Merry Christmas!

Thank you, thank you and merry christmas and more to everyone whose helped with Riverkids this past year - a number well into three digits now, with amazing support for our very tiny and new Riverkids Shop this holiday, with our Sixty Good People who've helped us keep running every month, all our donors, staff, friends and supporters....

But most of all to the kids themselves.

They stayed in school. They loved their families, and we saw some of their families start to love them better. Some excelled, some struggled, but they all tried, even when trafficked or beaten or abused, they have hope. Hope that they bring every day to Riverkids and share with us.

Dale is headed up to Cambodia 26th-28th this month, as Lyna is away so Dale will do the end-of-month finance and administration. Then January is business-as-usual plus our very first annual report. We'll be sending a copy to all our donors and supporters, and it's basically a chance for us to take a deep breath, assess what we've done and plan how to reach our 2008 goals. That will include finances, which I can roughly say now (thanks to the shop and donations!) gives us as of the 24th of December, enough for five months at US$3,000-US$3,500. We're very cautious about funding and spending for sustainable long-term growth, not a big splash and then we run out!

The other good news is that our charitable registration is in process in Singapore, and we'll be starting our Cambodia-side registration, and well! We've also had some really interesting volunteer opportunities for health, art and counselling.

On a much more personal note, Dale and Jim had an urgent family problem over Christmas, so we've got a backlog from about the 18th of December to respond to, our apologies.

And that, stockings stuffed, children asleep in Cambodia and Singapore, is all the quick news! Thank you!