Some of our household goals before receiving the transfers were to enroll my spouse in hair care training while I was to enroll in masonry training. Due to the high household demands, I did not manage to enroll in the masonry training because we ran out of cash after meeting the most pressing needs. I do not have a new goal but have not given up on my dream of being a trained mason. I am working towards raising money for the training.

In my opinion, the Give Directly processes are fair enough. We were visited by their officers who enlightened us about the program, we all later received the money which was followed by follow-up calls to check if we indeed received our money as was promised. This showed how transparent and concerned they are. I have not come across any dissatisfaction about their process from anyone.

After spending a bigger portion of my first transfer on constructing a new house, I ended up leaving it halfway because of the rise in the price of the building materials due to their rise in demand at that particular time. I had to spend 27000 KES from the second transfer to complete the construction. I am glad the house is fully done, and we have occupied it. 10000 KES I paid for my spouse's hair care training. This is her passion and long-time dream. Some times last year I enrolled her for the training but I could not manage the fees for the whole course. She, therefore, left it halfway because all I could afford was 3000 KES. I am happy to see her pursue her dreams of becoming a beauty therapist. Since she did not have any source of income, I gave her 8000 KES for the poultry project which she is currently managing as she continues with her training. The remaining 7000 KES I spent on enough foodstuffs for my family to take them for a while before budgeting for more.

At the moment I received a message that confirmed the receipt of my first transfer, I was very happy as this was a confirmation that the plans we had been making were soon going to work out. Since we were enrolled in the program, I had been planning with my spouse as we make consideration of what we needed most in our household. On that morning, I was already out with the motorbike as I had been working in the nearby town and bringing back the day's income after giving the owner of the bike the daily agreed amount. I became so excited and had to ride home first since I needed to share the joy with my spouse.

Even though I am still buying milk every day from the nearby shopping center where I had been working as a motorcycle rider, I am glad that my hope of getting enough milk from our in-calf heifer rose after I bought it. This has brought forth the biggest difference in my daily life that has motivated me to even work harder knowing that being dependent on the casual labor to buy milk from my household won't be forever. It had been so much challenging working even during rainy seasons to satisfy both the motorcycle owner and also to get some extra coins for my family. With the heifer I bought, I am hopeful that It will soon provide us with enough milk both for my household and also a surplus to sell as an extra source of income.

After the first day of enrollment, it has been an exciting moment in our household as I had been in continuous plans with my spouse on how best we would spend the transfer once we receive it. At the top of our list was to cut the high cost of buying milk by obtaining at a cow that will in turn provide us with enough milk. We also needed a new house among other projects that we had been wishing for. On receiving this money, we settled on buying four months in-calf heifer at KES25000. We expected to find a lactating cow as an instant solution to the challenge we had been having but the high cost of livestock in the nearby market could not allow us. I also managed to spend part of the remaining amount on purchasing construction materials that include 26 iron sheets at KES15000, nails worth KES5000, and also a tree that I am yet to cut down to obtain building poles and frames meant for the roofing. With all these, I have been very grateful to GiveDirectly for the great support that will soon enable us to start our construction. This will provide us a much bigger space than the squeezed one we had been experiencing with my family of three in our current small hut.