Christmas Parties!!!!

Life was busy the end of last year and although I posted pictures on my FaceBook of the Christmas parties, I never had the chance to write on my blog. So, if you are suffering from the January blues and tired of winter, let me throw you back into the holiday spirit!!!!!

This year instead of the big parties we did individual CarePoint parties at each and EVERY of the 19 CarePoints in 6 days!!! We had 3 teams of missionaries, Cup staff, HPC volunteers and 2 mission teams from the US helping out. It was not what we had originally planned, we had been doing 3 BIG parties BUT God had a better plan, more intimate partoes where more of the neighborhood children could come and hear the true reason for Christmas! The first picture is the kids waiting to get into the party at Fonteyn, followed by the program as they sat under the big tent! LOTS of kids to love on each day!!!

We had different activities from face/body painting to dancing!

We had soccer to relay races!!!

We had ice cream to water slides and jumping castles!!!

Puppet show about Jesus's birth and chicken and LOTS of FUN!!!!!!

So, Merry Christmas to all!!! And to all a blessed in 2010!!!!!

2009 Graduates!!!

School year in Swaziland is January to Decemeber. So we celebrated graduations at our Mangwaneni "Mahn-gwah-nay-nee" and Fonteyn "Fawn-tain"CarePoints just after the team was here and just before the Christmas parties started!

On graduation day, Mangwaneni showed us the skills they had learned and had a play in Siswati to celebrate this special occasion.

And Fonteyn this year celebrated with children letting us know what they wanted to be when they grow up and a play thanking Children's Cup for all they do. (If I can figure out how to upload a video of this I will add it in the future.)

2 of Make "mah-gah" Motza's "Mote-zah" (one of our cooks) grandchildren graduated from Fonteyn's class along with teacher Portia's daughter. (Although she wasn't her teacher it was teacher Nomvula "Nome-voo-lah" who taught her.)

We had 3 of the Mangwaneni cook's children (Make Shabangwe "shah-bong-way", Make Nzabanzaba "En-zah-bah-en-zah-bah" and Make Celiwe "click el-ee-way") and teacher Dorah's child graduated from Mangwaneni this year!(She did not teach her child either, teacher Nokutula "Noke-too-lah" did.)

Great job classes of 2009!!!!

Fonteyn Class!!!

Mangwaneni Class!!!

The Team's Last Day

The team spent their last morning with the Fonteyn classes.

Singing

then teaching "A Tutti Tah",

playing soccer,

jumping rope,

bowling

and dishing morning porridge.

The team will be missed! Hurry back!