Sub­ject: Bush Bun­ny Blog, Oct. 24, 2010

MELUCO ORPHAN CENTER TO EXPAND
 
The last 3 days I’ve been on the road, as the new Admin­is­tra­tor of Melu­co Coun­ty asked to meet with me.
Jose has just been trans­ferred from 2nd in charge of anoth­er coun­ty to 1st in charge of Melu­co Coun­ty and he has a great heart for kids.
He was con­cerned for 9 orphans who were dis­missed from our pro­gram 2 years ago by local gov­ern­ment offi­cials who did­n’t like them liv­ing near our mis­sion sta­tion (1 mile out of town).
We offered to buy a house in town and move the kids, but were told the kids were bet­ter off with their fam­i­ly, (who had dumped them on the street to eat garbage).
So these 9 orphans, ages 4–11, received our food but had no one to care for them over the last 2 years.
The old­est girl of 11 mar­ried a man at 13 just to get a roof over her head.
 
After hear­ing our report, the Admin­is­tra­tor gave us per­mis­sion to orga­nize a new home near our mis­sion sta­tion and fetch the 8 remain­ing children.
We are all amazed that none of them died of neglect!
Syl­vai wast­ed no time in check­ing out the area for a house to buy but none are available.
Land is plen­ti­ful in this area, so we plan to pur­chase a lot near our mis­sion ($100) and rapid­ly build a home of “pao pickey”.
This is a fence post laced with bam­boo type of con­struc­tion that is then plas­tered with cement and paint­ed to seal the Buy Xeni­cal Online walls.
It can be built in a mat­ter of 10 days and will serve as a great home for the kids, as it is super solid.
The rainy sea­son is upon us, so tim­ing is crit­i­cal since the rains are expect­ed to start in mid November.
 
GOD HAS MADE A WAY for these lit­tle ones and we are all so, so happy!
Under our new Coun­ty Leader, our assis­tance to the orphans with­out fam­i­ly will now thrive!
 
ERIC is doing well at 2 weeks post op and begins addi­tion­al phys­i­cal ther­a­py on Oct. 25th.
Keep your prayers com­ing, as his blood sug­ar is still unsta­ble, and he’s feel­ing very tired due to all the changes his body is feeling.
 
Will be a busy week in Bala­ma as we hope to put the fin­ish­ing touch­es on the new orphans hous­es and get the kids moved.
The bull­doz­ers have worked all around us (as we prayed they would stay away a few more days).
Doors and wid­ows go in and then most of the kids can move to their new places.
 
Keep those prayers com­ing and know we love and appre­ci­ate all of you!
Bless­ings, BBB and the Bala­ma gang
 
 
 
 
 
 

Sub­ject: Blog, Oct. 17, 2010 

ERIC’S RECOVERY ON SCHEDULE
His knee is doing GREAT accord­ing to his sur­geon and ther­a­py has started.
Post Op, his blood sug­ars were high, but with a strict diet and some
med­ica­tions, that is now under control.
Eric asked me to send his DEEPEST THANKS to all of you for your love gifts
to fix his knee as well as your con­tin­ued prayers for his fast recovery.

BULLDOZERS MOVING IN

Fri­day, Oct. 15, the road crew’s super­vi­sor drove up to my house to inform
me that their bull­doz­ers will be mov­ing in with­in 14 days.
We cheap pre­scrip­tion drugs must vacate 5 orphan hous­es as they will be bull­doz­ing to with­in 3 FEET
(1 meter) of these houses.
The 5 new hous­es being built for these chil­dren still lack the cement
floors, doors, and windows.
My work­ers have agreed to work 6 days a week till all is com­plet­ed, so we
have dou­bled our efforts and are work­ing at top speeds.

Dave DeBoer is key to this effort as he hauls water and build­ing materials
to the con­struc­tion sites and helps with the ware­house responsibilities.
Mil­lie Daniels and Mar­ta Rig­gin are mak­ing sure that the orphans and the
mis­sions needs are tak­en care of so I can con­cen­trate on food
distributions.

20 TONS OF FOOD DISTRIBUTED LAST WEEK TO ORPHANS
The Decem­ber rainy sea­son is fast approach­ing, mean­ing that the roads to
our 3 remote food dis­tri­b­u­tions will close.
Our 6 ton truck is haul­ing to 3 areas of the coun­ty each week as well as
tak­ing 6 tons/week to our orphans in Melu­co Coun­ty, 9 hours dri­ve away.
If it was­n’t for Dave, Mil­lie and Mar­ta, this Bush Bun­ny would be in
seri­ous trou­ble, because there is NO WAY one per­son can organize,
super­vise, and exe­cute all that is being accom­plished at the moment.
Please con­tin­ue to peti­tion the Lord Jesus for 2 per­ma­nent peo­ple to help
us here.
The pro­gram is grow­ing and it s a HUGE work load for Eric and I to handle.
We des­per­ate­ly need 2 LONG TERM peo­ple to come along side us to help.
Finan­cial sup­port is avail­able to qual­ifed peo­ple will­ing to com­mit to 3
years of service.

ORPHAN CLOTHING, HOES, AND MACHETTES
Mil­lie and Mar­ta have worked hard to orga­nize and dis­trib­ute cloth­ing to
the new orphans in the KWE KWE pro­gram (298 kids) as well as the IMPIRE
area kids (150 kids).
We have our own cloth­ing fac­to­ry with 2 sewing machines at our base. Two
men work pro­duce 20 outfits/day.
Orga­niz­ing cloth­ing to the 900+ kids in the Bala­ma area is no small job.

ALL 500 WIDOWS in the Bala­ma area have received hoes and machettes thanks
to a cor­por­tate donor who gave gen­er­ous­ly for this program.
The Melu­co Coun­ty wid­ows will be receiv­ing their hoes and machettes this
com­ing week.

Our goal is to give a HAND UP and not just a HAND OUT to those in need.
These tools, plus the corn and bean seeds to be dis­trib­uted in November,
will make it pos­si­ble for these teenage orphans and the wid­ows that care
for them to plant their own fields in the first step to becoming
inde­pen­dent of our food distributions.

Keep your prayers coming!
We appre­ci­ate ALL OF YOU and YOUR LOVE GIFTS that make this pro­gram a
reality.
Love in Christ,
Bush Bun­ny Brenda