Renee loves music, dancing, doing puzzles, gardening and.... chickens! Ever since she was a little girl, Renee has always been fascinated by chickens, from holding the baby chickens at the A&P show to experience at school incubating eggs and caring for the baby chickens as well as time on her Nana and Grandad’s farm feeding the chickens and collecting eggs (pictured below).

Renee is 18 years old and lives with Mum Alison, Dad Leon and her twin sister Hollie. She was born with Hypothalamic Hamartoma which is a benign tumor-like malformation that causes a syndrome with treatment-resistant epilepsy, developmental and cognitive deficits and behavioural problems.

In July 2013, Renee had major brain surgery to try and remove or disconnect the tumor. Then, in March 2017, Renee and her family travelled to Houston Texas for further brain surgery where nearly all of the remaining tumor was removed. This improved Renee’s quality of life, however she continues to battle daily seizures and cognitive impairments requiring constant care.

With the help of Fund for Good, Renee has purchased her own chicken coop and will soon get some chickens. Check out some awesome pictures below of Renee putting the coop together!

Having her very own chickens has been on Renee’s wish list for a long time. It will give her a sense of responsibility to feed and care for an animal she absolutely loves. Another benefit of having chickens is the short daily walk to the chicken coop which will improve her mobility and fitness.

It will be a project for Renee, as she is hoping when her chickens produce enough eggs, she can design her very own egg cartons and sell her chickens eggs to friends and neighbours.

We think Renee is absolutely incredible and we can’t wait to see her chickens!

A big congratulations to Renee, one of our successful Fund for Good recipients. Fund for Good is an innovation program helping to fund special projects and dreams of Manawanui customers which can’t be funded elsewhere. We are so pleased to be able to help Renee and look forward to updating you all on her achievements.

Ka pai Renee 👏👏