Not every Negative has to be a Negative .

hello hello!!

so todays blog i dont think will be so long, but you never know my fingers get key happy when i start to write these things !! hhah

so this week has not had the best start in the world ! Yesterday one of our babies died. She was 8 months old and perfectly healthy and beautiful and chubby!! We dont know what caused it all we know is she had a high fever that put her into having sesures  and then she passed from internal bleeding.. So with the doctors not having enough technology we don't know what killed her and we probably wont find out... it hurts my heart a lot becuse we have lost a baby before but she was very ill and we all knew she was going to pass. But this baby was perfect she never had any problems she was happy healthy 8 month old baby.. It was hard .. 

I find that as a western country we are very sheltered from death.. It isn't a common thing for people around you to die so often, we aren't used to it. As for me i have lost very few people in my life, and have never seen a dead body before. 

We had a funeral and an open casket  for her. She was the first dead body i have seen. It was impossible not to break down because she looks how she looked when she goes to sleep but i had to remind myself she wasn't asleep.. I didnt react to it well .. my stomach turned and i had to go to the washroom and throw up. 

It was a hard day for us all , especially when you put so much time into a baby trying to raise them to be a future leader and a wonderful person and you loose them.. 

But i dont want to look at her death as a negative. At first me and the girls all we could say was why.. God why did you need to have her so young.. But honestly.. It isn't up to us.. It never was. We are just passing through on this earth.. its up to God when we go.. And he was looking at her and he said its time, i want her to come to me. And who are we to ask his reasons.

 So i like to think to myself of the positive. she was a happy fat baby who loved her food and loved to play in the water, so i know she is in heavin now playing in the water and eating all the food she wants with jesus right by her side. So it is hard to think that an innocent soul was taken, But in the end we should really look at her and be like '' wow, she is so lucky she gets to be with jesus'' so i can't say i didn't cry and question and wish she was still here.. But now im happy and im at peace with everything that has happened.. and i think through time we all will. We will say her name and laugh and picture a little naked girl playing in the water with more rolls then you can count and smile knowing she is with jesus now !

 The pastor also wrote a story and he wrote it about what she is doing in heavin right now, and it was nice at the end he said when it is our time we will go to heavin and we will see her singing on the choir praising god with all the angels, and she wil run to us and jump into our arms and thank us for taking her to this point until she got to go home to God. That was all we needed to hear to lift our spirits and be happy and rather than mourn, be happy and celebrate. And i think thats something we should all think of when we think of our loved ones who have passed. think of all the fun there having up there, and think of how there just arranging a good spot for you till the day God decides to take you home. 

So enough about death or celebration of life, but things have since almost looked up, it has taught us all to appreciate everything in these babies and every moment we get to teach them and direct them towards god and love them. Even though they fart and sneeze on you, and they always bight my knees and kick me and slap me, there wonderful!

 let me tell you they really test my patients but since that funeral i have learned to be calm. we have one baby who was mad at me and slapped me, but when she was done i hugged her and kissed her.. took all my strength but i had to remember were these babies come from, i have no idea the things they have seen growing up before they got here. So i have to love on them and show them how to love until the last day i have with them! 

so i guess since this whole thing has happened i am learning how short life is, and learning that God has us here for a purpose and everything that makes you angry you need to turn it around with love. 

A prime example would be our cleaning lady, we have had a lot of problems with her lately and it has caused us not to talk to her anymore and to almost ignore her and today i was home alone and i was about to watch a movie, and she was scrubbing our toilet and i went to her and asked her if she wanted to take a break and watch a movie with me. Man did her face light up, and she did she watched the movie with me and it was nice to sit with her and have peace and forget about the past issues and just have a nice day together. Now of course i can't tell my roommies i let her stop working to watch a movie but i think it was needed. We need to show gods love every second we can cause you never know when that second will be over. So watching a movie with her on a tv she most likely does not have back at her home just made her day, she was smiling and singing worship songs the rest of the day while she cleaned, and she cleaned the house better then i have ever seen ! So it was really nice. 

So its been hard but i learn something new every day. sometimes not in a positive way.. like a baby passing randomly, or a child drinking dirty water, or a 10 year old  girl left to take care of her baby sister alone.. It is not always positive, but God takes those things and makes us learn something amazing out of them, and puts a seed and hopes you will take what you have learnt and do something truly amazing with it. As soon as we see all these things and allow ourselves to look to God in all the bad and learn from negative things is the sooner we will grow and accomplish truly amazing things for him! 

There is so much to do out there, its not even doing something drastic like coming to Africa, There is so much more than that..there is an opportunity everyday.  There is smiling to the trainee at tim hortans who totally just made your black coffee a triple triple and telling her its okay we all make mistakes and give her a tip.. ( i know tough right.. ) or its seeing that bum on the street and giving them the extra change in your pocket even though i know all of you walk past a bum and say '' they just want the money to buy booze'' trust me i have done it, and maybe they do. But atleast you were selfless enough in that moment to show love to someone who wants alchohol so bad that they would sit on the street and beg for it! hahah ! so i dont really know what i just said in my blog i think my hands went crazy i dont even know if it all made sense! but hopefully it did and you guys liked it ! and hopefully it put a smile on your face and maybe even taught you something :) love you all much much ! and hope no one messes up your coffee this morning !! :P 

xoxoxooxoxo

children of God

Hello all !  

so i have decided to update my blog a little sooner then i normally would because i feel like to much has happened to just let it sit for a while .. i dont want to forget all the good details !

so yesterday we went into a village in gulu to hand out clothing and groceries to in need families. this village is is all mud hutts and naked children and women because they cannot afford clothes,

we got all these groceries simply from fundraising money over a group on face book while we were all here in africa, we raised about 400 dollars and that got us enough clothes to cloth 600 children and enough groceries to feed 200 families 

so we organized the whole event wiht the pastor in the community church and he helped us and got local volunteers to help us distribute the clothes and groceries to prevent riots. it was amazing to see there selflessness in helping us we would have been lost without them.

 it was so much fun we got to go into the church with all the kids and teach them canadian and american childrens songs and dance with them it was wonderful ! we then later had them all sit and we personally went through and distributed all the the clothes to each children ! and let me tell you it was amazing , it was so wonderful to walk up to a little boy with ripped pants and no shirt and hand him a brand new pair of jeans, or to the girl who is to old to have a shirt ripped in the chest and hand her a new shirt to cover her. there faces just lit over one peace of clothing. It was beautiful but it was for sure madness ! it was a little stressful handing out clothing to 600 people, but i wouldnt have traded any minute of it. 

Later we then got a chance to go out into the comunity and personally hand the groceries to each family and ask them if they would like prayer. now think as a canadian if someone knocked on your door with food and said here can i pray for you? please just picture your reaction.. well for them it was oposite they invited me in. into there mud hut where they had nothing but ratty chairs and dirt floor and a little hand held radio the size of my i pod. i wont forget one lady who said yes but one moment and runs into her house and sweeps then invites me in and fluffs the pillow on her chair and lets me sit down for me to pray for her. it was so beautiful to see the love that they have even though they know that i we have more money if we are able to come to there country but they are not threatened and treat me like an imposter they invite me in and welcome me and offer me little but to them its everything they have. it was truly beautiful experience .. so we got to go to many houses and prayed for many people . the most beautiful experience the whole time was we had a mob of probably 100 children who just followed the whole time we went mud hut to mud hut they ran behind and waited outside every door, and while we would walk they would try and all hold my hand i had kids hanging off me i would be holding hands with a kid in each hand and there would be others holding my fingers , wrists , arms, back pockets , my waist. it was so beautiful I loved it. because to them simple thing like smiling and holding there hand will stick with them forever , they wont forget those things. so later we got the chance just to hangout with the kids, i taught them typical canadian hand shakes and taught them to pound it, now let me tell you i have never seen kids giggle so hard as they do when they give you there first high five , the minute you put your hand up to high five one kid they are attacked by 400 others wanting to get a high five as well. it was awesome ! i truly had a blast doing it. . they also invited us back to there church on sunday to sing some more songs with the church ! so we are going to go back another sunday to do that with them! we think its important to follow up with them, after giving them so much now the important thing is to build relationships and that accountability. so we are going to work hard for that ! 

I learnt a lot today about those kids and i have learned not to be bitter anymore at there life style and not to be sad and hate myself for having all the things i do, because the things we have are gifts from god, and its not if we use them that we are bad people it is if we apprectiate and understand how lucky we are to have these things and remember to give thanks to God when ever we can for all the great things we have.. but i have also learned that its not that god thinks any less of these people and likes us more or thinks we can better handle the money or deserve it more, . he sais in the bible blessed are the poor. and you know it is true. they are searching for god, and one day when they are in heavin they will be so blessed by god because of the battles they have been through .. god hasnt forgotten about these people. if anything he has specially focused on them to have people like us who personally go to see them to teach them about him so they can one day be in heavin,.. he loves all those kids and its making them see that that is the most exciting and hardest part of it all.. i found i was taught that a lot that God loves everyone but do you really remember that, when your sitting and a commercial for a starving kid comes on i think God why? why them? but he has a plan for them just as he does for us.. so really if you look at poverty i dont see it and be sad, i see it as a challenge sent from god. A challenge to look at my life and analyse the things i do, and see what is in front of me and realise what i can do to help these kids. so my challenge now is to not give up, i work at the babies home everyday but its not enough.. i wont rest. im going to keep searching for more things to do like we did today and we are going to keep going to that community to work with the kids and speak to more people about god. ITS GUNNA BE GREAT GUYS . its not about making up money and throwing it at them and buying them things, of course it helps but i learned today sometimes the biggest things to them is what you already have inside you. like taking time to play with them and teach them how to high five, that meant more to those kids than any kind of money. 

so i am learning a lot since being here and my whole outlook on life changes more every single day, and my appreciation for things changes everyday also. so i wanted to share that with you what im learning and hope to encourage you all! i wish you all could have been there today. those kids smiling at you is the biggest high you could ever have. God really does shine through those kids. it was amazing! so everyone keep praying please we need it here ! and also good news if you havent heard obama HAS FINNALLY sent in US troops to uganda and the congo to search and fight against the rebels and joseph coney! THIS IS SUCH AN ANSWER TO SO MANY PRAYERS SERIOUSLY A MIRACLE .. they have been begging that the states would set in for years becuse with there technology they can catch the rebels easy! so they have finally set in and i pray pray they find joseph cony! and rescue all those child souldiers ! so there is a happiness in the country right now! people are really excited about this so we will have to pray that it fixes things and doesnt further create more problems like a potential new war over it. so we hope it will be ok !! as for now im super excited this should be good. if anyone doesnt know who joseph coney is and doesnt kno about the war with child souldiers in uganda google it, it will change your life. 

so thanks guys for all your support and prayers, i would be done without it ! i hope you enjoyed the blog, i hope i didnt get to teacher on ya. just want you all to see where i am here. hahaha and thats it ! :) 

finally feeling at home :)

Hey all !


This is blog now number two ! So I named this post finally at home. I have a reason! 
I have been in Uganda for 3 weeks officially yesterday. Let me tell you, it is insane moving to a country that is so culturally different than everything I am used to, I mean its one thing to be away from my family for more than a week but its another thing to go from driving on cement roads everywhere I go to catching a boda-boda ( motorcycle ) on dirt roads with people selling me bananas off a basket sitting on there head! So its safe to say the culture shock was the most insane part. I have been to foreign countries before but it is a very different situation when you are living with these people and having the same type of lifestyle as them. Waking up in the morning going to work where they work. Walking the streets they walk. Going to church every sunday with them, getting to know them and seeing that they all are dirty and some don't have anything but they are the most beautiful people I have ever come across in my life. Every word they say you want to know more about them. 
So when i first came here i had to deal with the culture shock and with being alone and learning to find my way in a foreign country that for some reason at times it made me feel younger. I felt lost like a child. Through time the issues became blessings its wonderful here, and after 3 weeks i have finally become completely comfortable with where i am and i am so happy im here and i thank God every day that i am. I am here for a reason and i can't wait for Gods plan. So i guess you could say im home :) I am happy , im comfortable, i feel safe, im making beautiful friends and lots of African mommy's. what can i say ... IM A LOCAL :P


So as for life lately, I can't write a whole lot on the things that have been happening at work because since i wrote my post the last time i have only worked once because i have been sick so much ! I am okay now ! So i will write little blerbs of random stories ! Hope you don't get confused :) 


My roommate is on a little trip away now with the rescue team they go to a village far from here that is very poor and witness to people there. While being there she actually found a baby! The babies mother is mentally ill and taking care of this baby. So she called us and we have worked all the details out and she will be taking the baby with her when she comes home !! So we have a new addition to the watoto family next week !! I am so excited. 


The other day i had a nanny tell me '' i love your shirt where did you get it '' well me confused since it was a plain plaid shirt that every single canadian teenager over wears all the time i said uh.. canada.. and she responded '' i wish that i could shop for beautiful blouces like that, you know i will make lots of money one day and shop in canada and i will buy lots of those shirts'' I was so shocked by that because i have like four plaid shirts and i dont wear them ever but to her it was a beautiful shirt. So i have made the choice when i am done at this location i am going to leave her that plaid shirt , plus others with it. She needs it more then i do!  CANT WAIT TO SEE HER FACE :)


Lastly ... yesterday a baby was diagnosed with cerebral palsy , he is only 1 and a half months old which is so insane ! he is being sent to the city on friday to be better treated and then they are allowing him to be put for adoption through watoto. Watoto doesn't normally let children be adopted only when they have medical issues that they could benifit and be better treated for there issue in a western country that is more evolved and can give them a better chance at survival, so we will have to pray that there is a family that will adopt him because here in africa they can treat him but they don't have nearly enough technology that america or canada would have to treat him! 


Also all of our clothes that we got for the village have come in ! We have enough garments to cloth 600 children ! We also got enough groceries to feed 200 families ! So this is so amazing and we are so excited about it, we are hopefully going to be handing it all out next week so i will have to let you know how it goes !! 


So everything is good in Africa right now , things are amazing my roommates are truly amazing people and i would be lost without them, they were a God sent for sure ! God is doing amazing things in this country, he turns something around everyday. 
My biggest fears in coming here would be that i wouldn't be used in lots of ways and i wouldn't fit in and i would hate my roommates and those things haunted me at night when i would go to bed, but God had a plan all along, I have never been happier and felt more alive.. there is a whole other world here that living my life in Canada im sad that i had no idea about it! So i am taking every chance i get to learn about this country and the people because they all have a story meant to be heard and they are all beautiful to God, they have nothing and yet they are the happiest people. We as christians and people could learn a lot from the way they live ! Even having running water in your house is a blessing ! Take it from me, I had to hold in my pee for an 8 hour shift at work cause they have no running water.. I also saw a little boy today sitting over a creek of dirty water and he filled his water bottle and before he drank his bottle of brown water he got down on his knees and thanked God for it.. His filthy brown water full of germs... I have never wanted to cry so much in my life..So i hope you all remember everything you have is such a blessing and a gift from God. You may not see it but it truly is.. the small things in life are small to you, but huge to other people across the world. 
Well powers out and my candles about to burn out so im off to bed!! I hope you all enjoyed my blog!!! Have good day everyone :)


ps.. hopefully i didnt make to many spelling mistakes this time !! 

2 weeks in counting in the country I love.. Uganda

Hey everyone !! 

So I know a lot of you have been wondering what is happening on my trip and rather than messaging you each individually I have decided to start a blog! I will update it maybe twice a week and fill you guys in on all the amazing things happening in my life ! 

So shall we begin !

I am not sure where to start! I have been here for just over two weeks now , and to say it has been amazing would be an understatement , this country is full of beauty and life, and so many wonderful people who have been waiting for people like us to come and change there lives. So my first week I was here I was living in a city called Kampala . It was a beautiful but crazy insane city ! I like to call it Toronto gone wrong ! The driving was insane, you walk down a one way street and you have to look both ways because you cant trust any of the drivers. A round about is 6 lanes in Kampala. There is no street lights or stop signs just police men guiding traffic. It was wild and crazy but a good experience to start off there and get the crazy over with before i settled to anything else. So I worked in a babies home there. They had mostly ill babies since it was a city it was where they could get the most treatment so when village babies are sick they are sent to this babies home. I saw so much in that babies home that in a normal life i would never see ! I saw a 2 year old we called him big joe who had an eating problem that when he ate he would gain insane amounts. needless to say he was 60 pounds at 2 years old. He was very sick and was under constant watch because he was growing way to much for his health. There was also another baby her name was Hope, she was a new born premature baby born at 5 months in the womb, she weighed 100 grams when she was born and was alive for a month and was only loosing, i have never seen such a small baby, she ended up passing away. It was hard on the babies home but we all know she is in a better place. 

So normally when you come into this program you are to stay one month in Kampala and then you are sent to another village. So we had our monthly meeting when i was only there a week and they said things are confusing we will call everyone tomorow and let you know where your being sent, but vanessa dont panic your here another 3 weeks to finish your one month. So everyone else pack just incase. So i prayed that night and said God send me where you want me to go..
 I got a call the next morning saying '' we have never done this and im not sure why but your being sent to Gulu '' So it wasn't even that it was insane I was leaving since i had only been there a week, but the more crazy part is only people who have been here for 2 or 3 months are sent to Gulu because it is 5 hours away and out of the spot light and they cant check up on you so they only send trust worthy people.. 

So my roommates were confused especially since the one girl who has been here a month ended up staying in Kampala. So everyone didnt understand and calls were being made on my behalf trying to figure it out and people were telling me i wouldn't end up being sent cause they made a mistake probably messed up the names, so i skyped my mom and little sister that day very upset and they gave me amazing scripture to look at and i prayed to god and said i will be obedient i will go where you need me... whatever happens i will follow you...

needless to say IM IN GULU !!!!!

So it's been insane ! There is a reason i'm here, God switched to many rules around to send me here for no reason ! So now im just waiting to see how it all plays out. But so far im in love with this village. It is Africa. It is beautiful and has so much history! I am not sure if you all know about the war that happened here in Uganda with the LRA and the child soldiers but if you do , it all happened in the village im living in wich is so insane but so amazing !! 
so i work at a babies home here with beautiful children i love, 

i met a five year old boy here whos little brother is also here who is about 8 months i believe, and he is always checking up on his brother he always leaves his group to see him he helps change and feed and put him to bed, he is an amazing brother and at only five i had to know why he was the way he is. So i asked a nanny and she told me they found Joseph and dont his little brother in a mud hut, there mother was dead they think about two weeks dead and they found the little brother latched onto his dead mothers breast trying to breast feed from her... Turns out she died of aids which both boys have as well. In the two weeks joseph took care of his little brother and kept them alive, so that is why he is so protective over his brother. 

Every kid in this babies home and every person on the street has a wonderful story and I want to know them all. The war only ended 5 years ago so logically most people living in this village experienced it. Im often fighting myself trying to just walk past people even though I want to ask them all about there story!!  

So we have made an apt with invisible children, they are an organization who works with rescued child soldiers and sends them to school and we hope to get a tour and see the schools and meet some of the children. My roommate also has sponsored one of the child soldiers for a year now i believe so she hopes to meet him ! We are also going on a tour of living hope which is a organization for women who were victims of the war, and they give them work and they work with them to re gain dignity. They make dresses and bags and lots of beautiful things !! 
Since being here we have also started fund raising for a village in town, it is small and it's name translated to english means grave yard village because it is so poor. My roommate started this and has raised about 300$ and we are going to buy big bags of clothes and groceries and we have paired up with a donation agency who will help us hand it all out at the village and make an event out of it to prevent riots and fights. So some super cool things are going on here and I cant wait for it all to happen. Although i am working with these babies all day it is not enough so me and the roommates are going to continue to do stuff like this, there is to much need in uganda to only do one thing and hope everything is better. God has to much of a plan for this country and we will fight to see it happen!!  

SO from here i will keep you posted !! :)

JOB 5:8&9 - But if i where you i would appeal to God i would lay my cause before him. He preforms wonders that cannot be fathomed, Miracles that  cannot be counted.

I read this verse almost every night to remind myself at the end of the day im tired and i feel like working with these babies and being puked on is really not doing anything for the country but i read this and i remember patients, and that God preforms amazing miracles and me being here is one, and now i just have to work and do what i can and be all i can be through god and i will witness more and more miracles everyday. Because seeing this village called the grave yard may be over welming but with gods help me and the roommies are going to change it.

OH and ps.. My roommate has spoken with the pastor of a church there and they have teamed up to get the name of that village changed !!!!! HOW COOL IS THAT, so i will be behind her every step. Names are important and we want to encourage life in that village and not have them reminded every day of the negative. 

I HOPE YOU ALL ENJOYED MY LONG BLOG I will post more in  a couple of days :):)

MUCH LOVE FROM AFRICA!

and thank you all again who supported me, everyday im grateful that i can be here.