So many of you have brought gifts and clothes for the babies for Christmas and I can tell you they are packed in nine suitcases and ready to go to Africa! We cannot say Thank You enough. I could feel the joy you had shopping for them as you brought your gifts and told me where you went and how you found your gift.  Bless you for doing that. Giving really is more fun, isn’t it.

Now my challenge is to have a Christmas gift for the nannies. We love giving these hard working women a $100 bonus at Christmas. The average Tanzanian family lives on less than $100 per month. It is exciting to be able to give our 45 full time employees at Neema almost a full months extra salary at Christmas. You should hear them sing and see them dance when they receive their bonus!!

I dislike asking for money with a passion. But the scripture comes to mind that says, “You don’t have because you don’t ask.” Okay, so I’m asking. HELP!! Please.

Our nannies love these little abandoned, orphaned and at risk babies at Neema. One day I was at the hospital with a sick baby and it had gone long and was way past quitting time for the nanny who was with me. I was apologizing to her for keeping her late, she had already missed her ride home, when she stopped me and said, No, these are our babies too, I want to be here.

Watching all 10 of the crawlers is quite a job.  What a beautiful place for them to play, the front porch of the baby home at Neema Village.

We have a lot of laundry for the babies and big kids, our nannies carry laundry back and forth from the baby home, Montana Home and Ucare home to the central laundry – with a smile I might add.

Our nannys brave the wilds of Africa for our kids. Camels and snakes can be quite scary as Bakari well knows. It took a while for him to decide to get on the camel with Nanny Glory and then he wanted to ride again and again.

We have a piano teacher on staff. Below Sophia is teaching Malikia and Joycie piano lessons with Silke from Belgium looking on.

Our nannies help in school and they work with the children in crafts and they read to the babies, change their diapers, they play with them, they take them on walks and they feed and bath them, they give them medicines when needed, they get up with them at night when they cry and they wipe their noses and kiss their booboos! – all 46 of them!! They don’t really kiss booboos, that is my job. Below is Gertrude helping with painting.

Nanny Cessy below is reading to the crawlers.

.You can find Nanny Jenny playing on the trampoline with the toddlers almost any day.

Nannies Anna and Jenny feeding the toddlers.

Safina, our volunteer cook, learned to make biscuits for the visitors this year. Over 100 volunteers this year can tell you how hard Safina works!!

So there you have it. Nannys working hard at Neema. A Christmas bonus would be awesome for them. You can donate at www.neemavillage.organd mark it nanny’s Christmas bonus. It is tax deductible, just don’t put a specific name on it, the IRS does not like that. Thank you for helping!!

Michael and Dorris