Christmas is all around us

As you guy know our friends from Repairer Of The Breach sponsored our PAF xmas party. Lloyd just sent us a little report. Enjoy your read and merry xmas again!

“Christmas is a time of sharing. Family members and friends gather from far and wide to celebrate and reunite.
We in Chinkonono village were not left out of the festivities. Just like others around the world we gathered together to eat, sing and pray. It was indeed a wonderful time to see all members of the village assemble in the spirit of oneness.

Huge Party…big day for everyone

Feasting 😉

Some treats for everyone

So much joy for the kids

This special christmas was made possible by PAF and our partners from ROTB. They donated money earlier on already for sewing machines and fabrics gave PAF money to purchase food stuff for the event. From the funds we were able to buy three bags of rice, two bags of maize meal, a bag of flour, 10 goats, 10 chickens and also some snacks for children.

Maize flour and basic food

Baking goods and cookies

It was a big day. Food was prepared by PAF and 248 people were fed. But it was not only feasting. We also used the event to educate the village on what Planting A Future was doing

These are:

1. raising fruit trees seedlings for homes, schools and clinics.
2. providing tailoring skills to people through the PAF-ROTB tailoring project.
3. providing school sponsorship for hard working pupils from needy families
4. sourcing for donations, information and advice from wellwishers, friends and donors for installing boreholes, libraries, schools
5. encouraging the community through practical interventions and teach them new new ideas such as preserving fruits and vegetables by sun drying and solving problems like damming streams.

It was also an oppportunity to foster love and understanding among community members. Love without borders and love your neighbour as you love yourself were the themes. A pastor from the SDA Church preached a sermon from the book of Nehemiah on service to others Nehemiah 13 vs 14, psalms 133 vs 1 on brotherhood.
There was so much food that everyone ate to his or her full and even managed to carry some food to their homes. We also had two bags of rice and a bag of maize meal left.  These were donated to four old widows living on their own.

Men at work…to finish all food 😉

Our PAF women feasting 🙂

Preparing more food

Late night group shot

Second round 🙂

This was a big miracle for the village as nothing of its kind has ever happened. There was so much gratitude from the village to PAF and ROTB for feeding and bringing the village together.
It was indeed a Christmas.”

Merry Christmas

Lloyd just sent us a little Christmas message out of Chinkonono Village. Wesley was leading our PAF women choir.

 

 

We all wish you guys a merry merry Christmas. Thank you all for what you have done for us to make this year so special and successful!

You guys all rock! So let’s celebrate Christmas now and spend some time with our loved ones and families.

Following The Thread

Thanks to our dear friends and partners from The Repairer of The Breach from Jamaica we were able to buy 2 sewing machinges already. And it looks like we will soon get 2 more.

So besides our main project of growing trees we are busy building a sewing and show room. So the we can start creating jobs for the PAF women to give them a perspective to raise some money and also sew clothes for their families.

Of course most of the women know some basics of making clothes from fabric. But we decided to search for help and find a professional tailor who will teach us properly. This teacher was found in our dear Mrs Siankainde. She lives near by and is a professional tailor. She decided to help us for free. Zikomo mama!

PAF women learning the basics of tailoring from Mrs Siankainde

 

So as many times as possible our PAF women gather in our temporary sewing room…oh, and Lloyd is taking part in those lessons too 😉 Fun is guaranteed.

practicals 😉

our PAF women paying attention

our teacher Mrs Siankainde, a professional tailer

So far they have been doing the basics like machine parts, accessories and safety to get started. But also types of fabrics like nylon, cotton and silk. Very interesting for everyone were types of stitches like english and french seam or running seam. Lloyd just told me that by the end of the month he will be better than Calvin Klein 😉

 

Anonther important thing most of the women did never really learned but only anticipated is proper measuring and cutting of fabrics. But this makes a huge difference for the outcome.

Where are the scissors? 😉

Learning how to measure and cut fabrics

 

Of course we are also doing some practicals already and try to sew the first things like girls’ skirts and dresses which came out quite good. Unfortunately we don’t have pictures of that. But here are some indefinable attempts 😉

some stuff we made and still work on

 

Oh…in case you now think we just randomly tailor things…no no no. Of course we will be doing the most recent fashion trends. We got our model patterns…Calvin Klein, Gucci? Ah come on, folks…go Zambian style!

Fashion magazine African style

…also available for kids

 

One huge plan we have is to provide school uniforms for Nguba School, Singwamba School and Katanda School. The new term starts January 1st. So we intend to buy materials to tailor those uniforms for sale. That way we can raise some money for our other projects and the construction of the buildings. But as it always is…we need funds and donations to buy fabrics. So if you want to help us out…we would really appreciate that. And the kids would go modelling with the new PAF collection 😉

Another Brick In The Wall…

Our construction of the building that will contain both a sewing and a show room for clothes is progressing now.

We are still struggling to get or produce pan bricks. In total we will need about 4.000 (plus a few spare ones in case something happens…you know…). Until now we do have half of those already. Lloyd decided to donate another 1.000 and we will surely find a way to get the remainder.

But: Good news is…taaadddaaaaa! We did start the foundation for the sewing room. And everything else will come bit by bit so that we can open the building in spring next year.

The foundation for our little sewing and show room building

But as you can see all those bricks we need are not even close to the construction side. That means we have to transport all 2.000 we already have from the storing place to the construction side.

Luckily enough Grime’s father is a generous man and donated his ox cart to PAF so that we can ferry the bricks. Thank you!

Grime’s father who donated his ox cart to PAF

 

Getting the ox cart ready for ferrying bricks

 

Work in progress… 😉