The Salvation Army opened the Patvērums Childrens Day Centre in March 2002 to provide a safe environment for underprivileged children from the local community in Riga.
Thursday, December 21, 2006
Fire inspection
Just wanted to share the good news that yeaterday the fire inspector came back and passed the centre!!! Yippee!
It's a good Christmas present for us :-) and it's a good feeling to know that we've managed to complete one of the requirements. So it's 1 down 2 to go!
I've just come up to the office after being down in the centre for a while and you can tell Christmas is upon us!!
Today the staff and I went out to buy presents for all the children and teenagers. It's a great thing to do but can be a little stressful when you buying over 30 presents for a very varied group and only have 4ls (£4) to spend! We succeed though (as always!) and I'm pleased with what we've got them. For those of you that have to know - the girls have got a 'make your own bracelet' pack and a 2007 diary, the boys a sports clock and a key ring!
Also today 2 members of staff and 3 children went and bought the Christmas tree from the market. For me it was strange that Graeme didn't go and buy it with a small group as that was always his job! How times are changing. They did well though and we have a rather large tree with not many decorations on it!! To finish off today this morning I went to the British Embassy and collected 3 large boxes of wrapping paper, 100s of gift tags and 6 boxes of Christmas Crackers! It’s been quite a day!
This week the children and staff are busy preparing for our Christmas party which is on Friday. This year we are putting on a play written by us and will (hopefully) be performed by 4 of the children/teenagers! We're going all angely this year as the play looks at the birth of Jesus from the Angels point of view so every where you look there are cut out angels for the invitations, gifts for parents etc etc!
On Friday we could have as many as 55 people attend the party, a new record for the centre. It is bound to be a crazy afternoon with the play, singing carols, food, games and of course presents!!
Today I had the pleasure of presenting 2 of our children with a printed Christmas card which had their design on the front. This year we held a competition at the centre to design a Christmas card which could be used for TSA in Sweden and Latvia’s 2006 cards. This afternoon Graeme gave me the Latvian edition so I was able to present both Kristaps and Agita with a copy of their cards! They were both really pleased with them (and themselves!!)
So as you can tell like most people at this time of year it’s busy, busy, busy! I’ll post some pictures next week of the party so you can see how it all turned out! Hope you are having a good week and that you are really enjoying this Christmas.
Today Lilita came to see me in my office and told me that she was leaving! It came as a surprise as she only completed her 3 months trail last week and although I know she has had to deal with a number of new areas in the type of work that we do she has coped really well.
She has another job more in her area of education and as she said she's been thinking and praying hard about it but she feels that her heart is in the area of psychology so who am I to disagree!
She will finish with us on 12th January. Obviously we are now putting adverts out for her replacement but it's Christmas time so we'll have to wait and see.
This time my main concern is regarding Vineta and Inese not the children. They have seen a few changes this year and know that I am finishing in March so to have the newest member of the team leave is hard on them. I really don't need either of them leaving before I do!! Also they are the ones who have to help a new member of staff settle in more than myself, so I am worried about them. I spoke to them very briefly today and they are sorry to see her go but understand there is very little they can do about it!
We'd all appreciate your prayers as the next month or so it's going to be full of more changes and with the application still on going it's not an easy time down in the cellar right now! Thanks
Sorry for the delay in writing. The inspection went ok. The women was very good, understanding of our situation and the need for a translator!!
The good news: we do not need any structural changes to the kitchen and the basics that we already have in place are fine. She was happy with us using the kitchen for different groups eg the corps using for Friday breakfasts, HQ for staff meals and Patverums for the children and staff's meals.
The bad news is we've got a lot of work to do! Everything we do really needs to have a corresponding piece of paper to explain our actions, procedures etc. As you can imagine that is going to require a lot of work. It's lots of little things that in some ways can take longer BUT that's what's needed so that's what we'll have to do.
Our cook Irena is busy writing up a 'technical card' for each of the items of food she cooks, from beef burgers to strawberry cake!!!
I'm waiting for some papers from the department to finish our application for official status and we can expect 4 inspections a year!!
So we now have to get on and produce lots of papers! My favorite job - admin in Latvian!!!
I found out today that a boy that used to come to the centre when we first opened is missing. Ilga, who is the Salvation Army's social work director but who used to work at the centre, saw he's name and photo on a TV 'advert' showing missing children.
He's name is Pavel and he has had a very difficult childhood but at heart is a good kid!
If you could say a prayer for him, Graeme and I would really appreciate it!
