Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page. 

I am in the middle of starting up a charity to help children who are not as lucky as ours.

Awaiting our website to get online, I would love to make use of JustGiving so we can already start fundraising. When you will receive our birth cards, you will be invited to visit this page to make your donation. We do not need any birth presents, we have more than enough! Please read further and make a donation that comes from your heart... 

Pursuit Of Happy Kids fundraising for Hope and Homes

In order to make this sustainable, I have chosen to work together with a wonderful organisation, "Hope and Homes", who has loads of successful experience in reforming childcare systems in poor countries. I have visited them at their head office in December 2012, and I have been very impressed by the work they achieve. You feel that everything what they do is driven by passion and love, values that I see as the most important ones in life! 

Our mission is to give hope to the poorest children in the world – those who are orphaned, abandoned or vulnerable – by enabling them to grow up within the love of a family and the security of a home, so they can fulfil their potential. In Central and Eastern Europe, we close orphanages and move children into family-based care whilst developing the services needed to help prevent child abandonment. In Africa, we provide a vital lifeline for families at risk of breakdown due to the pressures of poverty, disease or conflict. We believe that, above all else, every child should live within a loving family environment.

You have to see with your own eyes what Hope and Homes does, in order to fully understand the value and necessity of their work! 

What can we do...

I myself can not do great things, only small things with great love.... I will do anything to make you all aware that "giving" to others who need it more than us, is all we have. An effort, how small it may even look like, will make these children's lives better! 

The project: The Chisinau Baby Institution in Moldova

After giving birth to our son/daughter, I plan to visit our first project as soon as I can. The project aims to help children of the Chisinau Baby Institute in Moldova.

This project is well underway and is aiming for completion in 2014 if sufficient funds are raised in time.

Moldova is the poorest country in Europe.
Over 7,000 children are growing up in institutions.
One child under the age of 7 is placed in an institution every day.

Hope and Homes for Children began working in Moldova in 2001. Over the last ten years they have closed three institutions for school age children, successfully moving all the children from these institutions back into families, either their own, local foster or adoptive families, or into Small Family Homes for children who require specialist care. As a result of our work, the Moldovan Government now supports the closure of institutions for school age children and there is more support available to families to care for their children. However, very little progress has been made for children under the age of three, and in particular for those with disabilities. Babies continue to be placed in the four baby institutions in Moldova and many professionals still believe that babies need to be cared for in hospital-like facilities. Babies are, however, profoundly damaged by the deprivation of a loving parental figure and are even more likely to suffer permanent developmental delays as a result of institutional care than older children are.

The closure of the Chisinau Baby Institution

In 2010 Hope and Homes began work on the closure of the Chisinau Baby Institution in Moldova’s capital city. 63 babies and young children are currently held in the institution. Many have disabilities and children affected by HIV/AIDS are segregated in a separate facility. When all new babies arrive they are held in complete isolation for the first few weeks which is particularly traumatic when they have just been separated from their main care-giver. As is typical of institutions, there is a distinct lack of the individual attention and stimulation that these babies desperately need to develop.

140 babies and young children have already been successfully moved from the institution back into families. Sadly, as a result of insufficient support for families within the community more babies have continued to be placed in the institution from local maternity wards or as a result of abandonment. Without the development of services to support vulnerable families this is likely to continue. We urgently need to stop this high rate of new entries into the institution and move the remaining 63 babies and young children out of the institution as soon as possible.

Keeping families together and developing family support services

To prevent more babies being abandoned into the institution we are developing a comprehensive range of services to support families to stay together. The services will be located within the old institution building and once established the local authorities will fund the on-going running costs, creating a truly sustainable service. Over the last year, as we have moved babies out of the institution, we have been able to utilise this space to begin work on the development of some new services. These include:

• Nursery: The nursery will provide a stimulating environment for babies and children under the age of three. One nursery has already been developed but many more vulnerable families are in need. To meet this urgent need, we will develop an additional nursery to support 12 more babies and their families.

• Day care for children with disabilities: A general day care centre has already been developed but we urgently need to provide specialist equipment and training to the staff so that it can care for babies with disabilities. This will benefit 10 babies at any time.

• Family Training & Support Service: This service will provide counselling, legal and career advice to parents at direct risk of abandoning their babies and the families of children from the institution who have returned home.

 

How to donate

Donating through JustGiving is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving – they’ll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they’ll send your money directly to the charity and make sure Gift Aid is reclaimed on every eligible donation by a UK taxpayer. So it’s the most efficient way to donate - I raise more, whilst saving time and cutting costs for the charity.

So please dig deep and donate now.

Pledge your birthday, the birth of your child, your wedding,....

Do you like my birth cards (soon to see)?  I am happy to design tailor made cards for special events for free! The only thing you have to do is help us collecting funds for this project, by pledging your special occasion to our project on your card. 

Small Acts for a Big Happy! That is what we can do together!