Tuesday, September 30, 2014
Patrick
Sharron
Pascal
Monday, September 22, 2014
Good things come in threes
Another surprise, a blog after only a week.... and what a week it has been!!
Baby Patrick seemed to settle in but we find he is a slow feeder and only takes little. On Tuesday he got some competition however. Tuesday night we got a call from Jinja Rd police station ( the same one that gave us Patrick) that they had another baby boy who had been abandoned, could we help. so we went with the ambulance and picked up Pascal, about 3 weeks old who had been left with a bag of clothes, very nice clothes, and was found by the police. We brought him home and find he is a good feeder so we have been helped out at night by being able to allow others to have him overnight. A Bev and especially A Tamar have been very helpful. We carried on with our usual activities and have enjoyed getting to know the children here better. Shopping on Wed. was a real mission as we effectively shopped for six houses, it was quite a marathon but we managed.
The weekend was its usual busy time but after church we were concerned about Patrick and his taking only little milk and vomiting often after a feed that we asked Dr Barbara to check him out. A blood sample indicated that he had malaria so last night he was put on a drip twice, first at 8:30pm then again at 4:30 am,, another night of broken sleep.This morning at around 6am I turned rat-catcher! A squeal from the bathroom alerted us to the fact that there was a rat there, so armed with a prayer and a broom I hunted it. It escaped from the bathroom into the living room but with Edwin giving instructions I was able to knock it on the head. Life is never dull here!!
However that's not all. Around 4pm we were called to pick another baby, this time a girl, from Lugazi (about 30km away from here) who was 4 days old whose mother had abandoned her. She is so tiny weighing 1.6kg (birth weight was 2.0kg) so we brought her home and as I write she is sleeping.
Life is NEVER dull here and we thank God for the lives of these and all the children here. During the day Aunty Martha and Aunty Rose have been wonderful at keeping up with the feeding, bathing, changing, medication and generally caring for Patrick and Pascal on top of their normal work.
Till next time
God Bless from the 'night nurses in training'
Baby Patrick seemed to settle in but we find he is a slow feeder and only takes little. On Tuesday he got some competition however. Tuesday night we got a call from Jinja Rd police station ( the same one that gave us Patrick) that they had another baby boy who had been abandoned, could we help. so we went with the ambulance and picked up Pascal, about 3 weeks old who had been left with a bag of clothes, very nice clothes, and was found by the police. We brought him home and find he is a good feeder so we have been helped out at night by being able to allow others to have him overnight. A Bev and especially A Tamar have been very helpful. We carried on with our usual activities and have enjoyed getting to know the children here better. Shopping on Wed. was a real mission as we effectively shopped for six houses, it was quite a marathon but we managed.
The weekend was its usual busy time but after church we were concerned about Patrick and his taking only little milk and vomiting often after a feed that we asked Dr Barbara to check him out. A blood sample indicated that he had malaria so last night he was put on a drip twice, first at 8:30pm then again at 4:30 am,, another night of broken sleep.This morning at around 6am I turned rat-catcher! A squeal from the bathroom alerted us to the fact that there was a rat there, so armed with a prayer and a broom I hunted it. It escaped from the bathroom into the living room but with Edwin giving instructions I was able to knock it on the head. Life is never dull here!!
However that's not all. Around 4pm we were called to pick another baby, this time a girl, from Lugazi (about 30km away from here) who was 4 days old whose mother had abandoned her. She is so tiny weighing 1.6kg (birth weight was 2.0kg) so we brought her home and as I write she is sleeping.
Life is NEVER dull here and we thank God for the lives of these and all the children here. During the day Aunty Martha and Aunty Rose have been wonderful at keeping up with the feeding, bathing, changing, medication and generally caring for Patrick and Pascal on top of their normal work.
Till next time
God Bless from the 'night nurses in training'
Sunday, September 14, 2014
Surprise!!!
Well this is a surprise, it has been less than a week (only 3 days) since our last post but a lot has happened in this time. We arrived back on Thursday afternoon to take up residence in P & P's house and were immediately immersed in many things that needed doing in our absence, not least of which was catching up with the mock exam results of the P7 class. The results were not good (as expected) so we met on Friday with the teachers after school to put in place a revision programme which started on Saturday. The mock exams were set quite tough so we were able to encourage the students that with the extra help we feel they will pass the actual exam.
Thursday night was spent in our usual preparation with A.Katie for the assemblies on Friday morning. God is very good at leading us to suitable messages which is good (just as well). Friday afternoon we were able to finish the appraisals of the Nursery teachers and for them to set some goals for the term.
Saturday morning we had breakfast with the children then the older ones went to school and the others played. Saturdays are always busy for us as, in the morning, Marilyn restarted the music lessons and I put together the lessons for Sunday School. In the afternoon we had church practice (involving more and more people, over 40 in our worship team) and then, with the help of the girls, Marilyn prepared a huge Lasagne dish which was enjoyed by all ( as well as a banana cake pudding with custard). This evening (Sunday) we had a 'family couch time' where we asked them how the week had been and the FIRST thing they said was they enjoyed the food !!!
Saturday evening was family movie time ( a replay of The Mighty Ducks) and we were ready for bed.
Today was breakfast with the children then Sunday School then preparation for church. Marilyn & Veronica made pikelets for afternoon coffee too. At about 1:20pm, just before church, we got a call from Piet in Kenya that the police in Jinja Rd had rung to say that they had an emergency situation with a baby, could we come. We dispatched the ambulance with U Mattias driving, U Bosco directing and A Tamar as the nurse. They arrived back with a lovely boy about a month old who has been called Patrick. He was left at a guest house in Kampala and the police are following up to try and track the mother. In the meantime he stays with us. Please pray that he settles. Also pray for a young girl (14yrs old) who was admitted to our malnutrition unit this afternoon weighing only 11 kgs. Also we could do with a prayer or two for strength and wisdom.
Until next time
God Bless
Thursday night was spent in our usual preparation with A.Katie for the assemblies on Friday morning. God is very good at leading us to suitable messages which is good (just as well). Friday afternoon we were able to finish the appraisals of the Nursery teachers and for them to set some goals for the term.
Saturday morning we had breakfast with the children then the older ones went to school and the others played. Saturdays are always busy for us as, in the morning, Marilyn restarted the music lessons and I put together the lessons for Sunday School. In the afternoon we had church practice (involving more and more people, over 40 in our worship team) and then, with the help of the girls, Marilyn prepared a huge Lasagne dish which was enjoyed by all ( as well as a banana cake pudding with custard). This evening (Sunday) we had a 'family couch time' where we asked them how the week had been and the FIRST thing they said was they enjoyed the food !!!
Saturday evening was family movie time ( a replay of The Mighty Ducks) and we were ready for bed.
Today was breakfast with the children then Sunday School then preparation for church. Marilyn & Veronica made pikelets for afternoon coffee too. At about 1:20pm, just before church, we got a call from Piet in Kenya that the police in Jinja Rd had rung to say that they had an emergency situation with a baby, could we come. We dispatched the ambulance with U Mattias driving, U Bosco directing and A Tamar as the nurse. They arrived back with a lovely boy about a month old who has been called Patrick. He was left at a guest house in Kampala and the police are following up to try and track the mother. In the meantime he stays with us. Please pray that he settles. Also pray for a young girl (14yrs old) who was admitted to our malnutrition unit this afternoon weighing only 11 kgs. Also we could do with a prayer or two for strength and wisdom.
Until next time
God Bless
Thursday, September 11, 2014
Where did August go?
Greetings to all, unbelievably another month has passed since we last wrote, so you are overdue for an update. The children have had 4, yes 4, weeks holiday and have just gone back to school this week so we have been involved in : monitoring the 'helping' roster,( we used to call it 'chores' but felt that 'helping' gave a more positive spin on it, but it is still chores) where children are rostered to help for an hour, 3 mornings a week in different departments so that they get to realise the work that the Aunties and Uncles do to keep the place running. Our job is to monitor that they turn up, the young ones are very good but some of the older ones can be a bit casual.
We have also run some extra study classes for our P7 students for an hour and a half each morning. Our P7's sit an exam at the beginning of November called the Primary Leaving Exam (PLE) which determines whether they can progress to further education or not. We had up to 22 of the 27 students turn up each morning for some extra coaching which we were pleased about. Our Friday nights have been taken up with Video/games nights for the family units, we have also carried out appraisals and goal-setting for the Nursery and Primary teachers as well as replacing much of the children's clothing from the containers. All in all we have been a tad busy so this week we have been at Holland Park in Jinja for some much needed R & R. We brought Katie (a young 25 yr old from America who is here long term and who organised the holiday programme for the children) with us for a couple of days as she too needed a break. This morning we leave to return to NACMU to look after Piet & Pita's family as they have left for Mombasa early this morning for two weeks for some time away too.
We have also farewelled Reny and Suzannah as they have returned to the Netherlands for good. Reny had been here for over 6 yrs so it was sad to see her go, but we know there is to be a wedding soon and we are delighted with that. It took sooooo long to get Suzannah's adoption finalised and they have been sooo patient but as the cheese ad says 'good things take time'.
Christian also had some time back home during this time but we are glad he is back and able to take over the keyboard playing in church once again. Marilyn had to step back to do it while he was away but Owen stepped up for two weeks which was good.
Over the last 3 weeks we have been back to cold showers and boiling water for dishes etc as a massive thunderstorm took out the main power cable and it has cost a bomb to fix it. But yeah!!!! It is now fixed, praise God. Another trial has been the fixing up of our home back in NZ so that we could relet it. We are very grateful to Sherrilyn who has overseen all the repairs and to Ruth and Jan and Heugh who have attacked the garden and to Pete and Robbie for all the cleaning and painting.
Well that's about all the news except we have had a steady flow of new babies, four recently, Colin & Katie, Enoch & Ethan but no Marilyn or Warwick yet. Please pray for Piet & Pita for their time away and for us as we look after their family. There are no photos this time as our hard drive crashed on the computer and our friendly computer technician Alfred is trying to retrieve what he can but we fear we may have lost our pictures so we will have to start again!!
Till next time
God Bless
We have also run some extra study classes for our P7 students for an hour and a half each morning. Our P7's sit an exam at the beginning of November called the Primary Leaving Exam (PLE) which determines whether they can progress to further education or not. We had up to 22 of the 27 students turn up each morning for some extra coaching which we were pleased about. Our Friday nights have been taken up with Video/games nights for the family units, we have also carried out appraisals and goal-setting for the Nursery and Primary teachers as well as replacing much of the children's clothing from the containers. All in all we have been a tad busy so this week we have been at Holland Park in Jinja for some much needed R & R. We brought Katie (a young 25 yr old from America who is here long term and who organised the holiday programme for the children) with us for a couple of days as she too needed a break. This morning we leave to return to NACMU to look after Piet & Pita's family as they have left for Mombasa early this morning for two weeks for some time away too.
We have also farewelled Reny and Suzannah as they have returned to the Netherlands for good. Reny had been here for over 6 yrs so it was sad to see her go, but we know there is to be a wedding soon and we are delighted with that. It took sooooo long to get Suzannah's adoption finalised and they have been sooo patient but as the cheese ad says 'good things take time'.
Christian also had some time back home during this time but we are glad he is back and able to take over the keyboard playing in church once again. Marilyn had to step back to do it while he was away but Owen stepped up for two weeks which was good.
Over the last 3 weeks we have been back to cold showers and boiling water for dishes etc as a massive thunderstorm took out the main power cable and it has cost a bomb to fix it. But yeah!!!! It is now fixed, praise God. Another trial has been the fixing up of our home back in NZ so that we could relet it. We are very grateful to Sherrilyn who has overseen all the repairs and to Ruth and Jan and Heugh who have attacked the garden and to Pete and Robbie for all the cleaning and painting.
Well that's about all the news except we have had a steady flow of new babies, four recently, Colin & Katie, Enoch & Ethan but no Marilyn or Warwick yet. Please pray for Piet & Pita for their time away and for us as we look after their family. There are no photos this time as our hard drive crashed on the computer and our friendly computer technician Alfred is trying to retrieve what he can but we fear we may have lost our pictures so we will have to start again!!
Till next time
God Bless
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