…When there was a honk at the gate. The Uche Ogah Foundation bus came to visit us last week bringing some much needed food donations. The house was on the last cups of rice when this wonderfully timed donation arrived. The bus came with Ogah Foundation members who visited with the children and spent time playing with them. They left with us much needed items including, yams, bags of rice, boxes of milo, milk, indomie, ground nut oil, soap, and tinned tomatoes. Everyone was so excited to have visitors and to receive these gifts. Thank you!
We seem to be building up a boys army in our children’s home! We are so excited to welcome three new boys to our family. They are around the ages of 9, 6, and 4 yrs approx. They have come from a very sad and deplorible situation. They are suffering severe sympyoms of PTSD as well as being malnourished. These boys do not speak English although they understand bits of it. While they speak Igbo, they are not speaking much at all right now. The staff and other children are doing a good job of welcoming them and helping them feel comfortable and at home, it will just take some time. We are excited and hopefully for the healthy and much happier futures of these darling boys.
It seems it is not the time for us to get a bus. Although in our mind we really need one, God must have a bigger, better and safer plan that we dont know about yet. After trying for the third time to purchase a good condition used bus from within Nigeria, we have still not succeeded. I would say three times is a good amount of tries. We will no longer be trying to purchase a used vehicle over there. Our new tactic is to find the necessary finaces/support to purchase a brand new vehicle from one of the Lagos dealerships, or import our own vehicles from here. Please pray for the needed connections and finances to do either one of these…or that someone over there gives us a new bus.
Hey Everyone,
We do have exciting news; after some great time and organization, we now are in the processes of getting our new bus. Thanks to Mount Cheam Thursday Rotary for their generous donation to helps us purchase a bus and fix up our current Terrano. We are excited to get it, which should be in about two weeks time. Our 17 children and 7 staff do not fit in our 8 seat Terrano. :) We thank God for growing.
Well we have a bit of sad news. After having our three little girls, Keren, Keziah and Jemimah for one week, we hear back from Women’s Affairs and the two littlest girls had to be released back to the custody of their mothers. Their situation is still very tenuous and they may yet return. The mothers are being monitored as to their ability to care for and not abuse or sell these babies. They will be watched and monitored however should they be permanently removed and placed with us. It was hard for the staff and children to say goodbye to Keziah and Jemimah as they all fell in love with them so fast and they flourished in the care that we were able to provide. We pray God’s safety over their lives and if it is His will, that they be returned to us.
The majority of our children are permanently placed with us. However we do have a working relationship with Womens Affairs and with NAPTIP,( National Agency to Prevent Trafficking In Persons). that sometimes we will provide a temporary placement for children while the situations are being investigated. Of course it is our hope that they can stay with us, but it is a fact that sometimes children in this category will not stay permanently with us.
We have started our own school! We are “unofficially” open as of yet, because we are still in the process of registration. But we have begun classes at the children’s home, Mon-Fri from 9am-4pm. We are so excited! It has taken much thought and prayer, as well as a year of trial runs with a few of our kids in a community private school, before it became abundantly clear that it is in the best interest of our children that they be schooled at home by us. Not only are their academics being supported, but also their behavioural challenges and their spiritual growth. Everyone has adjusted quickly and with excitement to the new system. After breakfast in the morning all together, everyone is quick to get their school bags and run off to their designated ‘class area’ in the house. We have hired another teacher to help us. So we now have three staff working in teaching positions :) We are currently looking to begin another home, as this one is quite full, and we are also scouting out a building to be used for the school itself.
We look forward to growing this section of our organization so that eventually we might be able to accommodate some of the less privileged children in the area who do not attend school.
We are all soooo excited to finally add some more girls to our highly male dominated children’s home! Although we love our boys dearly, seeing some lovely girly smiles and pretty dresses, and doing hair is certainly fun too!
We have just received three beautiful little girls who have been rescued from a baby factory. The State Women’s Affairs called asking if we could please make room in our home for some emergency cases and we couldn’t say no. So it is with great joy and rushing about to buy mattresses and shift everything about, that we have made room. Our other children are so happy and excited, to have their new sisters. These girls are 4yrs, 3yrs and 8months old. And we have given them the names of Jobs daughters when his life turned around and God blessed him; Keren, Keziah, and Jemimah!
We are thrilled to show the love and compassion of Jesus to these girls and to help them learn about what true family is like. That life can be filled with kind people, with family who love them, and with positive learning and growing. Please pray for them as we go through some medical testing with them and help sort out their individual medical challenges and poor health. xoxo
A very busy and exciting month around our house. Our three children who were attending a community school, rounded up with exams and then joined everyone else at the house. There were lots of football matches being held with the children and the staff. The house, walls, door frames and windows were filled with pictures and paper crafts for the Christmas celebration. The little artificial Christmas tree was put up with everyone participating in decorating it with our home made paper birds and bells. We had tried making salt decorations to paint, unfortunately it was too humid for them to dry out completely and it just created a soggy mess. There was story readings and teachings and little drama/sketches to act out. Lots of story-story (which is everyone telling turns making up a story that has a learning point). Amos and the staff had fun getting the list of little gifts for each of the children, and the daily preparation of food for over the holidays. There was much rejoicing as over the two weeks of Christmas as we have meat in the house! Fried, dry-spiced chicken and beef; delicious, one small cube each day. This year we did not have too many visitors, which was a bit sad as so many people know about us and our work, and it is actually their duty to come and visit the orphan homes and motherless babies homes. We did have our good friend General Dick and his wife Ufuoma come and visit, another friend Dave, and two representatives from the Mbaka Foundation. We are grateful they remembered us. We also spent some time taking little bits of what we had and sharing it with some of those in need.
In the first week of November, less then one week after Patrick arrived, we received to our home a new abandoned baby case. We notified by a State Social Welfare Officer and a Police Officer. They came to meet and discuss with Amos at the office, about a situation they were faced with. Less then two months previous, the Police were notified of an abandoned infant. After much investigation there was no parent discovered. They baby was brought to a hospital as he was ill, and nurse said she would care for him for a short time until he could be placed in a motherless babies home. The Social Welfare Officer worked very hard to place him, however, the baby was rejected by more then six orphanages and motherless babies home. All of them noted that he did not appear normal and that they would not take him unless they received extra financial support. The nurse soon said she would not look after the baby anymore, as he was a financial burden and she had to work (and was leaving him alone for many hours at a time anyway). Our name suddenly came up. We were contacted and of course upon hearing the situation, agreed to take the baby. We now have added to our family, a beautiful little boy whom we named Gabriel Favour. He has grown healthy and strong in our home and family. He has started bonding and showing progress and attachment with the amount of love and continued attention by all his new brothers, sisters, and staff. Gabriel does appear to show signs of mental retardation, as well as some serious muscular issues, and he has clubbed feet. However, he has gone from a completely silent or crying baby that doesn’t move, to a laughing, giggling baby, that is starting to grab objects and roll around! We are blessed to have him.
We were blessed to receive Patrick in our home several nights ago. He has come to us through the State Women’s Affairs after being rescued from a terrible situation. Patrick is 10yrs old and like our other children, has had a very sad, horrible past. He was very afraid to come home with us, and for much of the ride from the city to the house the truck was filled with screaming and crying he he tried to escape. He eventually calmed down with Amos and HD speaking with him, and upon seeing the other children at the house who welcomed him so well, Patrick was okay. He is a beautiful boy with such lovely manners, always saying please and thank you. As he has never been in school before, he is picking up well with learning his ABCs and numbers by sitting in lessons. He has been adjusting very well.