As at now, we practice mixed farming here at home. This is where we do some bit of crop farming and dairy keepingbas well. With the current climatic conditions, farming has been dealt a blow with most crops drying up and we end up with very little produce. We also have a problem with dairy keeping where we keep breeds of cattle that are less productive. In the next one year and beyond, my plan is to see to it that I get enough money to improve my dairy keeping business as well as improve my crop farming too. By so doing then the living standards of my family shall greatly improve. Right now I only have two cows that I keep here at home and my target is to have more than four cows by the end of the year. I can only achieve this through a savings plan that I have already started.

In my opinion, GiveDirectly does very well by giving support in form of cash transfers. This has given us the freedom to choose how to spend the money and we have done so to the satisfaction of everyone. Different people have different needs and clearly GiveDirectly appreciated that.

When I received my second transfer, I used $500 to cement the floor of our main house. I then used the remaining amount of $50 to buy clothes and food for my family. We had had to live in a house with uncemented floor for quite a long time since we had no money to complete it. The subsistence farming that I relied on could provide us with just enough to feed my family and meet other basic household needs. With seven children who look up to us to meet most of their needs, we could not raise money enough to bring our construction to completion. I am so happy that with GiveDirectly transfers we have been able to bring the construction work to completion. My husband who does odd casual jobs to support the family needs could not raise such money too and we were not sure of when this project could come to its completion.

It was around 6 p.m. while weeding beans in my garden. That's when I heard a message alert on my phone, on checking I had received KES 55,000 from GiveDirectly. I was very happy and this motivated me to complete the weeding of the remaining portion. I then withdrew the money three days later.

The biggest difference in my daily life since I received the transfers is the availability of construction materials. This will ensure my dream of having a cemented floor is realized. Secondly, there's also adequate food for my family which has made my kids healthier and happier. There is also stress reduction since I no longer do casual labor as before to get food.

My four-roomed timber walled house was built in 2015. But the floor was a mud floor, and getting smearing mud was hectic because it required one to travel a long distance to get it. Hence, there was a need to upgrade the mud floor to a cemented one when the transfers arrived. Thus, KES 35,000 of the transfers was spent on the purchase of construction materials like hardcore, gravel, sand, and cement. These will help a great deal in actualizing my dream of upgrading my floor from a mud one to a cemented one. Secondly, KES 12,000 was used on two bags of maize which can sustain us for the next two months. As a mother of seven, getting enough food earlier was a struggle given that I am a small-scale farmer of maize and beans. My husband works as a layman on construction sites. Lastly, I spent KES 3,000 on other food and household items. Earlier my household budget was KES 500 daily but this has reduced immensely with the arrival of GiveDirectly transfers.