Thursday, February 28, 2019

Ups and Downs

Greetings to all of our friends.  It has been a bit of time since you've heard from us.  It's been an interesting 2nd month of the year for us all and we appreciate your patience, support and prayers for us.

As many of you likely heard, there was a time of unrest throughout the country of Haiti.  The kids were off of school for a couple of weeks before it all settled down and life got back to normal again.  Unfortunately, times like those can be stressful as supplies and food stop circulating around the country and what you can get is extremely expensive.  This rise in food cost has continued in the weeks following the unrest as people try to get their businesses up and going again.  It sure makes a difference when you are feeding 100 people 3 times a day!  I don't know how Linda does it -- she is amazing -- but she kept things going and all the mouths fed!

In the last update I told you about the wonderful PT help we had received from the STAND Haiti Project.  One of the Haitian PTs who works with this group came back to visit the HOH once the short-term team had left.  She offered to come and work with our kids several evenings a week.  What a blessing that was for our kids to be able to have regular PT help.  
Here you can see Claudette, working with one of the HOH kids.  Because of the unrest and school being out, Rosnel (our young man who is studying PT in Cap Haitian) was able to come back and work with her for a couple of weeks.  It was great for him to have the chance to do some hands on learning as well.

Another nice thing that happened over this past month was the arrival of the boat from Miami.  We received many wonderful things from supporters and churches who sent things for the kids.  Here are some pictures...
Lovely and fun toys!!!
 
 
 
 Clothes and Chocolate!
 
 
Food!
 
 
A shipment on the boat can sure put smiles on faces at the HOH!!


We have a couple of new kids at the HOH and would love your prayers as we seek to give them hope in its many forms.  Isaac is a tiny baby who came a couple of weeks ago in very poor health.  Here you can see Esther giving him some love and formula...
 Here he is with Linda about 2 weeks later... you can see the difference a couple of weeks of formula have done for him!
 Then, just this week 5 year old Widley came to the HOH.  He is very malnourished and has just started on our nutrition program. 
We are so blessed to have you all stand behind us and help us out in so many different ways as we bring the hope of Jesus to the kids in our home.  The need around us is so great.  We love being able to help out, but there is no way we could do this without our team of partners and we appreciate each one of you.

If you want to learn about ways to help us out -- check out our "Get Involved" page on our website here.

If you'd like to be able to donate to this special ministry -- get the information on our "Donate" page here.

Thank you for the things you send, for the financial support you send us and for your prayers on our behalf.  Together we give hope!

Tuesday, February 05, 2019

Great PT help!

Here we are already into February!  The days seem to just hurry by and with constant activity at the HOH there is no slowing down time.  

How nice it was to have our friends Jacques and Isabelle come for a visit all the way from France.  They spend a lot of time in the NorthWest part of Haiti and we have numerous kids at the HOH that they found in very bad situations and brought them to us for care.  Brothers Davidson and Darolyn were two of these kids and here they are during their recent reunion.  Davidson is on the left and Darolyn on the right. 

We were also blessed to have a visit from some Physical Therapists who were part of the group STAND Haiti Project.  They came to the HOH to see numerous ones of our kids and young adults to see what help they could offer.  Then they had us bring two of the youngest ones, Widson and Kiky to their clinic in Port-de-Paix.  Alexandra and Jedline took them there...

At the clinic the group made multiple tools to help these young boys with their various physical disabilities.  What an amazing job they did!
Widson certainly seems to not mind his special board getting him to lie on his stomach and use some different muscles than what he's been using. 
 At first, Kiky didn't seem to mind his chair so much.  What a great smile!!

The special made walker was a little less well received.  He has had one of these before and hated it so much he literally ripped it apart!  Hopefully we can get some more use out of this one and it will help him use his legs more.
The special table seems to have not been so well received.  His face makes it look like we are torturing him, but we really aren't!  We hope these tools will help Kiky gain the use of different muscles and learn to do some things for himself that he hasn't been able to do.

We are so grateful for people like these who help us in various ways to find and bring hope to kids in Haiti who really need it.  Thank you for your part in allowing us to share this hope with them.  Please continue to pray for the various needs at the HOH, particularly for the kids and their studies, for health for both Linda and I, and for wisdom, strength and protection during times of turmoil in our lives and country.