Highway Farm: Charity Update -We're supporting Uk charities & people in Malawi

2/2/13 UPDATE £37,108.00 raised for Charity.

See our charity page. http://www.highwayfarm.co.uk/

Thank you, thank you, thank you for your continued support.

2012 was again a busy year with lots of lovely guests to stay, many village activities, family do's and Arty workshops throughout. Also

Dorset Arts Week, it's a fortnight actually, in June when we hosted the
Allsorts Textiles Exhibition and garden cafe and .............
THE BRA FENCE, see blog on 6th Aug for bra's happenings and photos, and finally a busy Weekend Workshop with 80 ladies and a few brave men, making Xmas-wreaths to sell for Breakthrough, you may not have seen my blog about it the Workshop on 25th Nov as I forgot to publish it!
All have been fabulous, fun, and hilarious at times. Brilliant support from everyone, thank you.x
The Bra Fence raised £4000 for Breakthrough, Cancer Research and Malawi, and we collected 452 lovely shapely bra's which Lucy has distributed in Malawi.
The Xmas Wreaths rasied £1601, (£231 from Eype Market Makers), for BREAKTHROUGH, and continued sales of Highway Farm KISS Cookbooks £1000.
Total £6601.

At the Queen's Jubilee in June we were involved in our wonderful village celebration street party, everything patriotic and colourful in red, white and blue and a torchlight evening walk to the coastal path with hundreds of others to see Thorncombe Beacon lit.
Then of course the Olympics followed. We were very proud of Dorset and Weymouth who rose to the occasion, everything looked splendid and ran like clockwork as did London and the rest of the country. It was a terrific and amazing effort after our doubting and it was so enjoyable, even the weather shone and we were pleased we made the effort to visit and take part.

John and I celebrated Xmas in style at my sister's and boxing day with our excitable and lovable grandchildren, and then completed 2012 with a family trip to Malawi to visit daughter Lucy and hubby Simon. His parents came along too and we celebrated the New Year on the beautiful Likoma island in the middle of Lake Malawi, it was a very special trip. We had such a wonderful holiday and all got along brilliantly, how lucky are we! I'm so pleased we fitted in a trip before they leave Africa and so lovely to see Malawi green and lush, it was the rainy season, and the maize planted and growing, and that's so important as it's their main crop to feed their families.

Lucy & Simon after 7 years in Malawi now have a departure date to a new Tea destination. It's New Jersey in the USA! There awaits new and very different challenges but I know they will treasure their time in Malawi and the many good friends and great times had. I've also enjoyed the opportunity to get an insider peep at Malawi and its people and their life's. We've been able to help in little ways, hopefully helping many, and with the help going directly to the needy where it can make a difference to know that people from outside care and that their lives are a little more comfortable.
Too big are the challenges, and sometimes the help overseas aid offer is not always what's needed and can create other problems or collapse when the aid helpers leave. It's been an interesting eye opener.

I'd like to continue to support Malawi and have chosen 2 charities which are set up and working, and in need of regular income to finance and continue their work. Often grants for large items are more easily available than the running costs, when they need maintence doing, a new wheel, or a taxi ride, there is little money in the kitty to provide.

The Foundation for Mother and Child run by Dr. Jeanette Van Os at the Billy Riordan Memorial Clinic http://www.billysmalawiproject.org/index.php?page=about
The Samaritan Trust in Blantyre http://www.samaritantrust.org/

We were able to meet Jeanette at the clinic in Cape Maclear, it was a Sunday and no clinics and few people in the hosptial so she was able to show us around and talk about the work they do and the support needed to maintain The Foundation Mother and Child. It supports a feeding programme for children under 5,
The Mother and Child supports a feeding program for children under five. The nutrition program is implemented in Billy Riordan Memorial Clinic in Cape Maclear. Dr Jaenatte has been working as a doctor since 2005 in Cape Maclear... I see children every day in the outpatient department as well as in the HIV/ART department of the clinic. Each child is screened for malnutrition and if necessary referred to a nutrition program. The government nutrition program only treats the very severely malnourished children in the village and stock is running out regularly. The children who are not eligible for the government program are included in the nutrition program from the Mother and Child Foundation in Cape Maclear, these children can get feeding supplements from us. At the moment there are 90 children in the feeding program. 85 children get the food supplement Sibusiso made in Malawi. It provides extra nutrients. 5 children receive formula milk,1 set of twins, 1 orphan, 1 baby with a mother who cannot breastfeed and 1 baby who cannot get enough nutrients from breastfeeding. If patients from the clinic must be referred to a hospital, for example a blood transfusion or an x-ray, transport costs are often a problem for the patient and we help with reimbursement for transportation costs, we work with a coupon system for local transportation. So we do not have to give money to the patient but still make it possible so that they go to another hospital.

We took with us to Malawi a large suitcase stuffed full with bra's, all pretty, all sizes and packed in sizes S, M, L, it was the very last delivery from the Bra Fence. Luckily we weren't stopped at customs as the suitcase had John's name on the label!

Lucy distributed a large number of bra's earlier in the year and again she emailled around to her contacts in Blantyre who promptly replied with requests for bra's for their projects. I was able to go along with Lucy to Stika a children's orphanage with a couple packets of small bra's for their teenage girls. It's run by GodKnows and his wife Helen. Yes, his name is God knows!

We were greeted by Helen and her family of happy kids, all ages, all smiles except for this little one, he touched our hearts.......

My name is Andrew. I am 13 months old and stay at STEKA (Step Kids Awareness) children’s home as the youngest child in the house. The reason I came to live at STEKA is because my mother left me on the train tracks for dead because she couldn’t care for me. Later the police arrested her and she is now serving an 8 month sentence in prison. http://stekakids.com/about/