Acholi Children thank you!
Last year our Christmas in Acholiland was a huge success!! We hope that 2012 is exactly the same. Please share this link with everyone you know!
I tuned my radio to my favorite station today and they are playing Christmas music from now until the holiday is over. It is the time of year when holiday music rings through car stereos and shopping experiences are full of jingle bells, decorations and lights bringing a warm atmosphere and new life to homes across America as families gather together. We go on a mission for that perfect gift for our loved ones, and then overdo it just because we can. This is the season of Love, resounding Joy and the season of family.
Americans Spending More on Gifts in 2012 According to a study performed by the American Research Group, Inc., Americans will be spending more money on gifts in 2012 than they did last year. In 2011, the average American spent $646 on holiday gifts. On Average each American family that traveled during the holidays spent $2500.00.
Americans Spending More on Gifts in 2012. One in 10 parents said the plan was to spend over $500 per child. While this is just an average, American families can definitely spend an astronomical amount of money on Christmas gifts.
As we watch our children open their gifts on Christmas, please remember the 147 million orphans worldwide who won’t receive a gift from a parent, or anyone. Some of them may even be starving and hungry!
What about the orphans? The children with no family, in war affected areas, children orphaned and affected by AIDS, children who have no idea about Christmas?
You can make Christmas possible for these children!
These are children who suffer daily just through their daily life. As we celebrate this season with our families we must remember those who cannot and will not be celebrating. But we have an opportunity to change that for a few children in Northern Uganda, and you can help!!! This holiday season remember our Acholi children who live in survival mode each day.
Some of these children for the first time ever, will receive the love of God through new shoes, new mattresses and a family Christmas feast!!!
Would you consider giving if your gift didn’t include something that goes under a tree? What if your gift allowed children to rest above the ground cleanly and safely as they sleep on a new mattress replacing filthy rags over mattresses soaked with urine, mud and years of wear? What if your gift allowed children to walk for miles without their feet touching soil. New shoes would bring new life to these precious souls. What if your gift would allow the children to eat until full without worry that there will never be any more??
Only you can help us make this happen for our children! You do not need to have a PayPal account to donate. Simply select Pay by Credit Card Option after clicking the button. We are caring for 60 children this year! Please help!
Here is what we need to make this happen:
Donate a Bull or a Part of the Bull to the Children: $250 for the bull (yes a bull) for the celebratory feast They will also dry the left over meat for future meals!
Donate a Live Goat that the children can enjoy throughout the year, meat and milk!
Donate a Live Chicken that the children can enjoy throughout the year, meat and eggs and chicks!
$25 each sleeping mattress per child and caretaker (They need about 40)
$30 for each child to have shoes, clothing and pay for their meals for the next month (there are 60)
$50 for each caregiver that has worked without any pay whatsoever for every single day. This will give them encouragement and allow them to buy necessary items they need for their own lives. (there are 8 of these) Please ask yourself how can we bless the adults that care for the children selflessly without pay?
School Fees and School Uniform, In Uganda education is not free.
Donate Any Amount to Christmas in Acholiland!!
We need to buy the following so any amount of donation can go towards that!:
- Bales of used clothing $300.00
- Entertainment (we hire a stereo system that will cost us $250.00
- Other Food: 1 sack of rice $150.00, cooking oil $45.00, sodas $150.00, potatoes $50.00
- Celebration cakes $25.00 (we need two)
- Sodas and Sweets for the children ($100.00)
Pay By Check
Make payable to “Little Miracles International” on the “for” identification line of the check, please write the project name “Christmas in Acholiland” and send to:
Christmas in Acholiland
Little Miracles International
PO BOX 19776
Amarillo, Texas 79114
What in that great list of gifts of American spending each year above, can you give up to give a needy at risk child this season? The children deserve what we can afford, and we must show them the love of God on this holiday season. We will send the money on December 18th, but any amount we receive after that would be a big blessing!!
Tags: Acholi, Acholi Tribe, Africa, African, AIDS orphans, beef, bull, caregivers, child charity, children, Christmas Celebration, Christmas giving, Christmas in Uganda, Christmas presents, donate, dried beef, East Africa, feed a child, Humanitarian Aid, impoverished, Kitgum, love at Christmas, love for the orphans, needy, Northern Uganda, Orphan, orphanage, Pader, please give, poverty, shoes for orphan souls, shoes for orphans, village, war affected orphans
The Bake Sale for the orphanage was a HUGE success!
The Sunday School Class of St. Andrews International Church in Athens, said they would help, and they did! They had a bake sale, not the traditional bake sale. Think Greece…think Baklava and beautiful handmade cakes, cookies and pastries!!! People love our children all over the world!
Imagine an European country in the midst of a crisis and austerity measures. Imagine Greece, where for the few that still have a jobs, they find themselves making forty percent less than they did two years ago. Since they are employed, they are expected to support not only their immediate family, but extended as well. It is not that they do not look for work or desire to work, but the country’s unemployment rate is above twenty-five percent and major companies are leaving monthly. It’s capital loses families and young people weekly as they move back to the country side in order to start over and live off the land. As with the people so goes business: store fronts fold up and their windows are covered with newspapers. It’s law makers are above the law, but their constituents are asked to pay for their indulgences and greed.
Amongst such circumstances a call went out to help orphans. Yes, those that heard the call saw and understand need, frustration and hurt these past few years. However they knew they were still better off than the orphans in Uganda. So a small church congregation in the suburbs of Athens, Greece joined together and mixed sugar, wheat, eggs, oil and spices to bake goodies to sell for the orphans. One family prayed that they would raise six to seven hundred dollars while another family prayed for a thousand. At the end of it all it was more than anyone could have imagined: OVER One Thousand Three hundred Dollars in a bake sale!
How is this possible? Is not this country and its people in need? The congregation has experienced death, unemployment, loss of pastor, loss of building, family members with cancer and tumors in the last 16 months. Yet, a need was shared and hearts and hands went to work. Thought their numerous little efforts God made plenty. Plenty to bless, not only the receivers but givers as well. One’s environment does not dictate God’s faithfulness. He has promised to make the dessert bloom and never to forsake His children.
A man came up to the event coordinator in church and gave her 300 Euros (386 $) for the orphanage because him and his wife would be gone for the event, and they had not even sold one cookie at that point!! GOD always comes through and blesses us more abundantly than we can imagine!
These wonderful people joined in with the Orphan Sunday events and decided to go for a bake sale since they have some very gifted ladies there. The Sunday school kids also contributed by making bookmarks which they sold. The congregation was amazing and very supportive! Everybody walked away with at least 3 pounds of goodies!! Many people donated money. It was a great event and has definitely stirred up many hearts to look some deeper into orphan care.
Last year this Sunday School class in Greece sent toys and clothing to the children in Uganda. We assisted them to send their wonderful presents they prepared for the orphanage and each individual child. It was a blessed event for the children.
Thank you St. Andrews International Church in Athens, we love you for loving our children!
Tags: bake sale, charitable giving, child charity, Donations, Donors, Humanitarian Aid, Humanitarian Projects, Little Miracles International, Orphan, orphan Sunday, orphanage, orphanages, orphans, raising money, St. Andrews International Church in Athens, Uganda, Volunteers
A Christmas Story From Jeannie Lorin, President of Beauty Society, Inc.
Many, many children n Jamaica live in ‘blissful poverty’. The country is not so ‘third world’ that they are cut off from the rest of us. They are smart and keenly aware of how we live because of television, internet access and wealthy people from all over that come to their country to vacation. The sad part is they know that other children around the world have so much more than they do, including how we here in the US and other countries, have our annual visit from Santa.
A close friend of mine Stayce Smith, from San Antonio Texas who lives part-time in Jamaica was asked by some Jamaican children recently if she believes in Santa. She said, “Of course!”. She explained to them that everyone believes in Santa, the kids replied, “Why does Santa not come to Jamaica?” She was heartbroken, more children chimed in and one child told her that they tell the younger children are told Santa was killed by a helicopter in an attempt to make them feel better about being left out, each and every year. That conversation, the mere thought that there are kids who feel that they are not good enough for Santa’s sleigh and reindeer to make a stop during his Christmas night around the world, has speared this ONE LOVE – ONE SANTA Christmas drive.
Teaming up with Little Miracles International, Beauty Society, with the help of Stacye Smith, all of you have the ability to make this a reality for some of the children in Jamaica. This will be the first year some of the kids of Montego Bay will see Santa! His first stop is the Montego Bay Public Hospital, a local hospital /orphanage. The kids will get to visit with Santa, and receive a small gift. A gift that will bring them joy and hope.
The process has begun. An initial donation has been sent to some wonderful friends in Jamaica, and we have even shipped Santa’s suit! Arrangements have been made for inexpensive toys, food and essentials to be given to needy kids. The wonderful people of Jamaica are so excited about this that hundreds are asking to volunteer in any way they can. There is even a family that is donating some of their livestock (their own food) from the family farm to be the main course at a Christmas Feast in Santa’s honor.
Small children believe in Santa Claus but very few Jamaican homes have chimneys. So the Jamaican Santa shrinks in size to fit through the keyhole of the front door to a home! We just know our Jamaican Santa will fit just perfectly!
Please donate what you can, just $3.00 will bring love, joy, dignity and self respect to a child in Jamaica. You will feel overjoyed by knowing that such a small sacrifice from you will be an enormous gift of generosity to these children. So very little on your part will mean so much this Christmas. Help Santa make his way up the mountain from Montego Bay this year…it will be a long journey, but Santa always arrives just in time!
There are two ways to donate:
Donate by PayPal by clicking on stocking below: (tax deductible contribution)
Please also know that every penny is going directly to Santa visit!
Yes Jamaica there is a Santa Claus, and he’s coming to town!
All The Love,
Jeannie Lorin
President and CEO
Beauty Society, Inc.
Beauty ~ Wealth ~ Humanity
