FROM “BUSH BUNNY BRENDA”
DATE: MARCH 3, 2018

IT TAKES A VILLAGE
Car­ing for the needs of 100+ orphans and their 30 sub­sti­tute moth­ers (wid­ows), is a big job that can’t be done with­out mas­sive team work. Our small staff of 7 have mul­ti­ple duties and every­one pitch­es in to do “what­ev­er it takes” to keep the chil­dren healthy and happy.

Wom­en’s Pas­tor Domini­ca help­ing cook lunch on our super size rock­et stove because a moth­er is sick.

Pas­tor Fred and our guard repair a localy made “rope” bed for a orphan in the village.

Fos­ter Moth­er Bal­bi­na “shop­ping” for pump­kins. She calls oth­er moth­ers to come buy when she finds a bargain.

Fos­ter Father Esteven and Granny Ati­ja show­ing off the gar­den that their orphans helped them make. GARDEN SEEDS a gift from Syrah/Twigg employ­ees (graphite mine) at Christmas.

YOU CAN HELP OUR ORPHANS BY SHOPPING SMILE.AMAZON!
(no cost to you)
Orphans Unlim­it­ed is reg­is­tered with SMILE.AMAZON so that our part­ners who shop AMAZON could ben­e­fit our chil­dren with every pur­chase at NO EXTRA COST. THANK YOU to all of you who now par­tic­i­pate for our chil­dren are ben­e­fit­ing! You “went the extra mile”, and this Ama­zon check is now help­ing us to help the children.

Those checks could real­ly grow if our part­ners and those they know would shop at SMILE.AMAZON. Your fam­i­ly, friends, and fel­low work­ers at your com­pa­ny could part­ner with us at no cost to them just by doing their reg­u­lar Ama­zon shop­ping and link­ing to Orphans Unlim­it­ed through the Amazon.Smile program

FROM MARCH 12 TO 31ST, SMILE.AMAZON will TRIPLE their dona­tion on your first purchase.

At SMILE.AMAZON you find the exact items/low prices you do at Amazon.
Dif­fer­ence: Ama­zon just donates a por­tion of the pur­chase price to your cho­sen char­i­ty, at no cost to you.

Your exist­ing Amazon.com account works on SMILE.AMAZON. Your shop­ping cart, Wish List, wed­ding or baby reg­istry, and oth­er account set­tings are also the same.

TO BENEFIT ORPHANS UNLIMITED CHILDREN
Go to: smile.amazon.com/ch/04–3717267
if you don’t like click­ing links, go to Amazon.com like you nor­mal­ly do and search for Ama­zon­S­mile. You’ll find direc­tions for search­ing for us, Orphans Unlim­it­ed, and choos­ing us as your charity.
Then just remem­ber to do your nor­mal Ama­zon shop­ping through their Smile por­tal and we will get a small por­tion of what­ev­er you spend. It is com­plete­ly anony­mous and Ama­zon won’t tell us what you bought or even WHO is link­ing us to their pur­chas­es. It’s just a love­ly, anony­mous sur­prise check for our kids!

TOGETHER, WE ARE MAKING A DIFFERENCE TO OVER 2000 ORPHANS DAILY.
BLESSINGS,
BUSH BUNNY BRENDA LANGE
AND THE BALAMA STAFF

PTL, BABY ARMANDO SURVIVES MALARIA!

Baby Arman­do, 7 weeks old, mirac­u­lous­ly over­came his malar­ia, and was released from the hos­pi­tal Mon­day, (Feb. 13th). In addi­tion to the malar­ia, he was fight­ing an upper res­pi­ra­to­ry tract infection.This, too, is now GONE after prayer and antibi­ot­ic treat­ment at home. My thanks to all of you for your prayers for this lit­tle guy, and to the 2 fos­ter moth­ers who alter­nat­ed stay­ing with him at the hos­pi­tal, pro­vid­ing excel­lent 24 hour care.

Baby Arman­do tak­ing a wel­comed nap after leav­ing the hospital.

PREMATURE BABY CONSTANTINO NEEDS OUR PRAYERS.

Weight:  1.4kg  (3 lbs) at 19 days of age, means this lit­tle tyke needs to feed and grow. He is total­ly healthy, just very small since his moth­er has no breast milk due to a breast abscess. With the Lord’s help, our staff will help these con­cerned par­ents to pro­vide all that this lit­tle one needs.

Tiny Con­stan­ti­no. Note that the bot­tle cov­ers more than half his body.

TINY TWIN GIRLS NEED URGENT PRAYER

The twin’s father and his best friend rode 18 km (11 miles) TODAY on a bor­rowed bicy­cle from Mavala  (The Man­go Tree Church Vil­lage), to BEG a can of milk for his 6 day old infants.   The man’s wife per­ished dur­ing their birth on Jan. 12th, leav­ing these 2 tiny girls of 1.8 kg (3.8 lb) and and 1.7kg (3.7 lb) in their grandmother’s care. One was born just BEFORE mid­night on Jan. 11th in Bala­ma, and the oth­er an hour lat­er in the Mon­tepuez hos­pi­tal (60 km/36 miles away), due to com­pli­ca­tions. I gave them a can of for­mu­la and a 100mts. ($1.50 or R18) so the grand­moth­er and father could ride the local “cha­pa” (taxi) on Mon­day to bring them to Bala­ma. A fam­i­ly mem­ber must present the twins at Social Ser­vices in the Bala­ma Hos­pi­tal for prop­er reg­is­tra­tion. Once this is done, we will pro­vide these 2 lit­tle girls with for­mu­la and baby clothes for the father can­not afford the mar­ket prices.

NOTE:  The father received 2 cans of baby for­mu­la and 2 baby bot­tles from the Mon­tepuez hos­pi­tal to get them start­ed. We are so hap­py that this man “did what it takes” to pro­vide for his 2 lit­tle girls BEFORE they ran out of milk. So many wait until the milk is gone, caus­ing the baby to suf­fer greatly.

FACT TO REMEMBER:  When an infant cries, it burns lots of calo­ries, and thus, los­es weight.  Tiny infants can­not afford to cry, for they have no body weight to lose.  Keep­ing them well fed and hap­py helps them gain weight at a faster rate.

YOUR LOVE GIFTS AT WORK!    PROVIDING BABY FORMULA, BOTTLES, AND BABY CLOTHES SAVES MANY INNOCENT LITTLE LIVES.

UNWELCOMED RAT EATER MEETS HIS DEMISE!

This morn­ing our brick lay­ers were walk­ing past our kitchen, when they spot­ted a 60 cm (2 ft.) ADDER (rat­tlesnake fam­i­ly) as it tried to cross in front of them. Our worker’s mot­to is:  “the only good snake is a dead snake”.  In the blink of an eye, one of the brick­lay­ers grabbed the 12 foot (4 m) bam­boo we keep at the kitchen for this very rea­son, and beat it to death as it tried to climb our sand pile.

Adder meets bam­boo rod and los­es, even in soft sand.

Adders are not fast mov­ing, but they “strike like light­ing” with great accu­ra­cy and their fangs full of dead­ly ven­om. Nev­er take any snake for grant­ed in Africa for 99.9% of them can spit far­ther and move faster than you can react. Keep­ing one’s eyes open, espe­cial­ly at dawn and dusk, can save your life.

Bless­ings,

Bush Bun­ny Bren­da Lange

And the Bala­ma Staff

MIRACLE HEALINGS IN NAMARA DISTRICT

Our 2 Pas­tors in Nama­ra Dis­trict, 24 miles (40 km) to the south of Bala­ma, report­ed 4 mir­a­cle heal­ings after pray­ing for the sick in dif­fer­ent locations.

Pas­tor Alber­to reports heal­ings and 25 new believ­ers in Namuno churches

A man who suf­fered from Bil­harzia (par­a­site infes­ta­tion of the blad­der caus­ing bleed­ing and mas­sive loss of ener­gy) showed no blood in his urine and regained strength over the next 3 days fol­low­ing prayer! Med­ical fact: Even with prop­er med­ica­tion, Bil­harzia is a tough par­a­site to erad­i­cate and the bloody urine does not dis­ap­pear with­in 3 days after treatment.

Two oth­ers were deliv­ered from chron­ic back pain and stom­ach prob­lems, while a 3rd per­son became pain free after suf­fer­ing chron­ic headaches for 5 years! Praise Jesus for all of this, and I pray for a greater anoint­ing on these 2 Pas­tors as they con­tin­ue to evan­ge­lize in this very remote area.

TWO INFANTS HOSPITALIZED WITH MALARIA THIS WEEK

Mon­day ear­ly a.m. found us urgent­ly admit­ting Baby Arman­do, 6 weeks old, with malar­ia. This is seri­ous as babies this age do not weigh enough to use the nor­mal treat­ments, so he had to be giv­en IV Qui­nine. He is still in hos­pi­tal with a pos­i­tive malar­ia smear after 4 days of treatment.

On Tues­day after­noon, Baby Jac­in­ta, 5 months old, was also admit­ted for a pos­i­tive malar­ia smear. She weighs just over the 5kg (11 lb.) lim­it, and could receive the nor­mal IV treat­ments. Jac­in­ta was released Thurs­day after­noon to con­tin­ue oral treat­ment at home for the next 3 days.

Both of these babies came to us in a very frag­ile, mal­nour­ished con­di­tion, which decreas­es their resis­tance to every sick­ness. Please keep them both in your prayers this week.

Malar­ia is on the increase in our area due to the rains slack­ing off in the last 2 weeks, allow­ing the mos­qui­tos to breed and flour­ish. All our chil­dren and moth­ers sleep under mos­qui­to nets, but any­one out­side after 4pm can become infect­ed as that is when the mos­qui­tos begin feed­ing. We thank you for your prayers for all our chil­dren for malar­ia is ram­pant through­out all of Africa in the rainy season.

Crossed a riv­er and walked 5 miles with his vil­lage orphans to fetch their school sup­plies and buy their shoes.

Pre­cious Soz­in­ho, 3 years old, demand­ed a back­pack for preschool.

WORK CONTINUES DESPITE HEAVY RAINS

Just as the US Post Office has their mot­to about deliv­er­ing mail in any weath­er, I believe our BBC and con­struc­tion teams deserve the same. THROUGH MUD, RAIN, AND DARK OF NIGHT, THE LORD’S WORK MUST BE DONE WITH MIGHT!

Our TREES OF RIGHTEOUSNESS.  The men reap­ing God’s harvest.

Our BBC and con­struc­tion teams of con­struc­tion work­ers faith­ful­ly arrive dai­ly before 5 a.m (still pitch dark) for our dai­ly devotions.

We do action songs, hear a mes­sage from God’s Word, then pray a bless­ing over all of them. The sky light­ens by the time we are done, and all go off to their respec­tive jobs.

Note:  Con­struc­tion made great progress as we con­tin­ued pour­ing floors, built a bath­room, and mount­ed win­dow frames at the new dorm this week.

Bless­ings,

Bush Bun­ny Bren­da Lange

And the Bala­ma staff

THE PITTER PATTER OF “HAPPY FEET” DANCING TO BAWANA GAMES

Every­thing needs sun­shine to stay healthy! Chil­dren, crops, and goats alike! Spots of dai­ly sun­shine “lit up” our chil­dren this week as the rains became more “nor­mal”.  After­noon or night show­ers are nor­mal for our rainy sea­son, and very good for the crops and the kids who seri­ous­ly need their morn­ing play time. (So say the fos­ter mothers!)

Bawana Games — bean bag toss

Today our chil­dren eager­ly played Bawana games on our bas­ket­ball court after 3 weeks of con­stant rain that can­celed most out­door activ­i­ties. Our teenage boys were busy hoe­ing up the grass on the soc­cer field. Can’t have grass slow­ing down the ball dur­ing the “After Church Soc­cer Game” on Sun­day! Over 200 peo­ple from the com­mu­ni­ty come to cheer on the teams dur­ing these soc­cer games pro­vid­ing fun and laugh­ter for every­one. It’s a great “fam­i­ly time” for all of us.

Now I hear that the Twigg (graphite mine) Team has chal­lenged us to a bas­ket­ball game. One prob­lem. We need a new bas­ket­ball so the boys can prac­tice. ($34 in Pemba.)

SCHOOL DAYS ARE ALMOST HERE

Bush Bunny’s liv­ing room is full to the brim with all the “school sup­plies” donat­ed by our friends at the Syrah/Twigg Graphite Mine. The “elves” from the Christ­mas Par­ty will join us this Fri­day to dis­trib­ute this moun­tain of school sup­plies to the 87 school age orphans liv­ing with us.

My over­flow­ing activ­i­ty room

The back packs are bright­ly print­ed with fun kid designs, as well as the zip up pen­cil hold­ers, and the easy to grip pen­cil sharpeners.

The items we can buy local­ly are pret­ty dull in com­par­i­son.  Our chil­dren saw these gifts at the Christ­mas Par­ty, and eager­ly await our Fri­day “fun time” when we out­fit them with every­thing they need for this school year.  It takes about 4 hours to out­fit this gang with  every­thing from uni­forms to pen­cil sharp­en­ers.  More next week as we gear up for the school year start­ing Feb. 5th.

PASTOR JOAQUIM’S HOME NOW ROOFED

Our sin­cere THANKS! goes out to those who gave spe­cial gifts to help us rebuild Pas­tor Joaquim’s home. By re-using some old tin sheets, we stretched those gifts to com­plete his roof this week for we didn’t have enough new tin sheets.

Pas­tor’s house with new roof

A team of 3 teens and 1 woman vol­un­teered to plas­ter the “pao-peeky” walls with mud this week to pro­vide secu­ri­ty and pri­va­cy. The fin­ish­ing work (final plas­ter­ing and water­proof­ing with oil paint) will be delayed until more funds are available.

Teen pow­er mud­ding Pas­tor’s house

BBC TEAMS ARE ON THE MOVE!

  (Our motor­bike and bicy­cle teams)

Because the heavy mud and rains kept the teams from going out the last 3 weeks, the vil­lage chil­dren thought they had been aban­doned for good (their tes­ti­mo­ny to the team). They went WILD with lots of scream­ing and danc­ing when the teams showed up this week. It’s nice to know that the chil­dren tru­ly appre­ci­ate the fun, atten­tion, and Jesus Love Lessons our teams pro­vide for them.

PASTOR FRED UPDATE

   (motor­cy­cle acci­dent victim)

Fred’s bro­ken leg received a new cast yes­ter­day as he com­plet­ed week 5 of his recov­ery.  Sad­ly, he will be anoth­er 3 weeks in the cast as his bones are still soft at the break site. (Both low­er leg bones were bro­ken just above the ankle). Please keep him in prayer for a com­plete and expe­dit­ed healing.

BLESSINGS TO ALL OF YOU AS WE WALK DAY BY DAY WITH OUR LORD JESUS!

BUSH BUNNY BRENDA LANGE

AND THE BALAMA STAFF