“MARCH –APRIL UPDATE 2016”
THE BEST
WAY TO PROTECT CHILDREN IS TO EMPOWER THEM TO PROTECT THEMSELVES!
We are so glad to see our Children doing so well in school even after changing school recently. This has been their first term at Presbyterian after being transferred from Christian Faith Trust school and it’s been quite fun and interesting for our Children especially the little ones as it was their first time being enrolled in school. The school performance of our pre-school children, lower primary and junior secondary has been tremendous. We hope they all continue working so hard for their own better future.
In order to encourage and appreciate our Children to keep up with the hard work, we took them out for ice cream at Hungry lion and they had a good time. Whilst on holiday our children who are in lower primary had an education tour at the Livingstone Museum. They took some time writing out a few notes on some of the topics they have and yet to cover in school. Later on the Children enjoyed taking some photo outside the premises and they just had a fun and exciting moment.
The best way to protect Children is to empower them to protect themselves, during this school holiday; we once again toured the Livingstone fire brigade with our smaller children. The main purpose of the tour was to educate our Children more on fire safety. The Fire brigade staff took their time to explain the general operations of the station and they show cased how the team on duty would respond in an event of an emergency and how they put off the fire. It was so interesting for the children but the highlight was when they drove around in the fire fighting vehicle.
SUPPORT
We continue to extend our heartfelt gratitude to our faithful partners Tandeka e.V. Augsburg and Graceklein Community in Alabama for their commitment, devotion, love and support to Kwathu Home. Through their support we are able to carry out our responsibilities needed on a quarterly basis.
In the course of March we were so blessed, we had two different Ministries from two different churches within Livingstone. On 19 March we had the women ministry from Presbyterian Church who had a lunch fellowship with our Children, they prepared a delicious meal and gave our girls a hair do. Among a few activities they carried out during their visit was to help out with the cleaning of the house, spent some good time interacting with our children and finally helped out with our Community Arts therapy.
The second group was the Children`s ministry from our local Church Bread of life international who visited our Children on 28 March which was also Easter Monday. They had a wonderful fellowship time with the Children, they spent time playing different sports activities and blessed them with assorted Clothings, food items and a lovely wooden trophy highlighted with a scripture from Isaiah 54:17.The Children had a fun day and it`s so great seeing the local community getting so involved in being a blessing to our Children.
SOCIAL
Birthdays are always special days at Kwathu filled with so much joyous and wonderful moments for every child. Gertrude is our oldest girl in the home, she celebrated her 13th Birthday on 11 March. Her birthday was characterized of some good dances from the Children and we enjoyed some soft drinks and a delicious cake. Later on, we all sang happy Birthday to her and we just had a wonderful family time together. It`s much of a joy to seeing this young beautiful girl growing so much.
In the course of the month of April our Children have been enjoying a 4 weeks school holiday and quite a number of fun and educative activities were outlined for them.
Austin celebrated his 12th Birthday on 13 April, during preparation time he helped out in the baking of his birthday cake which he really enjoyed and later in the day we had some nice family time, we all sang happy Birthday to him and his two brothers Francis and Obet did the cutting and feeding of the cake. Our little kids entertained us as they danced to some good music and we all had a good time.
For almost six weeks now our Children have been part of the Arts therapy at Highlands Creative Academy School. This activity usually takes place every Saturday afternoon. Amongst a few activies the Children enjoy doing are; painting, making face mask, and learning more about colors. Many thanks for the school administration for giving our Children this privilege of being involved in this fun and quite educative activity.
Our little babies also had a chance to visit and tour the Museum. It was more of a fun and adventurous moment for the children as it was their first time at the museum. They were so happy and excited and asked so many questions. During the same time the babies had an awesome time with our mama`s at Mukuni park and they enjoyed playing football and other outside games
The victoria falls has been for some years now remained one of Zambia`s best tourist site. This was the best and most fun time to visit the falls, the water levels are so high and the general view looks so beautiful. Our older Children and two of our visiting volunteers toured the Victoria Falls and they had a wonderful time.
UNITED WE STAND DEVIDED WE FALL!
For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that who so ever believes in him would not perish but have everlasting life. “John 3:16”.We are so thankful to our faithful friends who have continued supporting this project and helping us to show God`s love to our local Community. We have been inviting our local community every Mondays for the Community feeding programme. Approximately we have been feeding people of which 100 are Children and 35 are mothers. Apart from feeding on meals, we have also taken this opportunity to share God`s word and pray with our community. The Community Children are usually given an opportunity to play and have fun in our Children`s play park.
Community Arts therapy has been on going and this has been taking place every Saturday afternoons. Among a few things the Children living within our community have been involve drawings and color painting. It’s so great to see how much other Children are so talented and have such beautiful drawings and colors. The main ideal of this activity was to enhance our levels of interaction with our community but we think this will also help other Children realize their talents and gifts in Arts.
JOYFUL SERVICE
We continue to be thankful to our volunteers who travel from far places to take their time and dedicate their time in supplementing our efforts in caring for our dear Children. In the month of March we said goodbye to our three (3) Volunteers; Kim, Kith and Courtney were so committed and hardworking during their three months’ time at Kwathu. They were so much of great help with our community feeding program and other commitment in the home. We will greatly miss them and thank you so much for your time and every effort during your time at Kwathu.
On the other hand, sometime later in April, we welcomed two Volunteers both from Europe; although it`s different parts of Europe. Mia is from Romania and Febienne is from Switzerland. The two volunteers have been so much involved in Children`s welfare. Mia has been helping the Children in Bible study as she also recently graduated from Bible school. We thought this could be great for her to continue doing this with our Children. Febienne is well skilled in keyboard and she has been taking a few kids teaching them keyboard and also in sports activities.
Many thanks to the DTS Disciple Training School from Youth with a Mission Cape Town South Africa, who out of their busy schedule took some time to visit Kwathu. The team spent some good time interacting with our Children and helped out cleaning our surroundings. Thanks DTS team and we hope to see you again.
Self esteem is one of the most important element in every Child`s life. This involves helping a Children to realize their full potential and helps them gain more self confidence about oneself. Thanks to aunty Monde who has been educating our Children on self esteem. and we believe this will bring some positive change in the lives of our Children.
LAND UPDATE
Our administration block is almost complete. Three quarters of construction works has been done. Natalie our devoted ambassadress to the USA has tirelessly worked hard to see this project be accomplished.
From late last year to date, the following has been accomplished;
- Roofing
- Inside and outside plastering
- Air vents and car port vents
- Flooring
- Wiring of the entire block
- Security lights connect
The following stages are pending:
- Tiling US$ 1, 840
- Ceiling US$ 2, 496
- Plumbing US$ 500
- Concrete apron US$ 400
- Glass panes US$ 540
- Painting, undercoat and finisher US$ 185
Total US$ 5, 961
Please continue praying with us on these
- Pray with us for financial resources to help us accomplish our current building project, which is our administration block.
- Continue praying for Natalie’s Visa in the USA. It is very important for us if she can stay longer and continue being the hands and feet of Kwathu.
- Pray for provision of funds for the Feeding Program God has laid upon our hearts to feed poor children around us
- Continue praying for courage, faith, wisdom and mostly love that we can accomplish the goals we set for Kwathu and that the children can live, grow and mature in Gods daily goodness and loving kindness.
- Pray for our weakened Zambian economy. The poor are feeling the pinch in all this and it’s hard for us to budget for the home as commodity prices increase every day.
- We thank you all for your continued love and support towards Kwathu Children’s Home and may the Lord continue to bless you! Matthew 18:5 “And whosoever shall receive one such little child in my name, receives me”.
- We thank all our friends and partners for your prayers, donation and support of any kind to Kwathu. GOD BLESS.
- We finally thank our volunteers for selflessly giving their precious time to help our children and staff.
