Overall total is 218,859 (and we’re still counting!)
Happy New Year to you all. And it’s off to a pantastic start!
I had 3 main priorities when I got back from Africa in December. They were:
- Recruiting a replacement programme manager in Malawi.
- Finding someone to work with me to help with the increasing amount of admin for Smalls.
- Identifying new premises to sort and store our underwear donations.
I am delighted to say that the first 2 have been ticked off and fingers crossed I will soon be able to tick off the third too!
Joyce Ellis will join the team in Malawi on 1 February as replacement Programme Manager to oversee the education programme for the 330 preschool children in the 3 villages. Joyce was a primary school teacher and gave up work when she had her daughter and is looking forward to working with Smalls 2 days a week.
An anonymous donation was made to Smalls last year with the stipulation the money was to be used to pay for admin help. This has made it possible for Angie Blair to join the team, also on 1 February. Angie will work 10 hours a week on the long list of admin items on my “to do” list and I can’t wait for her to start! I hope you will all join me in welcoming Joyce and Angie to the world of Smalls.
I am very grateful to West Lothian Council for giving me temporary space where I could store all our underwear and where people could come along to help count and sort the underwear. However I always knew this was a temporary solution and that I would need to find new premises by March. I will admit this was worrying me, however I think I’ve found new premises and I hope to be able to tell you all about them in next month’s Round Up. Keep your fingers crossed for me!
We had our first sorting day of the year on Sunday 10 January – please see our latest Thank You message on the website. Thank you to everyone who gave up their Sunday to help.
Thanks to everyone who has so far helped us to raise £370 via Easyfundraising. This amount is enough to send 3 girls in Kenya to school for a year! This is a really simple way for you to help us raise money without you having to spend an extra penny! Click on this link http://www.easyfundraising.org.uk/causes/smallsforall whenever you shop online with M&S, Tesco, Amazon and many more big retailers.