We are excited to say we are in preperation for a trip back to Ukraine in October, 2011! To kick off the fund raising for the trip, we are having a Golf Tournament on August 20th at Stonebridge Meadows in Fayetteville, Arkansas. We are accepting online registrations at www.birdeasepro.com/99B. Four person teams with a shotgun start at 8:00 a.m. It’s sure to be a great time!
The trip was overall amazing! We had the pleasure of seeing so many children, as well as opportunities to educate staff, caregivers, and parents on the developmental of speech and language. It was truly a blessing to meet with each child, and to meet so many people ready and willing to learn how to better the lives of special needs children in Ukraine. The more questions they would ask, the more excited we would become.
We haven’t posted much about our last day working with children in Ukraine. It was spent at an orphanage we had not visited before with several special needs children. We met many sweet children that day. There was one little guy in particular that stole our hearts. This little guy that desperately needs a home was soooo thrilled in this picture to get his very first wheelchair (one of the ones we broke down and packed in a suit case). He has cerebral palsy and spasticity and tightness in his legs prevents him from walking. He was instantly mobile once we fit the wheel chair to him and now has a whole new world of independence. You can see the joy on his face. This chair belonged to a patient at Children’s Therapy Team that donated it. It is sooooo amazing that this chair fit this little guy so perfectly and even that we still had the chair to give to him even though it was our last stop in Ukraine. God had a plan for that chair from the start and it has changed this little boys life.
This trip we had the opportunity to meet some amazing parents. Parents that have made the choice to keep their special needs child despite what society encouraged them to do. Some of these parents lined these stairs at the hospital so they could meet with the members of the team.