Bike race!!!!!

On the 22nd of june four of our orphans and two of our Project O staff rode in the Kwa Ximba bike race. The bike Race was 10km and our guys all came in the top ten!!!!

Lindani, 14 years old.

Linda, 14 years old.

Agreement, 13 years old and Khayelihle, 15 years old have all been orphaned due to Hiv/Aids.

They have been members of our bike club for a while now and are some of our stronger riders which is why we picked them for the race.

They had a great day and the fact that they came in the top ten was amazing as there were around 100 people in the race!

We would once again like to thank Sean's Power Cycles, Group 5 and Action Pad Print for your support and for the bikes!!!!!

Crisis Center really cares!

A couple of months ago we had a team from Living Waters Missions crisis center come and visit us. God has really put our organization on their hearts and wanted to help in any way that they could.

Diane and her team came by one day and we all went to the Valley to visit some of our orphans. With them they bought food, toys, clothes and Zulu childrens books. We went to see a number of our orphans and the team had a chance to bless these children with the gifts that they had brought with them.

We had such a great day, the children loved their gifts and were so happy to see that some people care about them and their family. The team prayed with each family and I know that this was a huge blessing to each and every person under the sound of those prayers. The day was full of joy and laughter.

And I cant wait for their next visit in august.

Thankyou Diane and the team of faithful friends for coming to bless these children and thier families, I want you to know that not only did you bless them but you also blessed myself and the Project O staff. Thankyou for the encouragement and love that you have shown to us in the short time that we have spent together.

Teddy Bears all round!

We have some friends in the UK who had a great idea of how to bless our orphans. One day while cleaning out her toys Laura Cowen saw that she just had too many teddy bears and didnt know what to do with them. So after talkng with her dad they came up with the idea of sending them to our orphans here at Project O. When we recieved the box stuffed with bears and other soft toys we were so excited. The orphans that we work with do not have any toys and for them to be given a cuddly toy from a little girl in the UK was such a treat.

I shared with Laura and her Dad (Mike) what a blessing the bears were and how the children loved them so much, Mike came up with another idea. He is one of the leaders at the Kids club run by their church. He spoke with the children at Mighty Kids and they started to bring their soft toys in so that Mike and Laura could send them to the orphans of Project O.

We now recieve boxes of soft toys every couple of months and we love getting them.......more importantly our children here love to get them.

Such a simple idea from a little girl in England has made such a difference to these children here.

Thank you Laura for seeing a need and sharing it with others, now we have many happy little boys and girls who have a teddy to snuggle!

Thank you Mike for caring enough to get behind Laura and Project O.

And Thank you for all the children at Mighty Kids who gave your bears for an orphan. We belive every child should have a teddy bear!!!!!

Thembalihle our first Project O orphan.

One day 2 1/2 years ago I was walking through the valley with one of my friends. We were passing a small mud hut and noticed an elderly woman sitting outside on a blanket. In the Zulu culture you must greet people when you pass them so we slowed down and greeted the lady, as we talked with her i noticed a small child in the garbage dump that was next to the house. The surrounding houses and the Shabine (tavern) next to her mud hut throw all their waste into the pit. The little girl came out of the dump and she was carrying 2 apple cores. She lifts one to her mouth to take a bite when she notices Nthabiseng and myself talking with her grandmother, embarrassed she hides the apple cores behind her back.

Her grandmother was also embarrassed and explains that Thembalihle has lost her parents to AIDS and now it is just the 2 of them left, they are trying to survive on her pension but its just not enough for them and she cant even send Thembalihle to school. they go for days with nothing to eat.

I told Gogo (grandmother) that I would be back soon. We leave and when i am in the seclusion of my bathroom I break down, my heart breaks for the Gogo and her beautiful little granddaughter. I felt as though my heart was breaking into thousands of tiny pieces and the pain I felt for these two strangers took my breath away, it over whelmed me and I knew I had to do something.

As most kids do when they don't have the answers, I called my mum! I told her about my day and about Gogo and Thembalihle. What should I do? My mum and dad decided they they would help this little family, they became our 1st Project O sponsors and Thembalihle our first orphan!

For £19 a month my parents change a family's life. Now they have enough food to make it through each month and Thembalihle is going to school and doing great!! She is a very bright little girl and now has big dreams for her life.

Just £19 a month and a loving, faithful couple (I'm not bias) has changed their lives FOREVER.

Bike club, so much fun!

We are running a bike club every saturday morning in Maphephetaini- a rural community in the Valley of a Thousand Hills. Many of us take for granted the things that we grew up doing and those things that were made available to us. Bikes are another item on the long list of things that the children living in these remote communities will never have the chance of owning.

I remember when my little brother first learnt how to ride a bike......he was 4 years old and we were on holiday in america. there he was in his new Chicago Bears uniform riding up and down the street for hours until he got it right. The children that we work with will never have a chance to own their own bike let alone go to america and have a Chicago Bears uniform. I dont even remember learning to ride a bike! See how we take it for granted. we all know that at some point during our childhood we will learn to ride a bike, its a given!

Now Project O is giving these children the chance to learn something that every child should have the chance to learn....how to ride a bike.

Every saturday morning our staff arrive to the Chief's compound and are greated by about 100 children, all are waiting to go on a bike ride!
Each week a different group of children come and go on a bike ride, whne the ride is over they return to the compound for a life, moral, biblical lesson.

The club also promotes friendship, teamwork, fitness and hope.

We currently have 30 mountain bikes, with the hopes of building on that and getting 100 by the end of next year. We have had 4 national sports magazines across South Africa do write ups on the project and we are vrey excited about the impact that it is having on these children.

All this is possible thanks to Group 5, Sean's Power Cycles and Action Pad Print.

Quilts,Quilts,Quilts!

A few months ago a lady called BJ from Krazy Kwilts for Kool Kids contacted us and told us that her and her friends would like to make some quilts for our orphans. My mum makes the most fantastic patchwork quilts and because of this I LOVE quilts (cant make them myself, but i do love them!). So imagine my excitement when one morning I come down to the office to find it full of hand made quilts! Each one different from the next and each one had the name of the orphan that it had been made for!

Our staff have been taking the quilts to each child with their monthly supply of food that Project O supplies.

The children have been so grateful for their quilts and they have come just in time for winter!

I would like to thank BJ and the other ladies who took the time to design and sew these quilts. They are beautiful and I know that the children are so blessed by their quilts.

World record!

yesterday it was made official.........martin is the world record holder for shortest time to skydive on 6 continents.

To see the videos go to http://www.project0.org.za/

Hello friends

Hi every one, Vashti here.
We have decided to start this blog so that we can keep you all up to date with all the Project O news. So much happens on a daily basis and I am going to atempt to keep you all informed!
I am also going to post stories about the orphans that we work with and general information on how you can get involved with helping us to help the "least of these", the voiceless children of South Africa.
My aim is for this blog to be more personal than a website, please feel free to interact with me and ask me questions and give me any ideas that you have that you feel will help us to help them!

Thanks guys....looking forward to hearing from you.
Vashti