Little Friends

Dear friends and supporters,

As we approach this holiday season it’s good to pause and consider God’s goodness and faithfulness towards us in these challenging times. To remember that He is still Emmanuel – “God with Us” and wants us to trust in his goodness and closeness.

We are happy to tell you that after 18 months during which we were not able to have the kids attend our daily program because of the pandemic, last September we resumed our work and at the moment have 15 kids attending. During that challenging period of uncertainty and social distancing we stayed in touch with the families and provided them with monthly food parcels as our finances allowed. When they came to collect the food parcels we saw briefly most of the kids that didn’t start school and were supposed to come to our program. At the end of 2020 we had them over to give them Christmas presents and take some photos with the Christmas tree. They told us that they really missed coming to Little Friends.

During those months we had the time to reconsider some things and had some ideas how to spread and develop our work. Until now we have been registered as a humanitarian (non-governmental, non-profit) organisation and our official name was Humanitarian Organisation ‘Little Friends’. After we talked things over as a board and discussed, we decided that it’s time to reconsider some of the things in our statute and programme and change them so it will allow us to develop and begin new activities. So we talked to our lawyer and we made few changes. Now our official name is Center for Informal Education and Development ‘Little Friends’ since that gives us the freedom to work with socially vulnerable groups and offer different help in the form of classes for preparing kids for school (like we did until now) but also add literacy classes, english, homework club, teaching different skills etc. That would include both kids and adults.

Starting from September, we fully committed and started new things as part of our project. We continued with our main activities like working with the preschoolers preparing them for school but this time Alek got involved more and he started literacy classes for kids, english lessons for teenagers and youth and homework club for kids who go to school but need help. The possibilities for influencing and investing in the community are many and they can include different projects but for now we are planing to faithfully work on this ones. It’s really heartwarming and brings us joy to see the eagerness to learn.

This is a new season for us and we invite you to take part. We need both your prayers and your financial support. Please pray for us who work in Shutka, for the parents and kids who come to our preschool program and for all who attend Alek’s literacy and english classes. The situation with the pandemic still brings uncertainty but that should not prevent us from doing good for the community. We are there to serve.

Giving to Little Friends

Concerning donations, we have the option to receive financial support for our work via our official Macedonian bank account or via a UK bank or paypal account (please contact us for details), Even a gift once or twice a year would help a lot. We are fully aware that without your faithful support and God’s grace we couldn’t have done this for so long.

We wish you Merry Christmas and a blessed 2022!

With Love,

The Board of Little Friends

Dijana Krsteska

Aleksandar Madzarovski

Gunilla Naumann