It's nearly finished!

What a proud, proud moment to see these photo's sent through to me from Cambodia by Piseth Luon our "wonder man" who has been overseeing the building of our classrooms in the village of Makak. Without his knowledge and committment we would not have been able to achieve what we have in the time frame it has been - there aren't words to express our gratitude to Piseth and the people of Makak.








Photo 1: Sophie and the RR team on a brick passing line at the beginning of construction! - Sophie is in the brown pants and navy shirt - covered up for the fierce Cambodian sun!

Photo 2: Sophie (L) and friends helping with basic english in the classroom

Photo 3: Plans for our new structure.

Photo 4: In the early stages.

Photo 5: Ready for plaster.

Photo 6: side view.

As many of you will know, not even 12 months ago when our fundraising evening took place, little did we know how much the community would be behind us in what we were trying to achieve, and the initial goal of raising funds to build some play equipment was well surpassed, then came the dream of maybe raising enough money to build a classroom, that too was surpassed and as you will see the village of Makak now has a brand new building housing two classrooms to add to the existing classroom.

You will see the construction is brick and plaster and I have two bulging photo albums here at home with photo's from the beginning of construction to the stage it is at today. It has been built in brick and not wood as the original structure is, to withstand the intense conditions a cost we were prepared to make to have a structure that would be standing for many years.

There are 166 students attending the school - 95 boys and 71 girls - and at present we are working on new school uniforms for each of them. It was very important to me that as much opportunity for the wider community of Makak was involved - in the building etc, so we have the uniforms being tailored in the village - and I have heard it has been a source of great pride for the children to line up and have their measurements taken ready for their new uniform!

On their shirts will be printed our logo "Kids for Cambodia Charitable Trust" - these are going to be printed on a label here and packed in our suitcases and sewn on when we arrive there....which brings me to the exciting part!

The official opening for the school will be July 21st 2011 which we will be attending - we are all very much looking forward to being there, seeing what has been achieved and meeting with the children that Sophie has told me so much about.

We will be working at the school before the official opening, and hope to have the builders ready to make a playground for the children - things that NZ children take for granted - swings, sandpit etc - Piseth has told me the children will be very excited to have it as they haven't had one before, and I know my 9 year old son is very excited about being part of it all!

We will be taking some time to shop in Siem Reap for back packs - all 166 of them! - to fill with new stationery, pens, pencils - and maybe a few surprises!

I can't imagine what an emotional journey it will be, and what a proud, proud moment of a lifetime we will share and I can say to everyone that has been a part of this by sponsoring, donating, or attending our fundraising evening you can all be proud that you have been a part in changing lives half a world away.

Be involved in our Cookbook!

(The above images are a wedding cupcake tower I made for Hamish & Laura's wedding - and is one of my favourite recipes!)


After the recent success of our fundraising venture for our charity - "Kids for Cambodia Charitable Trust" we have decided on our next venture and that is the publishing of a cookbook!

We have seen with our fundraising how much can be achieved with community support for the children of Cambodia and how we can further their needs for a good education.

We are very proud to say that the foundations have since gone down for a secondary school for the children of Makak, a very exciting project to be involved with as the children of this remote area have never had the opportunity for an education past the age of 10 years old.

Our vision for this project is to have a book with recipes that are family favourites, perhaps something you enjoyed from childhood and reminds you of home, or of special friends, recipes that are simple yet stylish with a fresh twist and would be at home served to family or when entertaining.

We are hoping to achieve with this book a feeling of home, a warmth and a reminder of perhaps where you learnt to cook - for me it was with my mum and grandmother - although Friday nights were always cooking fish with my dad and always served with mashed potato and homemade coleslaw!

These cookbooks of tried and true family favorite recipes are always a success, and as a passionate cook and the owner of more recipe books than I care to admit to they are ones that are turned to time and time again.

If you would like to share your favourite recipes for consideration for our cookbook we would love to have them. Final submission date is APRIL 30TH 2011 and you may submit as many recipes as you wish, just as long as they are all recipes you have made many times, work and you love.

What we would like you to do:
1: send me via email - green33@xtra.co.nz your recipe, along with a short paragraph about the recipe, perhaps where it came from, if it reminds you of a childhood memory any notes that you think are suitable, or if it is a new favourite!

2: The heading title (from below) that you see it placed into

3: Name of the recipe, serving size if applicable, plus all steps, cooking times etc.

Your name will be credited to the recipe - so a great way to hand down your recipe to your children

Recipes will be collated under these formats: (final chapters will depend on recipes submitted):
Breakfast dishes
Lunch/light dishes
Nibbles
Mains
Vegetable, sides, and salads
Desserts
Celebrations - this can mean birthdays, weddings, christmas, easter, anytime!
Baking
Pantry Basics - sauces, preserves, dressings etc - in fact if it doesn't come under the other headings!

I am also hoping to have a special chapter filled with recipes from well known chefs/resturants - including their tips and tricks!

Recipes will be chosen on ease of making, appeal, style, point of difference.

If your recipe/s are included in our book you will receive a 20% discount on the purchase price of the book. We are aiming for a pre-2011 Christmas release - so a fantastic gift to give to family and friends.

We hope you will join with us and support in the making of this fundraising cookbook venture, and please feel free to send this email onto your friends and family who may wish to share and see their recipe in print - at the same time supporting our Charity - in fact the more people you send this on to and tell about it the greater variation in recipes we will have to put into the book - lets all make this book a huge success!

Bad, Bad, Blogger!!!

Hi everyone, where has the last few months gone??? December 1st and it is the last few days before Sophie heads away on her big trip. The nerves, excitment are all starting to hit home - and thats just me - her mother! I know that Sophie is very excited about what is ahead of her and very much looking forward to it!

Well there is some fantastic news after our fundraising evening here in Ashburton at the end of July. Initially we had the dream of raising enough money to perhaps build a classroom onto the existing primary school in Makak - but - we are very proud to announce that because these children didn't previously have the opportunity of an education past the age of 10 years old, primary level, we are in the position to build a secondary school - so to give the kids an opportunity that they haven't had before is incredible - and all down to the wonderful support we have had within this amazing community of ours!

The foundations went down on November 20th so as soon as I get photo's from the village I will post them here so we can all follow the progress.

There are exciting things in the pipeline for further fundraising that I am working on, inititives that will keep the momentum going and keep the school funded and in the future build on what we have already achieved and give more children the chance of a secondary school education - something we here in New Zealand take for granted.

I will put up information on a separate post about the next venture and hope that you will join us and become involved!

Well off to pack Sophie's back pack ready for her to have her build up day on Friday with the rest of the team, and for her very early morning flight on Saturday morning!

Thank you!!

What a fabulous night we had on Friday night, far exceeding everything we could have wished for.

The support from not only our home town but the wider Canterbury community was overwhelming and the auction was a huge success, we couldn't have done it without the support received from everyone and we look forward to sharing with you the results in the future.

You can view a video of the evening on the following link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hU5cB0VjfQA

and also photo's of the evening can be viewed by going to Ashburton Online and going into the "gallery" and searching the photo albums for the "Kids for Cambodia Charity Evening"

Once again thank you for your very generous support and we look forward to bringing you updates in the very near future!

Sophie

Two more mystery spot prizes.....

We have two more incredible mystery spot prizes to give away on Friday night, add this to the two other spot prizes and 4 very lucky people will walk away incredibly happy!

All I can say is this is one time I wish I wasn't organizing it so I could be in to win as well - all four are well worth winning!

But remember if your not there on the night, not only will you miss out on a fantastic line of entertainment, the chance to bid on amazing auction items, and the chance to be a part of this awesome fundraising event.....but you can't win one of these prizes!

6 days to go!!!

Time is ticking by and so many things to finish.....we went to the supermarket today to buy all the ingredients for making fudge for next Friday - those at the event will all receive a bag at their table...and I have to admit we did get a few unusual looks, what is so unusal about purchasing 64 tins of condensed milk, 8 tins of golden syrup, 6 kilos of jersey caramel, 17 kilos of brown sugar???? not to mention all the chocolate, butter...all mixed up to make delicious bags of fudge!!- those gasping in horror remember this makes 400 bags! So that is what "the sixth day to go" brings...back to stirring the fudge pot!

A reminder that if you haven't already booked your table or tickets, please do so before Wednesday as we have to confirm our total numbers for catering and table set up - get behind this fantastic cause and really make a difference!

7 days to go!!

Time has gone so quickly and we are only 7 days out from our charity evening - have you got your ticket yet???

Tonight we had a big fundraiser selling our homemade fudge and it was busy from the moment Mum and I started un-packing, we hadn't even got it onto the table and it was selling, we sold out quickly of our "Divine White Chocolate" and the other 5 flavours were almost sold out by the end of the evening. So Mum and I will be back to stirring the fudge pot tomorrow morning ready for next weeks charity evening.

Check back each day here as we will be posting updates about the evening and new items that have been put up for auction and even some new spot prizes!