Poor Internet

Hi Fellow Bloggers-

This is Paige updating for Father Marc. He apologizes for his delay in posts. He currently has no internet at his house, making it impossible to update. We are working on fixing this problem. Please stay tuned.

Thanks!

New Mattresses

Before coming to Pwoje Espwa, a majority of our resident children did not have a bed to lay their heads on at night. Many slept on the ground or a small mat, or covered themselves with a piece of fabric alongside a family member, but very few had a mattress to call their own. 

Since coming to Espwa, all of the children have a bed to sleep in, though they are no longer in optimal condition. The mattresses are handmade and only a couple inches thick- more supportive than the ground, but not even close to ideal. 

Below is a picture of a few mattresses stacked up on a bed. Some of the smaller children choose to share a bed so they can have more support by stacking their mattresses on top of one another. Some of the mats are torn and the foam is coming out, pictured below. 

Unfortunately, we do not have the funding to provide all of our children with a new bed and mattress. Please keep our children in your prayers as you lay your head down on your bed to sleep tonight.  

Visitors

These are the fine folks who visited us this past week. 

Top, left to right:  Mike, Frank and Regina

Bottom: Janina, Francine and Stephanie

Thanksgiving

In the early years of my work down here we did not celebrate Thanksgiving Day.  A few years ago, Linda and Peter Faford managed to get some turkeys down here and the Thanksgiving meal has since become traditional.  We will soon be carving the turkeys and enjoying all the associated goodies.
It is most appropriate to thank you, our supporters and benefactors, on this special day.  We wish you a very Happy Thanksgiving Day.  God bless you all.

Special thanks to the current visitors who brought down all we needed for our feast.  I'll get a photo of the group and post it later.

International Day of Children's Rights

Sunday was the International Day of the Child with a focus on their rights.  We had a special meal, a program that underlined their individual rights, an afternoon of dancing and singing.  The kids had fun.

Having fun can be exhausting!

Team painting

That's Mike Irr with a few of our guys painting the wall of the Guest House.  Mike is part of a small group who is spending Thanksgiving with us.  The other visitors were in another area so I'll try and capture them for a later post if the internet plays along.

Patience

I've been trying to post these last three days but have not succeeded (obviously).  We have signed up for a better/faster internet program with HughesNet but it is not working for me.  Guest House seems to be doing all right so there's a problem with my connection.  Sorry about this.  Keep checking as the glitch may be fixed soon.

Marie Carmelle Gilet

This is Marie Carmelle who suffers from sickle cell anemia to the extreme.  She has been told that she needs her hip replaced and that can only be done in Port-au-Prince.  Her family is dirt poor so she has turned to us for help.  Our budget doesn't allow us to do this but maybe you or someone you know could help out Marie Carmelle.  Maybe you belong to a group or club or school or church that would like to help?

Little Michelle

This little girl accompanies her mother here every day.  Her Mom sells hard candy, small packs of crackers and the like to anyone who passes by.  If she's lucky she'll make enough money to buy some food for dinner for her small family.  Michelle eats lunch with us whenever she's here.

Medical Mission

We are blessed by the presence of a surgical team from Doctor Mike Blood's medical mission team from Indiana.  The team is in town for the wedding of Merline and Vladimir, two Haitian doctors, who have been working with Dr. Blood for years now.  The surgeon, Doctor Ike, and his assistants have been here working from dawn to dusk since Monday morning.  The whole team is here today (about 40 people) so lots of folks will be seen.  God bless these kind and dedicated people.

Close Out Evaluation

The staff spent most of Monday and Tuesday participating in an evaluation of the AIDS Prevention Program that was sponsored by USAID and Cross International.  Protocols and procedures were evaluated and lessons learned were underlined.  This project is now over and we learned much in the process.

Building update

The work on the kitchen-dining room roof is moving along as you can see from the above photos.  We are really, really anxious to start using this building.

Storytelling

Tim (drum) and Patty are from Wisconsin, are here for the week and were enacting an African folklore story with a group of our boys just outside our finance office this afternoon.  Good to have you with us, Patty and Tim.  See the fellow in back taking a photo?  That's our old friend, Dokte Jerry, the pediatrician from Alaska who is with us for a month.  He is such a gift to us.

Somersault

What do you do when you have time on your hands and a huge pile of soft sawdust from the carpenter's shop just sitting there?

That's what I thought, too.

Reading time

Our little Julio with his new friend, Anne

Our friends from Minnesota took time to sit with many of our children who showed them how well they read.  This is great encouragement for the kids who will now work hard to show how much progress they can make.