Happy New Year!

A very happy new year to you all.  Hope 2012 is a happy, healthy and prosperous one for you all xxxx

Happy Christmas!

Hope you have all had a wonderful day with your family. 

Thank you for our lovely presents; we appreciate them very much, xxx

Our shoeboxes!

I've copied this from the link which Operation Christmas Child have emailed to me regarding the shoeboxes we made up:

Shoebox Destination: Bosnia



Bosnia is a predominantly Muslim country based in the Balkan Region of Eastern Europe. There are less than 700 Christians in the entire country. High unemployment and little new investment in infrastructure has left more than 25% of the population in poverty.


Shoeboxes are sent by truck to the capital Sarajevo and then distributed across the country by our in-country partners. This year, we sent 72,948 shoeboxes from the UK to Bosnia.


Below is a story from a previous year’s distribution to Bosnia…


Damira’s story


In Bosnia, many children will not receive a present during the entire year. We had the privilege of giving out shoeboxes to children with special needs. It was wonderful to watch their smiles as they opened the shoeboxes and found hidden treasures inside.


Our team visited the Drina’s Rehabilitation Centre at Fojnica where we met a little girl called Damira who was 13 years old. She had a tragic background as she was born with learning disabilities and for reasons unknown, 3 years ago her mother tried to put her on a railway line in front of a train.


Instead of being instantly killed Damira survived but now lives in this rehabilitation centre. She has no visitors so it was unlikely that she would get any Christmas presents that year, were it not for the shoeboxes. When she saw that she was to get a shoebox her face lit up and she was overjoyed with her gifts.


Our work in the region


Samaritan’s Purse doesn’t just send shoeboxes to Eastern Europe. We work with local churches to provide support to abandoned orphans in Belarus and also provide medical, emotional and spiritual care for people living with HIV and AIDS in the Ukraine who have no one to look after them

Week beginning 19th December is week 3

Snow!!!!!

Huge flakes of snow falling right now!  We've just been outside to have a look, then watched through the window.

The children want to make a snowman later so keep fingers crossed for lots more snow!

Christmas biscuits

Yum!

They will be coming home tonight along with all the other Christmas creations.

Book bags

Please make sure you send your child's book bag all week as they will be taking home some Christmas creations on Thursday or Friday.

Labels

If you remember, please could you label your child's wipes and as many clothes as possible, particularly items like hats, mittens, coats etc.  Being not as young as we once were, Chris and I tend to forget what belongs to who!!!! ;)

Thanks, it would be a great help xx

Learning Journey files

We are in the process of completing the summary sheets ready for the children's learning journeys to go home at Christmas.  We will send them home at the end of next week.  We'll also send home the photo sticks for you to download the photos on to your computers at home. Once you have downloaded them, don't forget to delete them from the stick so that it doesn't fill up. 

Only two weeks till Christmas Day!!!!!!! 

Christmas trees

We painted wooden Christmas trees on Friday and decorated them with little stars. 

This week is week 2 of our menu