July 31, 2009

The kids at the orphanage are doing great. The weather is still cold but I think is starting to change. We are not as cold and sleeping is much nicer.

Hope, our baby at the orphanage is gone. She is the one who was abandoned and no one knew anything about her. The government called and said they had someone who wanted to adopt her so she has left. We are all very sad. Hope was our baby.

The government also dropped off a 12 year old street child with us named Mercy. Mercy was with us for a couple of days and appeared to be integrating well into the orphanage setting. However, on Monday she put on the new clothes we bought her and said she was going to wash her clothes. She never came back. Life on the street was all she knew and what she grew up with. This was the third orphanage that the government had placed her at. She is now back on the streets. We are praying for her.

The government also dropped off a new boy with us this week. He is about 2 years old and no one knows anything about him. He showed up wearing nothing but a sweatshirt – no diaper, no pants, no shoes. (Don’t worry, he didn’t wear dresses for long – we bought him some sweatpants.) The kids named him Happiness but he is not living up to his name. He appears to be sickly and not very happy. The government is trying to find out something about him so they can place him back with his family or his village.

We have some friends from America that we met through our pastor friend here, who is also from America. These friends are also adopting a child so it’s great to be able to go through the process with them. They are adopting a girl who is about 9 years old. They live in the US but are here in Malawi for an extended period of time. Mphatso had become friends with their daughter and she wants to go visit them whenever she can. Like I said, it is wonderful to be able to share stories and go through the process with someone.

Since we are now legally foster parents for Mphatso, our attorney is now drafting up adoption papers to start the adoption process. He hopes to have the papers ready in a week or two. Please pray for a smooth and speedy process.
We also have another new addition to our family – another cat. This cat’s name is Toby. So now we have a dog, 2 cats and a child. Our house is full - full of activity. Toby is very tiny – just a few weeks old but momma died and so we now have another orphan cat.

I have taken up an old hobby – crocheting. We found a store that sells yarn – cheap quality as it is and I’ve been purchasing quite a bit of it for the girls at the orphanage. We also found some crochet hooks so if they use the inside of ball point pens as crochet hooks, that’s their choice now. There are a lot of crochet hooks floating around the orphanage. I have made several stocking caps for the kids. I’ve also made a couple of scarves and a poncho for Mphatso. Oh yeah and all the doll clothes that I have made. Every day, I get, “Amayi, skirt – dolly, hat dolly, dress dolly” so I have to make something for Mphatso’s dolly. I am now working on a small lap afghan. Crocheting large objects also keeps you warm as you are working on them. The girls at the orphanage are making purses, hats, and one is making a poncho. It is great to see them and work with them on this activity.

Anyone have any solutions for bedwetting that they want to share? We’ve limited her fluid intake from late afternoon on, get her up before we go to bed and try to get her up in the middle of the night (if we wake up). We’ve rewarded with stickers, food and now money. The money reward has lasted the longest but I think she is sleeping so soundly that she doesn’t even realize what is happening until after the fact. Any suggestions anyone has would be great. You can send me a separate email if you want so you don’t have to post a response for everyone to see. Thanks in advance!!

Blessings (madalitso) to you!

Pics: Mphatso (and Lyson) with her new poncho, Toby, Ray helping make bunk beds

Exciting news!

July 23, 2009

I am sorry that we have not posted this information earlier but we wanted to wait until we were a bit further in the process to make this announcement.

We have another addition to our family………a 6 or 7 year old named Mphatso. (Pronounced mpotso - emphasis on PO, which sounds like a PA.) In our October 25, 2008 blog, I mentioned a small girl who was at the orphanage because she lost both of her parents and was begging in the market. (I said in that post that she was 7 at that time but later found out she was younger than that.) We have not verified her age completely so we questions whether she really is 7. We think she’s 6 but are still working on verifying her age. However, we do know her date of birth – January 30. That’s the same day as Jamie’s birthday. So now we’ll have two daughters with the same birth day. How exciting and fun for them.

Anyway, over the period of time that we have been here, we fell in love with this child and want to adopt her. We have done a lot of praying about this and whether this is something that the Lord wants us to do. He has confirmed to us that we are to adopt her. So, when we got back to Malawi, we spoke to Esther and Bishop Stephano about it and Esther said she had been praying for this. Mphatso moved into our house two days later and has been a huge joy (and challenge sometimes) to us. She understands English much better than we understand Chichewa but we are getting better at understanding her and she is getting better with English. We no longer call in one of our staff to help interpret for us.

We went to the village where her relatives, (her granny and two aunties) live to discuss us adopting her with them. The relatives got together to discuss it. Their 5 minute discussion seemed longer and I was a bit worried but I prayed the whole time they were discussing the matter. Granny finally said that it was ok, there was no problem with us adopting her. Later, the gal who was interpreting for us told us that they were excited that Mphatso would be able to go to school and she would be taken care of. They asked that we allow her to remain in contact with them. We said absolutely – we do not want her to forget her family and where she came from. We will make sure that she keeps in contact with them. Granny gave us some sweet potatoes, which was a huge gift as these are people in the village who have literally nothing. We gave granny some money for food and I gave her a wrap I had with me. (A wrap is a piece of fabric used to wrap over your skirt to keep it out of the fire, to hold babies on your back, to haul items, to use as a blanket, etc. There are numerous other uses for a wrap but those are the basic ones. The only reason I explained what a wrap is is because I could see someone wondering why I had a wrap (food) with me in Africa and wasn’t it nice that I shared my lunch with granny. ) lol ;-}

We have met with our attorney several times and he had the aunties and the group village headman sign papers allowing us to adopt her. When you visit the village headman, you bring a gift to him. They felt a live chicken was appropriate.
Since then, we have filed paperwork with the Social Welfare Department and today, we signed the paperwork along with Bishop Stephano and were granted permission to be her foster parents. Malawi still has the law on the books that you have to live in the country for 18 months to adopt. However, Madonna’s cases have changed that and they are now looking at what is best for the child. So, it won’t be 18 months before we can adopt her. We have met with the social welfare department several times and they have verified again with the relatives that they understand what this process entails and that she will be our daughter after the process is completed.
So, now we need to have a home assessment done in Malawi and according to the Social Welfare Director, we can start the adoption process now. Still much more to do there with the process but this was a huge step today!

She is bonding very well with us and calls us “Abambo” (dad) and Amayi (mom) instead of Lay and Alicey. She is very independent and loves to wash her own clothes (by hand), wash the dishes, cook and help with anything you are doing. It didn’t take her long to discover how to sit in the bathtub and now had graduated to laying in the bathtub and “swimming”. (The kids at the orphanage stand and splash water on themselves from water in a bucket as their bath.)

Sometimes I wonder what we are doing. We are 50+ years old and adopting a child. What ARE we thinking? But after we look at her and watch her for a while, we realize why we fell in love with her. She is precious to us, even when she pouts (we’re working on that and she’s getting better). She told us the other day that she wants chemicals for her hair so she can dye her hair either green, pink or purple so she can be like Jamie. (This is really scary because no one ever told her that Jamie had all those different hair colors at different times.) We purchased a hoodie for her and when she put it on, she said she was now like Jamie. We bought her a doll, which of course, she named Jamie.

Our lives have changed here: our focus at the orphanage has changed and we are now designing the new orphanage, we have a child and a cat to go along with our dog. By the end of the week, we will probably have another cat.

We are very blessed to be here and thank the Lord daily for the changes he has made in us, for the changes he has made in our lives and in the lives of those close to us. We thank Him and praise the name of Jesus for allowing us, nobodies that we are, to be servants in His kingdom. Thank you Jesus!
Please pray for enough food for the orphanage, warm clothes and enough blankets for all the kids.

Ray, Alice, Mphatso, Lukia (dog) and Princess Fiona (cat)

PS – these are pictures of Mphatso. One she has the doily from the couch on her head, one she is carrying Jamie her baby and one she is carrying Hope (the baby at the orphanage).

Independence Day

Happy Independence Day USA and Malawi. While we celebrate this day in the U.S. on July 4, Malawi celebrates its independence on July 6. This is 45 years as an independent nation. This is a national holiday—everything is closed.
The crowds are gathering at the stadium for a day of festivities and there were thousands of people already in line early this morning. What a great day.

We have met several other missionaries here in Malawi who are from the U.S. We had a couple of them over for dinner on Saturday night. That was great fun to talk with other Americans. This group of people have been here about as long as we have but we went back to the U.S. in March and they did not. I had Jamie send me a package of flour tortillas back with Bishop Stephano when he returned to Malawi last week and we got them in time to make enchiladas for dinner on Saturday. Our friends absolutely loved it. They said the one thing they had been craving was Mexican food. We figured that because we know that’s the one thing we cannot find over there and that is what we *really* craved when we landed in the U.S. So, we used our one package of tortillas and made enchiladas. I also made a homemade chocolate cake because finding good cake over here is absolutely impossible. It was a great time.

Today, we are going to the airport to help another American missionary pick up her team that is arriving from the U.S. So, more contact with people from the U.S.

The kids at the orphanage are doing well. We’ve replaced the fence around the orphanage as grass fences don’t last forever. This time, we used bamboo mats as fencing and it is much stronger. The carpenter is also building some bunk beds for the kids so soon, they may not have to sleep on the hard, cold concrete floor. Thank you Lord!!!

The two new young girls have integrated well into the orphanage. Hope and Eliza come to the car to greet us with the other children now and Hope always thinks I have something in my purse for her. (Well, I usually do. I carry fruit snacks with me and all the kids know it.)
Thanks for your prayers and your support. We love our time here and are very grateful that the Lord placed us here. I can’t imagine being anywhere else right now……………..even if it is cold.

Hope you all had a great independence day. We’ll celebrate independence day here in Malawi!!

Cold in Africa??

We keep saying that this is not what we imagined. The word “cold” and “Africa” never seemed to go together before – until now. Now we know what winter is like in Malawi. It was 51 degrees when we woke up this morning and raining. Yesterday, it made it up to 56 degrees. We are cold and the kids are even colder, sleeping on a cement floor. Most of the kids have some type of long sleeve, if only a long sleeve dress shirt, that they can put on but very few of them have adequate clothing for this time of year. We have adequate clothing (now that I found a place to purchase a pair of sweat pants!) and we are cold. There are no furnaces here so it’s not like we can just turn the heat on. And cold showers this time of year sting your body. Ray took the temperature of the water coming out of the shower at our house this morning and it was in the upper 40’s.

All of the babies and most of the younger children at the orphanage are sick. Colds, flu and congestion and headaches are the illnesses recently. We also have it in our house. We have taken several of the kids to the hospital this last week to be treated for malaria or this cold stuff that is going around. Several of the kids are on antibiotics to try and get rid of it. No wonder everyone is sick – cold weather, winds and wet. Makes a great combination for sickness.

I wrote about Hope, our youngest orphan in a previous post. We now have another baby, a bit older than Hope. We think Eliza is about 2 and Hope is about 1 ½ . Eliza is the sister of two of the other girls at the orphanage. She is Chisomo and Chifundo’s sister. I wrote about Chisomo and Chifundo last October or November when the village chief dropped them off with a note. Hope has been the center of attention both at the orphanage and around the country for the last couple of weeks, with the news media getting involved in her story. She was dropped off on the side of the road with her sack of clothes and a woman spotted her and took her home. The woman cared for her for a couple of weeks then when she was no longer able to support her, she dropped her off at the police station. The radio and newspaper have been involved in trying to find out some information on her such as her name, where she comes from, etc. but no one is coming forward to claim knowledge of her. It is so sad. She is such a good baby and so cute. She is adjusting well.

Since Hope has been the center of attention at the orphanage, Peace (our previous youngest) is jealous of all the attention Hope is getting. Well, now since Eliza arrived, Hope is jealous. Any time either Ray or I pick up Eliza, Hope is right there on your leg with arms lifted wanting you to pick her up too. Carrying two babies is tough but it can be done.

We purchased some nutritional peanut butter that has lots of vitamins and protein in it. It is targeted for sickly people and malnourished children. Hope has decided that she cannot get enough of it and if we try to give some to any of the other children, like Eliza or Peace, she has a fit. She does not want to share that peanut butter. Ray was holding Hope the other day and feeding it to her and he mentioned that this was the first time he has fed a baby. He did really well. Eliza is malnourished as most of the children are when they arrive at the orphanage so we are anxious to see how well she responds with this new peanut butter supplement also.

Life here in Malawi is good. God has blessed us in placing us here and we are grateful for all your prayers and support. The only downside to being here is that we are getting really tired of the blackouts. On Monday night, we had a blackout for almost two hours. The power came back on and then about 30 minutes later, it went back off again for another 30 minutes. Power was on when we went to bed but was off in the morning when we woke up. It seems to be an everyday occurrence recently that we lose power in the evening and again in the morning. Being as cold as it is, we have to heat water in the morning for coffee or tea so we use the charcoal burner outside – bbrrr. We’ve been drinking a lot of tea, coffee and hot chocolate recently. I’ve also been making soup quite a bit for dinner.

We are continuing the take the children three or four at a time to purchase shoes & socks and to take them to lunch. I think we’ve taken about 1/3 of the kids out since we returned the end of April. The last group we took consisted of three of the oldest girls. They got to get out of school, which they were thrilled about. We purchased school shoes, a pair of shoes to run around the orphanage in and a very small purse for each of them. We were walking around Limbe and decided that they each needed a new skirt. They were thrilled. They laughed and giggled for a long time and kept saying, “God bless you, God bless you.” He has.

One of my former bosses sent some fabric back with me and I took it to the tailor to have skirts and blouses made for some of the smaller girls who do not have anything very nice. They loved them. The tailor loved the fabric because it is so much better quality fabric than anything they can purchase here. When I stopped by to see how he was doing, he kept saying, “I have never seen fabric like this before. It is so nice.” Thanks Eva!! That was a wonderful gift for them.

The pictures are Eliza and Ray feeding Hope.

If you feel God placing it on your heart to help the orphans, please send a check to Hope International Services at P.O. Box 540825, Omaha, NE 68154. Please place a post-it-note on the check that the money is for warm clothes, blankets, food, shoes, school supplies, whatever you desire, for the orphanage. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts and may God bless you as He has blessed us with these children.