December birthdays

While we were at the Shalux on New Year's Eve, we celebrated the birthdays of Nico, Matthews, Judie and Philip.

New Year's Eve

This year was different. We were given money by a local group to 'entertain the children' so we arranged an evening out at the local Shalux Food Centre which serves mainly Indian cuisine. This was a first outing to a restaurant, probably for them all, so they dressed up and waited to see what would happen. Most took just a small helping the first time, but when they realised how good the food was, it wasn't long before they were all full up!
After the meal, the restaurant allowed us to stay on and play some party games including pass the parcel and some memory games.
We would like to thank the donors and the Shalux management for hosting us.

Playing outside before dinner

Serving chicken dishes of korma, butter masala and jalfrezi

accompanied by rice, chips and naan bread 

Mayo Marjorie does a forfeit during pass the parcel

Rebecca wins the prize!

Christmas Day

Christmas is a time, Christmas is a time, Christmas is a time to LOVE!

Uncle Phil took us all to church in the morning for the service, we were part of the Christmas play.  It was a good message for all of us to remember the birth of our Lord Jesus and worship Him before all the celebrations at home.

The girls assisted Auntie Deborah in the kitchen to prepare the 'Christmas Feast',  we all enjoyed plenty of good food, pudding and ice cream.  We had fun pulling crackers and working out what the 'jokes' were about!  After a relaxed but noisy, dinner the Mayos went to wash up, we watched some of our pictures from the year and then played some active fun games.

After that it was time for the Christmas Variety  Presentations, everyone took part and they were very interesting, fun and showed off some true talent. Some groups sang, rapped, memorised memory verses and whole Bible passages.

Sira and Mercy recited passages from the Christmas story

Peter's group presented his rap 'Does it make it right?'

This year all the children received a new Bible which they were pleased with along with some other gifts which were immediately tried on and sorted out!  There was a great buzz of excitement surrounding present giving and opening, with the children and the Mayo's too!

Time seemed to fly past and it was almost dark in the chota.  In the evening we had room for some cake sweets and snacks while we watched a movie to finish off the day.

Christmas Day Service

We all went to Bethel for the Christmas day service which was run by the Sunday School where most of Ipusukilo were involved in the Nativity drama which ended with the song 'Christmas is a time to love'.

Narators including Matthews

Joseph and Mary with the shepherds

The angels join the scene

Christmas drama

The children of Ipusukilo were asked to present the drama at Bethel this year for the candlelight carol service. After some weeks of hard work and rehearsals with aunty Deborah, all went very well last night when they presented 'The king's servant finds the Servant King'.

The story was recounted by Mercy as a grandfather to his grandchildren. He was the king's servant, acted by Sira, who was present when the wise men visited the palace at the time of Christ's birth through to being present at his death....

GLO Camp

• We went for GLO Camp in Ndola from 9th to 15th December.
• We were divided up into groups.
• The theme was 'In a world gone loony' and the theme song 'I'm coming back to the heart of worship'
• The topics were Ignorance, Modesty in a world gone loony, Understanding the world, Going back to the basics and Relationship with God.
• We had knock-out games on Saturday and Sunday and a shhh time for a moment of reflection.
• After each session each group had to go and discuss about what the preacher was talking about.
• Each day, there was a workshop where we talked about subjects such as addiction, careers, music, dressing, reading culture and confidence.
• In free time we had games such as volleyball and football and on Saturday night we had 'Glo's got talent'.
• The food was good. For breakfast we had tea and a bun, lunch was nshima or rice with chicken, sausage or beef and cabbage.
• Our conclusion was that 'your life maybe the only Bible that people ever get to read, the way you walk, the only path they will ever walk and the way you speak maybe the only truth they ever get to know'.

By Mercy, Philip, Bartholomew, Peter and Bright

Christmas comes early

Christmas came early to Ipusukilo when some friends from the ex-pat community in Chingola visited  Ipusukilo last week with lots of goodies for the children. They brought a decorated tree, gifts for children and house mothers, plenty of cakes, drinks and sweets. Everyone was very happy and we are very grateful to them.