Please pray for these children (especially at Easter)

Most of all...

~ Thank you for your prayers! ~

Please let me know if you would like to give an Easter donation to Boanerges Deaf Initiative http://www.bdigrace.com/ Boanerges Deaf Initiative is a non-Governmental, non-profit making registered Christian organization that was established to provide basic services to the deaf people of Uganda. My friend works there and I will ask her if I can pass on the account details if you are interested. Go to the website for more details. 

Pease go their official website http://www.bdigrace.com/ and another blog website with more photos at http://www.boanergesdeafinitiative.webs.com/ 

  But most of all...

~ Thank you for your prayers! ~

Thanks to God and please pray for me...

Hi, friends and family!

After hard work phoning, and handing in resumes at many many childcare centre's the whole of this month and finally having several interviews I have finally got a casual relief job, yay! Recently I have worked at two centres as a relief early childhood educator in the Group Leader role so far and for the main centre I go to today was my fourth day. It is in the 3-5's age group (Pre-School) and now that the children are getting more settled with me and are starting to develop some connection with me as a new person at the centre I am starting to really enjoy the challenge of working in that room. I am extremely grateful to God for these things!

For those who follow what I am up to these days and who like to pray for our family please continue to pray that I would get a permanent job so I can start the last bit of my studies as an existing worker on the job. When I have completed this I will have done my Diploma in Children's Services (Early Education and Care 0-12 years). I see my job as a ministry but please also pray that God would give me the grace to be more patient at work during the busy times of the day (there can be anywhere between 14 and 22 children in the room for the 3-5's age group at one time) and that when I come home tired for work I would also be patient and kind with my family.

I appreciate your prayers or thoughts! May God richly bless you.
Jessica 

The Bangladesh Protibondhi Foundation

http://bangladeshprotibondhifoundation.org/index.html

The 30 second orphan rate in South Africa and "I'll Stand By You" sung by Carrie Underwood

"I'll Stand By You" sung by Carrie Underwood 

Every 30 seconds a child in South Africa is orphaned due to AIDS

Note for parent's of younger viewers: This video clip has a scene that shows children visiting the graveyard of a family member or friend and also one that includes a grown man lying in bed suffering from AIDS. Please do not let your children watch until you have previewed this video yourself.

Jarryn's 4th birthday

This last photograph is (right to left Timothy, Erica, Jarryn and Emma)

Amazing fact about Green Tree Frogs

My 21st birthday video

A video of my birthday yesterday created by Grandad:

"...possessions in my hands will never be as valuable as peace in my heart."

"Why? Because it is Africa that has taught me that possessions in my hands will never be as valuable as peace in my heart. I've learned that I don't need what I have and that I have what I need. "

http://tarryhome.blogspot.com/2010/05/i-need-africa-more-than-it-needs-me.html

AIDS and Orphans in South Africa

Read 'Give me eyes so that I may see...'

http://1of8kids.blogspot.com/2011/08/give-me-eyes-so-that-i-may-see.html

And Visit: 
OCR Overseas Community Reach (Non-profit organisation) at
http://www.facebook.com/pages/OCR-Overseas-Community-Reach/157758800933392 
and
http://www.overseascommunityreach.org.au

Photographs - My 20th Birthday, October 2010

Opening Presents:

Blowing out my candles:
"Will there be any candles left over? How many boyfriend's do you have? None? Phew!"

Photographs - Easter 2011

Give me eyes so that I may see...

Check out this slide I created of the Unakho Children's Home, it's really cool! I will be presenting it tomorrow in class with the 'Brandon Heath Give  Me Your Eyes lyrics' as background music for the topic 'Advocate for  the Rights and Needs of Children and Young People - My Early Childhood  Passion Is...' Can you guess? Yes, that's right! South Africa's many  orphans. Did you know South Africa has the highest HIV rate in the  world?

 Please put this music from YouTube on as I have not yet figured out how I can embed the music in the slide. Please also read the story or article below and give me feedback whether it is clear enough or brings across the point I want (as I am hoping to use it for the October fundraiser if it is good enough), thanks! If you have any editing suggestions please paste it into word insert the suggestions in bold or highlight and email it to me, thanks heaps!

P.S. You might be interested to know that the word Unakho means 'God can' .

My Early Childhood Passion is:
Doing Ubunto (see definition below introduction) by Raising Awareness for the Many Orphaned or Abandoned Children Effected Either Directly or Indirectly by HIV in South Africa. 

More commonly mentioned is the fourth stage of HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus) infection being AIDS (that is Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome). Not only is Aids a killer, but unknown to many people a person can die from various common illnesses if they have HIV because their immune system does not work properly. Having the highest recorderd rate of HIV infection per population, South Africa is the number one country concerning this issue.

But…
“What is ubuntu?”

“The Zulu word "ubuntu" translates roughly as "humanity towards others". But it means much more than this. The spiritual foundation of African societies, ubuntu involves a belief in a universal bond of sharing that connects all of humanity, a unifying worldview best captured by the Zulu maxim umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu - "a person is a person through other persons".    ”
Read more: http://www.southafrica.info/about/people/#ixzz1U2S24DdD

“Hang on how, on earth does this affect the early childhood environment?” you say.

My response is very easy; just close your eyes and listen to this very real story. Although made up, it is modelled after the reality of thousands of children in South Africa. I’ve first decided to tell you a story to help you understand how this relates to the early childhood environment in South Africa instead of blasting out the many statistics right at the beginning as it is just as easy for you to read or look up the statistics at a later time.

So here goes… but don’t forget to close your eyes or look at the wall and…

“Imagine that a few years ago you were a child living in 2009 and both your parents were one of the estimated 310,000 people in South Africa that died to infections related to HIV (not including those alive with HIV related infections). I say ‘related’, because due to HIV being a virus that affects the immune system, a person can more easily die from things such as the flue or pneumonia but the underlying cause still being that the person was not able to recover because his or her immune system was not strong enough.

Now imagine that your parent’s died within 6 months of each other. You then had to move off the land where your home was, without you or any of your relatives receiving any of the benefits from the sale of the land because your parents did not realise that they needed to write details like this in their will or maybe they didn’t even know what a will was. You had Gogo (the word you use for Grandmother) who took you in. Since Gogo had so many other ‘children’ (grandchildren) that she was looking after who were orphaned too, you are grateful for her taking you in, but it makes you feel a bit bad.”

“Why?” you simply ask blinking out of the story. “Well, now let me explain, just remember this is potentially ‘for real’ story…”

“…Since you came to live at your Gogo’s place, she has had to share the already bare minimum out with you as well rather than buying more to feed the family. Despite Gogo’s cheerful attitude, you can’t help but feel like you should blame yourself, at least a little bit, for the fact that meals are slightly smaller than they were before. So when a man who is a stranger to you, but has had contact with your Gogo, offers to take you to the children’s home that he works at, your Gogo is grateful for the help. Although she finds it hard to part with you Gogo knows all too well it will be for your best. You not only will be provided with adequate food, nutrition and clothing but you will be given a workbook or two, pencils and school supplies to take with to school and use for your homework. Although this might seem like basic necessities, to you it is the most wonderful gift ever.

After two house ‘parents’ from the children’s home come to pick you up and spend most of the day visiting, talking and getting to know you; your Grandmother, or ‘Gogo’ as you call her, breaks down in tears when they eventually start walking out the door. It is just too much for your beloved Gogo to hold back the feelings inside of her. Hugging and kissing you, her precious grandchild of seven years, she reminds you and the house ‘parents’ from the children’s home to visit as often as time will allow. Gogo reminds you for the tenth time to work hard at your homework while, for your sake, she makes vain attempts to hold back the both sad and happy tears mingling down her chocolate brown cheeks. Your loving Gogo is both sad to part with you and overjoyed that at least one of her precious grandchildren will have, not only what she considers necessities that she is able to provide, but also what she considers ‘bonuses’ or ‘extra necessities’ that many other people in the world would consider everyday necessities. To your Gogo necessities are things like two meals a day and what she considers bonuses or in other words things that she scrapes, scrimps and saves in order to at least provide a little of these luxuries for her many ‘children’ or grandchildren are items such as more than one pair of clothes (which means a warm winter), pencils, a workbook or two and other homework supplies, and of course clean water and three meals a day including a protein meal for every day of the week. So now; hear you are in 2011 a healthy child of nine years old and you have been at the children’s home for two years. You also sometimes wonder how your family is doing and what it would be like to live with them, but you know that Gogo is too poor to look after you sufficiently and so even though you  would like to see her more often you are happy with what you have got.

Then one day your house ‘parents’ have an idea. Why not invite Gogo as a house ‘mother’ to help them look after the other children and in return Gogo’s many ‘children’ or grandchildren may live with her, only this time they will be provided with the same benefits the other orphans at the children’s homes have. You are extremely excited over this idea and happily agree to go with your house ‘parents’ to visit Gogo as they discuss this matter over with her. In two months you have to still pinch yourself to check whether all these things are real; living with your Gogo and seeing your cousins every day, knowing that they have enough to eat daily, clean water and yes even enough paper and pencils to do homework!

Further details…

Heavily mentioned in this article is the amount of orphans due to HIV related issues but it is worth remembering and noting that not all children orphaned for this reason have contracted HIV themselves and many, many more children in South Africa are orphaned for other reasons such as loss of employment, poverty, limited employment opportunities for the uneducated, limited employment opportunities for mothers who were not educated past primary school, Zimbabwe refugee issues such as job shortage amongst South Africans due to Xenophobia (which means fear of other races or tribes) and the fact that Zimbabweans work harder than the majority of South Africans, abandonment (not always due to rejection of the child but sometimes also due to poverty as many mothers think that ‘it is better that the child is cared for adequately’).

Besides the orphans in the country who are orphaned or abandoned due to issues such as poverty that are unrelated to HIV, unbelievable scores of children are left destitute due to either both their parents dying or their mother dying and their father is unable to provide for his children. This is because in many families in South Africa it is part of the long upheld traditional culture for the men to have various wives or partners without the often rejected practice of using condoms which are often thought of as part of the practice of the ‘white man’s medicine’ or ‘white man’s ways’. ‘How could a poor man, like me, be expected to provide financially for all my offspring if I have had so many partners?’ is how many men must think.

Despite raising awareness through knowledge for the plight of these children (especially for providing financially for those who are in children’s homes) being my passion, I never cease to be completely bowled over at the statistics every time I look up the numbers. Although I have only had a brief time to introduce you to this topic, I hope that you will be interested enough to read the hand-out later in your own time that I have provided for you.

Also please put your name down if you are interested in coming to my fundraising birthday party in October (it will be on a weekend so won’t clash with our practical work). All are welcome to come! Also just to let you know no one is obliged to donate any money as the idea is just that no one will give me birthday presents but rather only if they want to they may donate to Unakho children’s home in South Africa. Although not all children at Unakho were orphaned due to HIV related issues, Unakho has many children who were and some of them have also contracted HIV from their mothers.

Please also let me know if you would like a disk with photographs, video clips and more information regarding both Unakho children’s home and South African orphans.

For more information go to references used:

Definition of HIV                                    http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=3769

Clean water - a basic human right            http://www.southafrica.info/about/social/watergovt.htm

What is ubuntu?                                    http://www.southafrica.info/about/people/

HIV and AIDS in South Africa                http://www.avert.org/aidssouthafrica.htm

The Different Stages of HIV Infection        http://www.avert.org/stages-hiv-aids.htm

Oops, sorry for any inconveniences...

I have been thinking strongly of setting up a website for some time now instead of using blogger because I have found blogging extremely clumsy for longer than a year now. At the moment all the things I have tried to do are not achieving the design outcomes and standard of professionalism I intended and I have since then realised that I am not able to achieve these outcomes with a simple blog as my tool. This is why my new pages are so messy and in such a jumble at the moment. Despite my extremely busy studying schedule I am planning to get a website up to replace future blog posts sometime in the future, just not so sure exactly when... (maybe Ekka holidays?... fingers crossed that it won't be as late as Christmas time). I apologise for any inconveniences this may cause you. Thank you for your kind consideration and understanding.

The very interesting Moringa Tree

At first, glance before I read any information or watched the documentary I thought ‘yeah, maybe it's just another one of those money grabbing vitamins that claim great results’ but no, there is validated scientific evidence that this tree has an amazing amount and variety of nutrients in one plants. It's amazing! I also like the idea that it is very hardy and if it is planted in the right place it can provide extra vitamins, minerals, amino acids and antioxidants (I’m guessing it’s also depending on what part of the tree you harvest as to what nutrients you’ll get). Because of this it means it can and could be a great plant to promote in third world countries.

What do you think? Before you go to the website, I suggest that you watch this documentary (10 min) which has various professional scientists explain its amazing quality...

Moringa - The Miracle Tree

Here is the website link that I found the video on:  

http://www.moringatoday.com/Aminoacids.html

Mom's new dog website, please take a look!

Joy'zown Tzus

https://sites.google.com/site/joyzowntzus/home

More samples of art on Emma-Jane's Art Blog

Check out Emma-Jane's Art Blog ( http://emmajanesartblog.blogspot.com/ ) to see more photographs of her art work including elephants and a leopard. I took the photograph below so that you can see how she is progressing on her horse painting that she has not yet finished. This horse painting is her first canvas paiting and I think the photograph that I took does not do justice to the painting as a camera is not able to portray the effect that you get when you stand back and look at an impressionist paiting from a distance. Be sure to look at the post entitled Emma-Jane the artist at work: to see the original post with her working on this painting.

Brain Builder is good (see Products section of this website)

ABT Advanced Brain Technology; A leading provider of products to improve brain function  http://www.advancedbrain.com/

The LORD is...

The LORD is...

My personal shepherd:

" ¹ The LORD is my shepherd;
         I shall not want."

 

My caring shepherd:

 " ² He makes me to lie down in green pastures;

         He leads me beside the still waters.

 ³ He restores my soul;

         He leads me in the paths of righteousness

         For His name’s sake. "

My restoring shepherd...
 " ³ He restores my soul;
         He leads me in the paths of righteousness
         For His name’s sake. "
         

 My Comforting Shepherd:

 " ⁴ Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
         I will fear no evil;
         For You are with me;
         Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me."

My protecting shepherd: 
         " ⁵ You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
         You anoint my head with oil;
         My cup runs over.
 ⁶ Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
         All the days of my life;
         And I will dwell in the house of the LORD
         Forever. "

References for retrieved pictures are from:

(Note: They are not listed in the order of how they are put on the blog post. No responsibility is taken for the link of these websites to my post and no agreement with philosophies are guaranteed.)

http://diligentleaves.wordpress.com/2011/05/17/thinking-like-sheep/

http://kingsenglish.info/

http://tankoksiang.wordpress.com/2011/06/16/david-psalm-23-part-1/

http://terri0729.wordpress.com/2011/06/20/my-monday-thoughts-going-through-the-depths/

http://thesaintmarcus.wordpress.com/2010/07/19/beside-still-waters/

http://newcovenantjournal.blogspot.com/2010/03/23rd-psalm.html

http://blog.adw.org/2009/07/insights-from-psalm-23-are-you-smarter-than-a-sheep/

http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Wg-koDkDUkk/0.jpg

http://www.bible-archaeology.info/images/Sheep_with_their_shepherd_matson_collection.jpg

http://blog.ministryequip.com/post.cfm/run-that-by-me-one-more-time

http://officetipsandmethods.com/algomareflections/?p=177

http://streetpastor.wordpress.com/2011/05/15/the-great-shepherd/

http://theuniversityoftheway.blogspot.com/2006/01/only-six-verses.html

http://www.diddilydeedot.zoomshare.com/38.html

http://www.lifeintheholyland.com/images/Psalm_23_slides,_my_cup_runs_over,_mat05679.jpg 

or http://www.diddilydeedot.zoomshare.com/38.html

My cool mother...

Knitting with her snazzy boots on...

And don't forget to notice the blue polka dot mugs and piano and art material in the background giving a classic homey feel...

Look how fast Mom can knit, whoo hoo she's a geneous!

Ah, sigh! Mom is sooooo beautiful!

And look she's even got those really cool laces on her boots that I've always envied!

How about you,

wouldn't you like boots like these?

And just remember the point of this post is to say that;  " I love my mother! "

ADD frustrations a failure?

Encouragement to a person struggling with ADD related issues and feelings of failure.