A sunburned baby found..

Sunday evening the Police came to Amecet with a small baby. The baby was found by an old woman, in a maize garden. They brought the baby to the Police andthe Police first went to the hospital with the baby for check up, and after that they came to Amecet. Nobody knows the mother, the Police is doing investigations to find the mother. The baby is a cute little girl, who got the name Angela, her weight is 2.2 kg. We took her this morning to the doctor, the baby is burned by the sun, she is red and also her tummy is red. We don't know how long she has been laying in the sun, in that maize garden... It is sad to leave a baby in such a position, even dogs could have found her..... She will get IV medication and also the ARV medication for baby's, until we can prove with the HIV test that she is negative.

Rest in Peace, sweet Jesica......

 Jesica passed away last night, just before 11 pm. We have been going to the doctors with her several times, she was diagnosed with Neonatal Sepsis. She probably got it at birth, because when she was born, her mother started to bleed and the family organized an ambulance to take the mother to Soroti Hospital, for blood transfusion, but the mother died on the way. The baby was also in the ambulance. They went back home and the baby was brought to Amecet. The symptoms started some days later and resulted in her death last night. Every time it is so painful. to see this beautiful little girl, laying in the coffin, inside feelings and emotions of sorrow, of anger, of doubt (did we do all we could have done??).

We had a small coffin made and together with the grandparents, Simon and some of the staff members, we drove to the village, where the family lived and where the mothers was buried, not even 2 weeks ago...  My heart went out to the family, as they sat, under the tree, around the small coffin with the body of Jesica. They had sat like this, only 12 days ago, around the body of the mother of Jesica...... We shared what had happen with Jesica, the time she was in Amecet, they thanked us for our care and that we brought the body home.... Then we left them to mourn and bury the little girl next to her mother....

God have mercy on them!!!!!!

Gideon and Job went home with their new parents.....

Today was a special day for baby Gideon and for Job!!! They were going home with their new parents!!!On December 14, 2017 Job was brought to Amecet by the Police. He was found in the bus station and was a very traumatized little boy of around 5 or 6 years old. He didn't talk and was wild, he was scared of people. You can read in the blog of January 26 about his story and how we tried to find his relatives... But today he went with his new parents to his new home. 

This are his new parents, a lovely, older couple who have been in Amecet before. On the blog of 23rd of January, you can read that they adopted Patrick from Amecet. Job was happy, he doesn't show much, but he was sitting with them and felt very comfortable with them. I believe this couple can make a different in his life. We have seen already a lot of changes in Job, but still a lot has to happen .In our blog of April 14, Patrick and his parents came to visit us, it was good to see Patrick and to see that they are a family. Today,Job got also his new family and his new brother!!

Then baby Gideon, you can read his story in our blog of January 16th. He was born on the streets. The mother disappeared and the father... was not the father. We took him for a DNA test and that showed that he was not the father of the baby. Gideon is a beautiful little boy, everybody fell in love with him!!! But he also needs his family and this family also adopted before a child via Amecet. On the blog of April 14, the parents came together with Jesica to visit us, it was the same day as the parents of Patrick and Job came. It was beautiful to see them today with their new son!!

And after the Probation officer handed them "officially" over to their new parents and they got their care orders from the court, they walked out with their new children! (before the probation officer and our social worker had visited and inspected their homes) Gideon was carried by his mother and Job was carried on the back of his mother. The fathers went outside the gate to get a motorbike taxi, for going "HOME"!!

It was a very busy and a bit chaotic day, I want to end this blog with a prayer request for baby Jesica. We went this morning with her to the clinic and now she is on IV fluids. Jesica is a baby of 12 days old and her mother passed away after the delivery. She came in Amecet only hours after her birth. We have been struggling with her for days, but today, we took her to another clinic and had several blood tests done. She has a neonatal sepsis. We started right away IV antibiotics. Please pray for this little girl, that she will come through this....

Also pls. keep praying for Betty, I wrote about her before. There is no improvement.

Amecet has new (farm) land.....

In the blog of March 30th, I wrote about our 3 cows, Betsy, Clara and Daisy, and I shared about our desire to have more income generating activities for Amecet. Today I want to share  about our new land!!!

 This is a picture of the new land, it was still dry, by the time I took this picture. It is not very far, just outside Soroti (direction Lira).  Our plan is to use this land to grow crops, for Amecet, but also to sell. There is also the possibility to keep chickens, for the eggs, or even keep pigs. The cows will go there also in the future, we have now two cows pregnant, so our life stock is growing!! We are so thankful towards the Foundation de Figurant, from the Netherlands, they helped us to purchase this land, with their help, and also many gifts from Dutch people, we were able to pay for this land. 

Everything was paid cash.... On this picture you see Simon and the lawyer counting a part of the money. I felt  a bit nervous, when I got the money from the bank, in a shopping bag, and I brought it with me to the lawyer, where we all had to sign. We had many people involved it this, several family members from the family who sold the land to us, local leaders, a leader of the land committee, someone from YWAM Soroti and Elias, Simon and me. Many signature's were placed on the documents, so we know we are safe....

And on April 30th Amecet became the proud owner of the new Amecet farm land!!!

Now we have to start with the development of this land. The first step is to get a fence around it, because otherwise we will feed all the cows of the neighbourhood with our crops. Then we will grow maize and special grass for the cows. while we make a good plan for the next crop growing.

If anyone of you wants to be involved in this new project, please mail us. We also welcome donations towards the development of the Amecet Farm land....

This is how we get extra food for the cows now... Bosco and Simon went to cut the special grass at the roadside and brought it to the cows to eat. 

Children come and go.......

I have been a bit quiet, those last weeks, but there is a lot going on in Amecet. Yesterday a small. new born baby was brought  to Amecet by the Police.

The mother of the baby had knocked somewhere on a door and had asked for some food, after she had eaten, she asked if she could rest a bit, before going on her journey. The lady of the home gave her a mat to rest. The lady went outside and when she came back, the mother was gone and the baby was laying on the mat. She went to the Police and they brought the baby to Amecet. We gave her the name Naome. it is a beautiful little girl, with cute hair and she is probably only 4 days old.. 

Another beautiful baby is baby Jesica. She was born in the early morning of May 9th. Her mother died just after the delivery. When she was brought to Amecet, she was only a few hours old....

In the blog of April 8, I wrote about baby Eliya and how he was brought in Amecet. His mother tried to kill him. He was malnourished, and had wounds in his neck, which were infected. After testing we got the results that he is HIV+ and we started him directly on the ARV's, the medicines which slow down the growth of the HIV virus. This is his picture today, he is doing better, is gaining slowly, and his cough is gone. He is still small and frail, but very cute!!!!

In the last blog, I asked prayers for Betty, pls. keep praying for her!!! It is not going well with her. I was again on Sundays in the clinic with her, for a scan and X-ray. She has now also problems with passing urine.

Here is our naughty, cute Matthew. He came in December 2017 in Amecet. He is HIV+, he was malnourished, sick, had TB and cried so much... Now he is a cute little boy, running around, playing, eating well. He takes his ARV medicines much better and.....he is potty trained!! We are working with the family to re-settle him back with his relatives.

We have now again several toddlers, two were abandoned by their families, but after going to the villages, our social workers have been able to find relatives, who are willing to take care of the children. 

 Today, the grandparents of Mary will come and pick her!! The left picture is made on the day we got her, you can read the story in the blog of February 2. The right picture is how she is today, a beautiful smiling baby. The parents are not together anymore, but the grandparents (father's side) are very willing to raise the little girl. The mother is not able to care for the baby.

Not all children leave with a happy face........ this picture, I took when we brought this girl to another place. later I saw that, when I took the picture, she was crying... She had a terrible story about abuse and other emotional pain. We couldn't help her, only gave her a safe place for some days, so she could rest and relax. We took her somewhere, where they will be more able to help her. But I know I really felt for her. There is so much suffering and so many children have emotional pain, miss a loving and safe home. In Amecet, children cry, when there are 12 baby's, you hear often a baby cry, but the tears of this girl touched me....

As you see, a lot is happening in Amecet, and I thank God we (sometimes) can make a difference!!!!