Art Support

We give thanks to the artists who donated R1000 to ECYCC, provided by putting their paintings into an auction.

A group of well known South African artists have been on an Art Retreat at Erin Country House in Middelburg, painting the inspirational Karoo landscape and buildings. The artists have kindly donated original paintings to be auctioned in order to support various charities in Middelburg and are also exhibiting very affordable paintings for sale.

The artists are:-
Robert Domijan  - Rob Dutton  -  Ronel Alberts
Maureen Gordon  -  Gaynor Gordon  -  Rentia Coetzee
Yvonne Ankerman  -  Harvey Rothschild  -  Retia Lamprecht

We also give thanks to Trevor & Kathy Hyson from Erin Country House in Middelburg who were kind enough to host the event and think of us. Much appreciated!

Erin Country House:
Cell 082 379-0404 •• Tel 049 842-2293

http://www.karooexperience.com/

September Progress

We're happy to share below some more photos of the building work. The work continues at pace and it's very exciting to see the progress toward expanded facilities for the children including 6 additional new bedrooms, a bathroom with 4 showers and new large recreational hall. We recently had a donation to contribute to the roof do that will be the next stage of building. Any donations for finishing the building and decorating would be gratefully appreciated - please get in touch.

In other news, Sister Arendz from Huis Karee is visiting the home on a monthly basis to present in-house training for the staff about general hygiene, self care for the care worker, handover procedures, basic first aid, etc.

Sanmari Groenewald started music lessons on a weekly basis with the kids, she starded off with the recorder, basic music reading, will move on to guitar lessons and drum lessons later. Her mother Nelia assists. The older children aim to perform in public and also take their gumboot dancing to the next level. The boys already performed successfully at Agape church and are practising now for a street show. We need funds for overalls and white t-shirts for their dancing outfits.

Hands on Africa Holiday Club

We recently had the Hands on Africa group visit us and they provided some lovely activities for the children during the school holidays. At the local Agape centre, which had been beautifully decorated for the occasion, there was music, dancing, singing and blessing which they were involved in. We thank Hands on Africa for putting this on, and also for helping with renovation of the garden, where new vegetables were planted and a worm farm set up with the help of Francois and Karen.

Here are a few photos to remind us of some happy days...

Charl du Plessis from Hands on Africa wrote us a nice letter afterwards which included:

"We would like to thank you for the opportunity and privilege to minister to the children during the last week. It was a great blessing for the whole team. Given the enthusiasm displayed by the children we can see that this could become an annual event... 

During our last semester at the Middelburg (Eastern Cape) Bible School in May 2014, the hearts of some of the team members were touched by what God is doing through you at the Emmanuel Child & Youth Care Centre. We realise that you have the thankless task of looking after the many orphans under your care and as is often the case, you hardly get a chance to rest. God laid on our hearts spend a few days with the children during the July holidays with a view to share a little bit of His love to the children, but also to give you a much needed break.We trust that the children enjoyed the holiday club events in the mornings. In the afternoons the team members helped some of the older children with schoolwork. We trust that this will also reap fruits – even though it was very basic and very little."

Building For The Future

More reasons to be grateful for this month - the home continues to grow and make steps to even better facilities and experiences for the children. Volunteer Petra and her friends and family have kindly donated funds for the children to take some fun and educational day-trips and to cover other needs like new clothing. They have been very generous so many thanks to them.

Also Michael Halsey has continued to make a big difference for ECYCC... he has kindly donated to the building funds that will extend one side of the house to make a second bathroom and additional bedroom, increasing our capacity and helping us to meet the standards required of by the Department of Social Development for our registration. The photo below shows the start of the work which will transform the home when completed.

If you would like to support us further with the building work (which we still do not have the full funds to complete) please get in touch with us at emm.childrenshome@gmail.com and consider donating to us on the donation link which accepts all kinds of payment. The link is here. 

Some belated thanks - a couple of months ago we said goodbye to Maria, one of our volunteers from Germany. We were all sad to see her leave, especially the children who had many fun memories with her. Thank you for your kindness Maria and good luck with everything in the future!

ECYCC in May

We have 23 children currently residing at Emmanuel (up from 13 in first months in year). Our most important needs on a daily basis: food, fresh produce, electricity costs and of course the completing of the building. We urge anyone who can help with donations to get in touch - we really need some good samaritans soon to help us deal with the rising costs for running the centre. However, still lots of people for us to be grateful for in recent months:

The Hands on Africa group ladies ran an arts & crafts workshop with the kids on 14 May, arts and craft workshop. Their time and efforts which are much appreciated. The ladies also visited the home in order to help out with study periods at the centre.

Rhett Newton (the chairperson on the board of ECYCC), for his time and effort organising the Karoo Mighty Men Conference drinks stall where Emmanuel donations in return for supplying cool drinks to the attendees. Rhett has gone out of his way to help the centre and truly has a kind heart to do this. We also thank Bertie, Ronel and Joanelle, Mellissa and friends for their hard work selling the drinks. 15,000 people came to Middelburg for the Easter weekend to attend the conference!

Inspirational singer Dewald Gouws, for the recent press release that he has done in order to promote the home and the need of funds for building. Everyone greatly enjoyed his visit to the home to meet the children over the KMMC weekend.

Our Occupational Therapist, Rowena, for her commitment towards the centre and the children. Rowena's commitment is far beyond her work as a therapist - she commits to host movie nights with the kids once a week, and make the kids part of her project at the old age home, Huis Silverjare, in order to present and accommodate crafts and games for the elderly. All our bigger children will join in.

Last but not least. Some neighbours of Emmanuel home, who were very kind to give the children some basic horse-riding lessons and a unique experience to pass on afternoon. It was a lovely time and made for some good photos: 

Charity Riders

The Empyrean Riders is a local bikers club from Middelburg. Jaques Niemand is the President of this club and organizer of event on the Easter weekend who visited the home, handing out goody bags, other treats and Easter eggs to the kids. The kids could look at their shiny bikes and enjoyed the time with the riders. Thanks to all riders present and secretary Inge Botha, as well as Celia, Jaques mum who baked cupcakes for the kids. The club plans to drive from Middelburg to Botswana on their bikes raising funds for Emmanuel towards end April. The club need sponsors in order to do this run for the home. Contact details: ingebotha@rocketmail.com

A great project and we are grateful for supporters like this. Here's a photo of the visit:

Donation Link

We now have the facility to receive online donations. These are processed via a secure online payment system called Payfast which accepts most credit and debit cards (SA and international).

You can click on this link and this will take you to our Payfast cause page where you can donate. Enter your donation amount in the box (the value will be in South African Rand) and you will be taken to a page where you can pay with your credit card or internet banking. If you are an international donor you can use the credit card facility for Visa or Mastercard (current exchange rates are here)

All payments go directly into the ECYCC ABSA bank account from which all day-to-day running costs of the home are paid. If you would like to specify that your donation is used for a particular project we can make provision for this.

If you have any questions on donating please email us (emm.childrenshome@gmail.com) and we'll your questions. We will happily provide a written receipt for donations. ECYCC accounts are audited annually as part of the Department of Social Development's requirements for maintaining non-profit organisation status.

All donations, big or small, are gratefully received and make a massive difference to the lives of the children we care for. 

New Volunteers

Some more things we are grateful in recent weeks...
Firstly, we're very grateful for big donation we received: R23,200 from the company Goldee Trading 174 CC2. The contact person for the company was Hester (a local born and bred in Middelburg) and she suggested that they should donate to ECYCC this time around. Thank you so much! The funds help us to pay for important day-to-day costs essential to the running of the home: electricity, care-worker salaries, food etc.

Secondly, we would like to welcome new volunteers to the home: Petra and Maria from Germany. They have settled in really quickly and are making a great difference to the children's lives with their kindness and enthusiasm. We've very glad to have them with us! Here's some of their recent photos... 

A Big Milestone

This day has been a long time coming for ECYCC but it's finally here and testament to the hard work of everyone associated with the home, especially the founding managers Carol & Bertus. This week we finally received registration from the Department of Social Development, which authenticates ECYCC as a child and youth care centre which is operated to the highest standards. It now allows us to work hand in hand with DOSD to care for a greater number of vulnerable children (up to 24 at any one time) and give them a caring safe home, whether on a temporary basis or more permanently. 

We are so happy with this news after waiting many years for this moment. The home will continue to grow from strength to strength and we will stay one united big 'family'...

Xmas Memories

One of our highlights from the festive period was a Xmas play that our children put on at the old age home in Midros. With our care workers, Martha and Dollie, helping organise them and prepare the play, the children put all their effort into putting on the entertainment for residents of the home. It was so nice to watch and well appreciated! Here are some photos...