Newsletter Christmas 2003

To my dear friends, family and supporters,

I am again sending warm Christmas greetings out from Fort Portal Uganda. It is amazing as it feels as if we just finished Christmas, yet it has been a full year. I have enjoyed many visitors from California, Colorado, Ireland, Canada and other places. It is always encouraging and just plain fun having folks come here. I have one lady who is still with me and is planning to work here long term. She is currently searching for a house to rent.

I also traveled again in October. I visited friends in England, Ireland and Germany, where I was received with wonderful welcomes everywhere. It was a good time of strengthening old friendships and making new friends. I really enjoyed the beautiful fall scenery in all three countries, even though it felt very cold for me.

It has been a sad year as well; loosing two children to malaria and three mothers to AIDS. The number of people dying of AIDS is alarming with more and more child-headed families left. We are trying to help these families in all ways to strengthen them. The children are all sent to school and we also take care of medical costs. The ongoing malaria is the highest expense with the medical care.

We are now in the process of evaluating families who will be capable of handling projects of chickens, goats and pigs. This will not only increase the nutrition level, but give an added income to assist in the needs of these large families. With other families, we have helped cultivate larger areas and planted more food.

With some generous donations, we have bought many mosquito nets, blankets, beds and mattresses for families. This will give them protection from mosquitoes that carry malaria, and also give them warm and comfortable places to sleep.

Along with the material support families receive, we strive to give them spiritual support. We tell them that it is God's love that touches people to care for them so that they are now being helped. We try to teach them that each one is very special and that they have a friend in Jesus who will never let them down, no matter what happens in this sometimes crazy world.

Last Christmas a friend gave out Bibles out of donations from her church. The kids were excited to receive them and several students have accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Savior. In another situation, a family of Moslems came to Christ. We all celebrated that day!

My field worker, Amos has kept busy keeping track of our many families and my office assistant, Rose, who assists with the translations and entering daily expenditures, is also working hard. I am so grateful for the help these two give. Rose has completed a data base of all of the families and scholarship students and we now have detailed statistics that we can access. I was surprised to discover that the total count of children being assisted is up to 503 and growing daily. There are 115 families on the program and 145 students receiving scholarship assistance with each term. There are three terms in a school year. I praise and thank God for the miraculous growth we are seeing in the program.

Let me close with a very big thank you to all of you for your prayers and assistance and your encouraging letters. All of us on the staff and the children and care givers too, wish all of you a very blessed and special Christmas and prosperous New Year.

With love and gratitude, Carol Adams

PS I have exciting news. I have purchased a new (for me) vehicle. It is also a Suzuki, but much newer and MUCH more comfortable to drive. God is so good and I am thrilled to have such a wonderful car. I had planned to send a photo of it with this news letter, but I started thinking that if emails bounce back, so will the picture, and that it will be a huge problem downloading it.

Back
Home