were out of the park by dark and camped by the gate since we didn't think it was wise to drive home in the dark.

The photos are from Evan's first rugby game of the season. They won 25-5.

Yesterday's (Saturday) game which was 90 min. drive away was lost but the boys said it was still fun. Evan said it was fun since he got tackled this game and got to "tackle some big guys".