APRIL 2008 REPORT
by Celia Fenn
It has been a while since we reported back on our project. This has been a difficult time for us, as our Donation link has been out of commission for a while and no money has come in for a few months. We are now down to the bottom of our account, and would really like to ask people to donate if they feel drawn to do so in their hearts. We need at least 300 US Dollars or about 200 Euros, a month, to run our basic Starchild program of feeding and our garden. Then we are also running art classes and supporting youth initiatives in our Community. So, help is always appreciated.
At the beginning of March, we participated in the Sir Lowry's Pass Community festival, which is organized by Wilma in her role as Co-ordinator of the local part of the annual Cape Town Community Festivals. Starchild Global created a stall in which we featured an "Imagine Peace " tree for Yoko Ono's "Imagine Peace" project. The children helped to create a colorful container for the tree, and to make the labels for the tree. Because it was a Festival event, we also donated prizes that were awarded on the basis of a draw from the labels on the "wish tree".
Here are some of the children tying their wishes onto the tree:
Here are the winners of the Draw with their prizes:
And here are some of them just having some Festival fun in the Sun!
At the end of March we had our second Starchild Easter Egg Hunt for our children. Here are some of them searching for the hidden eggs. Well.....where else do you hide eggs in Africa!
Everyone was able to find at least a few of the colorful eggs:
And Wilma, as the official "Easter Bunny", made sure that every child took home something from our Easter Basket of Love and Fun.
Our most recent project has been to start Art and Craft classes for the children. They dont have these options at school, and we wanted to allow them to be creative. So, we added art classes to our other activity of working in the organic garden, which of course still continues.
We invited a woman from another community to come and teach people in our community the art of decoupage. We were looking for a craft that would be reasonably inexpensive and would also afford the children the opportunity to learn about recycling. So, we asked them to collect tins, which we would then turn into containers for storage or for gifts. We asked some parents to come along too so that they could see what was being done.
So, here we have the Teacher explaining the process to the Group:
Here Wilma concentrates as she cuts out her shapes.
Here on of the Children shows off the "angel" tin that he made in class:
And here are two of the finished works. The one with the Dolphins is the one that I made, of course! And it is now sitting on my desk as a container for the crayons that I keep for the children that I work with at home!
We have also just completed replanting the Organic Vegetable Garden after the long hot summer. We have opened several new beds, and we expect to have a big crop of vegetables in a few months time. We will bring you some photos of the garden activity soon.
Please help us with this work. All these activities are made possible by your Support and Sponsorship. We now have a Paypal link that operates through our Spanish site. Please go the following link:
Click on the first yellow button that says "Donar" and you will be taken through to the English Paypal Donations portal for Starchild Global.
I thank you for your support and love
with blessings and gratitude from all of Us here in Africa
Celia