It was around 8 am and I was outside feeding the cow when suddenly, I heard my phone ringing hence notifying me of a new SMS. I decided to stop and check what it was all about. To my surprise, it was an SMS indicating that I had received the KES 55000 that GiveDirectly had promised us. I was so happy that I called unto my wife telling her about the great news. She came with lots of excitement on her face upon hearing this to confirm if it was true. We then gave thanks to God for the blessing. I then asked her and my son to prepare themselves so that they could go withdraw the amount. That day was our happiest, we even ate special food to celebrate it.

The transfer has brought a very big difference in our lives as a family. We got most of the things that we didn't have before. We have managed to build a nicer house though we have not yet completed the construction. We now have a wheelbarrow which is helping in making our work easier, for example, carrying water from the river. Other than that, we are now sleeping well since we bought a mattress with part of the transfer. We didn't have one before and we use to sleep on a dried cow's skin. We are so much grateful to GiveDirectly for everything.

We spent most of our recent transfer on building another house. We bought 24 iron sheets at a total cost of KES 20400. We also spent KES 3000 on sawing the wooden frames for the construction of the roof. I had already bought timber before for the walls. It was in our plans to build another house because the one that we have been living in it had grown old and is mud-walled. We had just not gotten enough money for the construction. We are small-scale farmers where we usually grow crops such as sweet potatoes, and vegetables and we sell them at the markets places to earn some income. The money that we get is little and it is only enough to buy food and the small household essentials. Other than that, we also spent KES 1750 on buying five chickens to add to the ones that we had. We bought the chickens so that we could increase our egg production. We usually sell the eggs and the money from the sales, we use in buying the small household items such as soap, salt, etc. We also bought a wheelbarrow at KES 3500, a spade at KES 1500, and 3 rolls of wire mesh for fencing at a total cost of KES 9000. We also spent KES 2000 on paying school fees for our son who is in secondary school. With the remaining transfer amount, we used it on buying a mattress.