Call for volunteers for an extreme makeover of the St George's home for girls in Wynberg, Cape Town

Call for volunteers

Many of you must be famil­iar with the tele­vi­sion series Extreme Makeover – Home Edition, where fam­il­ies who are down and out, who have faced hard­ships in life or are des­per­ately in need of a bet­ter and some­times safer liv­ing space are sur­prised by a team who rebuilds, extends, upgrades and improves their home.

Well how would you like to take part in an extreme makeover? I’m sure your imme­di­ate answer is yes, how­ever this extreme makeover is not one that involves you or your house get­ting upgraded, but this involves you mak­ing the lives of some very spe­cial chil­dren a whole lot bet­ter and giv­ing their home an extreme makeover ...

Woolworths together with MySchool is spon­sor­ing an extreme makeover of the St Georges Home for Girls in Wynberg, Cape Town who cares for over 40 girls. This home is over 100 years old and is def­in­itely in need of some TLC. Thanks to the Woolworths Food Youth Day pro­mo­tion in 2009 this pro­ject is able to hap­pen, it will be man­aged by NewKidz on the Block and Cape Core Construction.

The St Georges Home for Girls is a registered Children’s Home and is the only res­id­en­tial care facil­ity in the Wynberg District who provides care for chil­dren who have been aban­doned, neg­lected, orphaned or abused. This home also cares for chil­dren with beha­vi­oural prob­lems or who come from failed foster place­ments. This is def­in­itely a place that needs the com­munit­ies sup­port because as so many of the children’s homes in South Africa this one is def­in­itely in need of some res­tor­a­tion and rejuvenation.

Ok, but what does this mean for you and how can you get involved? 300 volun­teers are needed to work in shifts from Wednesday 3 March to Sunday 7 March and you are asked to help in whatever way pos­sible. There will be team lead­ers who will work with smal­ler volun­teer groups guid­ing and train­ing them.

There are so many ways you can assist with this pro­ject. If you like to get your hands a bit dirty or aren’t afraid of hard work then and are able to remove tiles, then sign up today. If you have a cre­at­ive side and are able to paint pic­tures onto walls or are just gen­er­ally cre­at­ive, then they need your help. If you can help with build­ing, elec­trics, plumb­ing and gen­eral handy­man (-woman) tasks, then lend them a hand. If you have a green thumb, are a keen gardener, can assist with wood­work or sand­ing, the please let them know. Or if you are bet­ter at sort­ing, clean­ing and clear­ing up or if you’d like to assist the team with refresh­ments, this pro­ject can def­in­itely use you. Or if your spark­ling per­son­al­ity can inspire and enthuse those who are tired at the end of a long day you assist­ance would be greatly appreciated.

The extreme makeover will con­sist of paint­ing the entire home, fit­ting lam­in­ated floor­ing in, give all of the dorm­it­or­ies a facelift by mak­ing them have a more “homely” atmo­sphere as well as new beds. New bed­ding, linen, cur­tain­ing and fur­niture for the lounges will be pur­chased as this is all des­per­ately need­ing replace­ment. The recre­ational area will also be upgraded and a func­tional food garden is to be made

Your help is needed, come and sup­port this pro­ject any way you can!

If you would like to assist in this pro­ject please con­tact NewKidz on the Block by call­ing +27 (0)83 283‑0576 or visit www.newkidz.org.za