ORPHAN OF THE MONTH – MAY

MATHDALA CHARLES

AGE: 4

BEEN AT THE ORPHANAGE FOR 3 YEARS

NEEDS $75/MONTH

Orphanage Update

 To all Orphan Sponsors:  Thank you so very much for the time, money, and effort that you have put into getting Christmas for your orphan.  We have one crate for each family, loaded with all XL ziploc bags, and complete with a detailed inventory of each bag!  Janeil and I are so grateful for Curtis Rogers, who has been working to get all this organized.  Thank you Curtis!!  The load may end up being on time this year!! 

I am also thankful for everyone who went out of their way to get boxes and boxes of play clothes to us for the orphans.  There is quite possibly enough for the entire year of 2008!!! 

When Janeil and I began working at the orphanage several years ago we figured up the cost to run the entire program on a monthly basis and divided that by the number of children that we had at the time.  As the years have passed, we have added more children and more staff.  In adding the families last year, we increased our expenses considerably.  We believe that this has enriched the quality of life for the children in a thousand ways, it is however, been difficult to pay all of the bills.  We greatly depend on the monthly support of the orphans to run the program.   We have several children who are in need of a sponsor.  I am going to be featuring a “Child of the Month” on this blog.  If you are interested in Sponsorship, the entire cost is $75/month.  You can send the whole amount, $50/month, or $25/month.  If you send fifty, the child will have one other sponsor.  If you send twenty-five, the child will have two other sponsors. 

note — You can contribute to the Orphanage Account at any time without choosing a specific child. 

An exciting development over the last few months….THE ORPHANAGE IS MOVING!!! 

We have found a piece of land in the Far West with several acres that is PERFECT for the orphanage.  It is located in a place called Salines Myet which is close to the town of Beauchamp.  We have a church in Beauchamp and a church in Myet, but will also be building a church and a school for the orphans as well.  This is very much in the beginning stages but is happening!  Please be in prayer as God brings this vision to reality. 

The Orphans need CLOTHES!!

Erin and I spent yesterday separating a crate of clothes that had come in for them on the last boat.  There is no longer a boys tub and a girls tub, now everything has to be divided by five.  Everything…down to the socks!  The kids are always so anxious to help me do whatever project I have going.  I love that!  Precious little bitty things.  We went through every single piece of clothing in this orphanage and threw much of it away.   In what I gave them yesterday I assume that it will last 2 to 3 months.  We are in desperate need of kids summer clothes.   We are doing good with nicer clothes that they kids can wear to church.  Everything that comes in for Christmas they will use to wear to church.  What we need are gently used shorts, dresses, skirts, and shirts that the kids can put on after school and church to play in.  

On the road Again…

Yep, that is where we spend much of our time, on the road.  Good thing we love it.  Saturday we took all of our friends that we love like family and went to see Miss Pat.  There is a peace there that is pretty amazing and always grants me a chance to breathe.  Sunday we drove to LaFonte for church and then on to Port de Paix to get Janeil to the airport.  He is in the states this week for a leadership conference.   My least favorite thing in all the world is saying goodbye to Janeil.  To try and help myself out a little, I decided to take the kids and stay at the orphanage for a few days.  

We’ve had a ball!!  Ne has learned how to do the GuyPi (a Haitian dance) which I could watch her all day and still want more.  It is the greatest thing I have ever seen…hilarious.  Josiah screams to play on the slide, which I remember well NeNe at that age doing the very same thing.  Ne has been communicating with her best friends, who are all 13 and 14 years old, in Creole.  That has been a riot as well.  She has no accent except for that of a 2 year old still trying to master the English language.  The kids love to hear her speak in Creole so they egg her on which just adds to the funniness of it all. 

The orphans are doing good as well as the new family units.  I have heard two of the fathers tell me that they love their orphan family as much as they love their own kids.  The mothers work night and day to rightfully provide for the children and make them feel loved.  I see kids running after fathers, who are walking in the yard, for the chance to hold his hand.  Kids are being punished, grounded, and removed from harmful situations.   Still a long way to go in a lot of ways, but I’m so proud of all of them.  We’re on the right track….no doubt about it.

Here comes Christmas!

Update on Orphan Christmas:

The list is completed and has been posted on the chaletorphanage website.

I am working to get each sponsor a copy of the kids Christmas list on a xl ziploc bag.  I will be mailing those out with in the next week or week and a half. 

This year we are hoping to scale down just a bit from years past.  Having sponsors send everything in a XL ziploc is going to help us in many ways.    

* Have all Christmas to the office by November 1st

* WE NEED SWIMSUITS SO SO SO BAD!

* Please contact us if you would want to buy Christmas for an orphan who doesn’t have a sponsor.

* Please also contact us if you are a sponsor who cannot buy Christmas for your child this year so that we might make other arrangements for that child. 

* I will post a list of gereral orphanage needs on the website (www.chaletorphanage.com) for anyone wanting to donate specific items.

Thanks to Everyone!

love,

Heather