I recently returned to Melbourne after spending five weeks working at Familia Moja. I am very happy to say that the trip was extremely productive, with some major progress made on the following initiatives:
FARMING
Commencement of farming activities on land purchased for the orphanage in June 2010. We planted the following vegetables: spinach, cabbage, kales, sweet potato and tomatoes that will reduce our monthly budget. We also planted Mango and Avocado trees on the land, which will bear fruit for our children in the future.
BUILDING
Drafting of architectural plans to construct a permanent home for our children. We plan to commence building our home in early 2012, depending upon raising the required funds to do so. Once the home is finished we will move the 31 children in our care from our rented home. This will not only reduce the monthly running costs of the orphanage but will be a large step towards ensuring a safe and prosperous future our children.
WATER
Planning the drilling of our own bore hole/well to provide water for both our residential and agricultural needs on the land. This project will be sponsored by Imperial Bank Kenya; an agreement was reached between Familia Moja and Imperial Bank whilst I was in Kenya.
VOLUNTEER PROJECT
Planning of a group volunteer project for January 2012 to commence the building of the children's home.
INCOME GENERATING ACTIVITIES
Investigation into income generating activities, such activities include farming goats, poultry and dairy cattle on the land to both reduce the monthly budget by becoming increasingly self sufficient and also generate income to take that next step towards self-sustainability. This will be started once we relocate from our rented building to the permanent home, which we hope will be Christmas 2012.
EDUCATION
Our six oldest children will be entering into secondary school education next year, so I spent a considerable amount of time investigating the secondary school options for our children within the broader Mang'u community. We now have a clear plan on where to send all of our children in 2012, the application process and also an estimate of school fees.
SPONSORSHIP
Reviewing our sponsorship policies with the Board of Directors.
We now have a clear, up to date policies on:
- Food, Shelter & Clothing Sponsorship
- Education Sponsorship
- Staff Sponsorship
GIFT CARDS
I helped our children make 150+ 'one of a kind' gift cards, which I brought back to Melbourne to sell to raise funds for the centre.
If you would like to help sell some of these cards, please contact myself via familiamoja@gmail.com
EASTER
To celebrate Easter, I arranged (and assisted financially) for all the guardians of the children to come join us at Familia Moja. This was a wonderful day as each of the children was able to spend time with a grandparent, uncle or aunty whom they had not seen since Christmas. Some of the guardians had travelled for up to 15 hours to join the celebration, and were very happy to see the children, take home a copy of their latest school results and join in our feast of goat, chicken, vegetables and chapatti.
Check out some photos of my trip here.
Thank you for your support.
Jess White
Co-Founder/Development Partner
31st May 2011
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