The Girls get a new Aunty!

On a snowy, cold and slightly nerve-wracking morning just after Christmas, the wonderful Sarah put the final things into her suitcases, not quite believing that everything she was going to use for the next 12 months (at least) was tightly packed into the two bags in front of her.

Sarah was about to start a journey she'd started planning only a few months earlier - prompted by prayer, prophesy and a deep conviction of God's call on her life, she'd given up her job as a Physio, said her goodbyes to her family and friends, packed up her flat, undergone cross-cultural mission training, had many planning sessions with us, and booked her flights - she was ready to become the Girls Home Aunty.

Touching down in Uganda in time for a New Years Eve she never experienced before (all night prayer meeting anyone?!) Sarah has flung herself/been flung headlong into serving the poor of Nyendo. She's our Girls Home Aunty, responsible for the White Eagle Girls, our deputy-Manager, responsible with Emily and Julius for the smooth running of the project and is involved in our Hospital Ministry and Youth Club. She got a pretty enthusiastic welcome from the staff and White Eagles too!

You'll be hearing plenty more about Sarah on this blog...! For now, we wish her all the best and we're so excited about what God is going to do in her life, and in others' lives through her. Amiina!

Buy a gift with a difference this Christmas...

Back by popular demand, we have updated our Alternative Gift List... this year, it's all about boosting the bog fund! As you know fundraising has been continuing apace all year to keep on building the boys home. In January, we opened the new sitting room, dining room, kitchen and store. And now it's time to build the washrooms and toilets! Our estimate for this section of the boys home is about £15,000. With all the fundraising that's been going on we're hoping to have raised about £13,000 - can you help us push it up to the target?!

Our vision in the White Eagle Project is for a qood quality home in the middle of Nyendo. Somewhere that some of Uganda's most destitute and vulnerable can call home, somewhere that can help us give a standard of care which will release the White Eagles to fly high!

So, please do download the all new Alternative Gift List here , go straight to our online donation page here and be inspired to buy someone a washbasin, a toilet or even part of a cesspit!

Time for a little swim...

The 'Try'Athlon Team have finally finished their challenge! 12 River of Life supporters met up at the Manchester Aquatics Centre to see how far they could swim, most having not managed more than 20 lengths since before time began... Collectively they managed 13 miles, with 8 year-old Eva the star of the show, putting in a very handy 50 lengths at about twice the speed of everyone else. Others who couldn't make the Manchester swim did it where they are, with a particularly impressive 150 lengths from Kath Room the following morning, and the extraordinary exploits of Brenda Davies, who is training to swim 300 lengths - just shy of 5 miles - next week!

Most excitingly, the White Eagles themselves joined in! Emily, our Director, writes: Thirteen children and two staff were able to swim last Saturday and the rest of us were just giving them morale support - I didn't know we could actually have world champions in the White Eagle children! Eight children - Mujuzi, Nicholas, Ssemakula, Tony, James, Ernest, and Nakawuki - and Julius were able to swim lengths and five children - Judith, Daniel, Namatovu, Kisakye and Kevin - and Rhonnah swum widths. The 1st group swum a total number of 129 lengths and Ivan was the best and swum 30. The 2nd group that swum across did 20 widths. We were all shocked at Ivan's speed!

Who'd have thought it, the White Eagles swimming well over 2 miles between them! You can sponsor their heroic efforts by donating online here.

A week in the life of the White Eagle Project

Julius, our new deputy Manager and boys mentor, has been with River of Life for as long as i can remember - his Mum Betty is an Elder and leads the Hospital Ministry and other Community Outreach initiatives. Here are some extracts from his first weekly report - it gives you a flavour of what life as a White Eagle is like!

This week 7 of our boys and 1 girl did their Primary Leaving Examination (P.L.E). On Tuesday evening we went to the school to pick them up. On their arrival, they looked exited and free as if they were out of Jail ha, ha! Every one was happy for them and they commented on how they believe they are to pass with 1st grades. The next day we surprised them with a welcome back home party. Charles arranged music for the evening and the food was delicious. In the afternoon we took them to the pool to have fun and also see who can join in the swim on the 21st of November.

Three of our kids attended a worship gathering at Masaka Pentecostal Church; the boys and girls gave testimonies this week on how the Lord has blessed them to be part of this project - they were really touching; we had a sports evening; we continued the staff training on physical Intervention and different ways to help and support each other as colleagues in front of the children; Kelvin started crawling; In Youth Group we talked about The Power of the Tongue and over 18 youth came to the meeting, we got 4 that came for the 1st time.

This week I visited Hope and Good Foundation Schools to see how the children are doing. The headmistress thanked us in general for supporting the school. She continued to appreciate the way all the kids have behaved.

Spread the word on Facebook!

We're starting a campaign this autumn to spread the word about River of Life on Facebook. We're developing a fancy new Facebook Connect Gizmo that will help us easily tell all those hundreds of Facebook 'friends' most of us have by posting a message to our walls...

You'll see a little Facebook Connect button appear on the homepage, and throughout the rest of the site, and the idea is you just click on the button, write a short message like "I'm checking out the River of Life website" or something, and submit it to your wall... that then turns up in all your friends' newsfeeds, and they get a chance to click on the link and go check out the site. Ultimately we want to spread the word and gain support for the work :)

We've also got a Facebook Group you can join, and our own Facebook Page which I'm beginning to build...

Let me know what you think about it all, either by emailing me or leaving a comment below!

Latest newsletter is out!

We've just produced our latest newsletter which you can download here. It comes complete with a sponsorship form for the 10/10 hike - where the White Eagles will be doing a sponsored walk in Uganda and we can all raise sponsorship for them!

It contains some of the stories you can also read on this blog, plus more including prayer requests, 'news in brief' and more about the 10/10 hike.

Please do download it here and share it with your friends and family!

Can anyone sponsor Daniel or Veronica?

It costs on average just £60 per month to provide a home, an education, care, spiritual guidance, and of course decent grub for each White Eagle. We're looking for sponsors who can contribute any amount towards the costs for quite a few of the White Eagles, but we'll start with Daniel and Veronica!


Daniel is in P7 - the final year of primary school. With the all important Primary Leaving Exams coming up in December, he's buckling down to work harder than he's ever worked before!




Veronica is currently at secondary school. She joined us in 2008, we think the victim of a child traffiking attempt. She's wonderful - very helpful and kind!

If you can help, please get in touch by emailing us!