Introduction God continues to do marvelous things for Lulwanda Children’s Home. We thank you all for your continued love and commitment to the children of Uganda. You are a great blessing and have turned the bad fortunes of many into real hope for a good future. We pray for you every day.   Children Despite the increased food prices you have been faithful in sending us the funds to ensure that we continue to make all the effort to provide all the necessary meals to all the children. From our heart we say thank you for standing with us even in such hard financial times that many are currently experiencing.   Health With the onset of rains came; cough, malaria and flu. However, we still manage some of these illnesses on site using our first aid kit.  The search for an appropriate medical worker is going on and there are some applicants who are promising.

School We are in the final stages of completing the school fence and its gates. This has already increased the safety of the children at school and the school environment.   Effort is being made to encourage our teachers to teach particularly the semi candidate class as there is much at stake. However, we are hopeful for better grades when our children take the national examinations next year.   The Library usage is going up as the staff and children make every opportunity to use the facility. The Internee Students from Nyondo Core PTC completed their internship after five weeks of intensive teaching and developing many teaching aides. Those 12 ladies made a good impression to the children and contributed immensely to the teaching and teaching environment at the school. A Good working relationship with the college was established and the school was promised to be considered for more such internees in the future.

Home Inspection Towards the end of the month under review, the home was officially inspected by a district team that included the probation officer and the director of Community Based Services.   Farming We harvested the first piece of rice which we had dug on a pilot basis. The harvest was encouraging. We are yet to establish how many kilograms we received. We are yet to harvest other portions and maize.   The goats/cows and pigs are doing well and we are optimistic for a better yield as we come to the end of the year.  We continue to make effort to open the farmland and make it productive. Although it is still challenging we are determined   Staff Some staff members fell sick and as I write this, Harriet Sanyu is still sick could you please pray for her. Some members lost relatives, among whom is Florence who lost a niece and was buried at her home. Nusura lost her sister in law and travelled to Mbarara for burial.   All the four mothers had their week on duty and their weekend off in the course of the month under review.  We received a new set of guards to continue with the work of providing the much needed security of the children’s home and its facilities.

Notable visitors During the Good Neighbor fellowship, the home hosted the Minister of Gender, Labour and Social Development Honorable Gabriel Opio. He was accompanied by the District Secretary for Women and Children Affairs and the director of Community Service.  The Minister promised to do what he can to help Lulwanda Children’s home officially registered by the Government of Uganda in addition to renewing the memorandum of understanding that GICF has with the government which expired in March 2009.   The Children donated some wheel chairs to the Minister to give the most deserving disabled fellow children in his constituency   Team of CDC child counselor trainees from Tororo, visited the home for two consecutive days. As part of their training and practicum, they counseled 24 children and documented some of their concerns. With the consent of some children, they gave the administration some feed back. Some of the issues raised are being worked upon to ensure that all our children are comfortable.   The Good Neighbor The Home welcomed the community children who came early, and provided breakfast. Time for games and fellowship was refreshing and after the Minister left, children had a time to play different games together. Later as they were leaving they were given a health kit and this included; a tin of Vaseline, a bar of soap, tooth paste and tooth brushes.

Children Visited Samwiri received his sponsor Michelle from Australia who visited for a day and came with some gifts for him. Pete Massa, Araft Munyafu and Phoeb Namono were all visited by their next of kin.   Joint Management committee In the course of the month we had a joint Management committee meeting. Here a number of issues were discussed and members agreed to meet again in the month of November 2009 to plan for the next year 2010.   Audit 2008 The Audit was completed in July 2009 and it shall be presented to the Management committee in November meeting.   Future projects Our desire is to look ahead now and see what God will do for a secure future of the home and its children. We continue to trust Him for we know is able to take us through. However, the management committee is working to come up with business plans for the Primary School and the farm once these are done, other business plans for the health unit and viability studies for other projects being considered shall be brought to your attention for possible support.