Sustaining Sandra's Smile (A CFCA "Tell A Story" Post)

I have called you each by name
I love you and you are mine.

From "You are Mine" by David Haas

The child in this picture is Catarina (although she prefers to be called by her middle name, Sandra). I have volunteered to tell Sandra's story as part of the Christian Foundation for Children and Aging's "Tell a Story" campaign. I hope that someone who learns about Sandra it will either agree to sponsor her for $30 a month, tell her story to someone else, and/or pray for her.

Here are the basics:

• Sandra is five years old (her birthday was on March 7)
• She lives with her father, mother, and 2 year old brother
• Sandra speaks Kiche
• The family lives in one room, with adobe walls, dirt floors, and a corrugated metal roof
• The family members sleep on wooden beds and cook on a firewood stove

(This image of a typical Guatemalan firewood stove

is from this blog.)

• The family's approximate monthly income in US dollars is $60
• Sandra's father plants black beans and Sandra's mother washes clothes for other people

(This picture of a Guatemalan black bean plant

 is from this blog.)

Sandra's profile from CFCA tells us that she likes to sing and play dolls. She is described as "very happy." I think her smile confirms that!

If you are not familiar with CFCA's sponsorship program, the $30 per month commitment helps families meet basic needs such as education,  nutrition and medical care. Sponsorship also provides the support and opportunities these families need to improve their life situations and provide a better future for their children. More than 94% of CFCA's expenses go toward program support. (More about financials here.)

For one sponsor's perspective, check out Tina Fisher's post, Heart Treasured Letter, about her family's experience sponsoring Ryan James from the Philippines. I love how she and her children find a special place to sit and savor Ryan James's letters. I am not so patient with our sponsored child's letters!!

I started this post off with an excerpt from the song "You Are Mine" by David Haas. When I was listening to that song during worship yesterday, Sandra and this post were very much on my mind and in my  heart. Other lines of that song say:

I am hope for all who are hopeless

I will be your light

Sandra and her family need the additional hope that a sponsorship gives. Please consider sponsoring her or shining a light on her situation by helping me spread the word!

Here's a sample tweet:

I am helping "Tell A Story" about Sandra, a 5 year old in Guatemala who needs help via @CFCA sponsorship. Contact @biggreenpen for details!

For more information:

My phone number: (850) 556-3517

My email:  opuswsk@aol.com

CFCA: http://www.hopeforafamily.org/

CFCA email: mail@cfcausa.org

CFCA phone: 800.875.6564

Artwork by Estela, 6 years old, Guatemala

 (Tenley's Sponsored Child)

Note from Paula: It is possible that more than one person may contact CFCA about sponsoring Sandra or that a potential sponsor may really have their heart set on sponsoring a boy instead of a girl, a child from one of the 21 other countries served by CFCA, or an elderly person. Please know that CFCA has many sponsorship opportunities available and will be happy to work with you to select who you want to sponsor. You can get more details on that here.












           

Fleeting Pop Fly Perfection! (A Mama Kat Writing Prompt)

Darn you, Kat, if I stay with your prompts long enough I just may work through all of my childhood issues. Like softball. Brought on by this week's prompt number 3, "assigned" me by www.random.org: Incorporate the following line into a poem of your own: catching air with my fingers (inspired by Buttered Toast Rocks).

Fleeting Pop Fly Perfection

PE
Every day
Softball is PE and PE is Softball where I grew up
Get sent to right field
Pray ball goes to left field
Pray all pop flies go elsewhere
Anywhere but here
Stand in a "ready" position
Pray for once to be the "athletic" one instead of the "smart" one
Act enthusiastic on the outside
Cower on the inside

Until that fluke of a day
When it all suddenly makes sense
Something changes
I watch the ball from the moment of impact with the bat
      right into my glove!

It seems so simple, so elegant, so satisfying
It really is all about "keeping your eye on the ball"

Until the next day when the magic ends
The courage evaporates
Every other pop fly in the years and decades to come
Leaves me catching air with my fingers

Wordless Wednesday (#StyleMeMarch - Week Two Edition)

Week Two of the "#StyleMeMarch" challenge from Hilary Rushford of the Bow Ties and Bettys Style Blog is being hung up in the closet now.

As a reminder, here's the breakdown of what each day's theme is:

Week two started last Wednesday with "LBD to Work" day. The "B" had to be for blue in order for it to work for me. My "LBD" was a little (lot) dressy for work:

But this is the LBD...

...and I put a shell over it that goes with an entirely different suit. It's a great color of seafoam green. Not a perfect match with navy but it worked well enough:

With "LBD to work" day behind me, I moved on to the equally challenging and out-of-comfort-zoneish "tease that hair" day. This one involved a lot of "product" and a lot of forehead. One thing I did like about "tease that hair" day was the fact that it was International Women's Day and I was wearing a necklace made by Ugandan women and sold by Bead for Life.

For "stripes or dots" day on Friday, March 9, the first (but certainly not last) repeat item of the month appeared (the skirt I had worn on "Parisian Day"):

What on earth to do for "rock star" day on Saturday, March 10? I was participating in the Shamrock Scurry 5K that day, so I experimented with a St. Patrick's Day themed  "tattoo sleeve":

But it was a pain and I didn't want to run in it. So I tattooed (temporarily) something else:

Sunday saw me move from Ireland to France. It was "something borrowed" day and Tenley and I had an "Afternoon in Paris" women's luncheon with my mother-in-law, so Tenley loaned me her Eiffel Tower necklace.

On Monday, I walked in and my co-worker said, "Oh I see you are doing belt day!" People are sometimes more observant than you think! All of my belts were pretty boring so Goodwill came to the rescue:

Finally, to accent the final day of the (style) week, I needed my teenager's help for "dramatic eyeliner" day. The girl is a pro after all these years of "wings" as part of her dancer makeup. She applied liquid eyeliner on my top lid, and I filled out the rest with a darker pencil than I usually use. Great reaction when I walked onto the track for my weekly intervals workout tonight and one of my friends said, "Oh, did you get made up for track tonight?" It was a fun comment and led to another explanation of #stylememarch.

The spectrum of my eyeliner choices ranges from the usual (on the right - nothing!) to the modest one I have been using during #stylememarch to the pencil I used today after Tenley applied the "heavy artillery" liquid liner.

Yes, as a matter of fact I did wear this same shirt five days ago. Oops! Different jewelry each day though - maybe that mitigates the duplicativeness a bit.

Another week of #stylememarch behind me and a week ahead of digging deep in my limitless imagination to create something interesting out of my not-so-limitless closet.

Care to join me?

Chocolate Delight (A Mama Kat Writing Prompt)

When Random.org handed me Mama's Losin' It prompt number three this week, my friend Merrio's go-to dessert that she brings to almost every office pot luck came immediately to mind. The prompt was: Share a favorite dessert recipe.

This recipe is technically called "Chocolate Delight" but it has a naughtier nickname. I'll get to that.

I had a plan - I would prepare the dessert over two nights (there is a little baking, a little softening (cream cheese), a little thawing, and a little chopping involved), take some pictures, and time it so I could get this blog post up then provide a nice dessert to my coworkers on Friday, after the weekly Biggest Loser Challenge weigh-in.

The problem is: I kept messing things up! I failed to thaw the whipped topping before mixing it in. I used all of the whipped topping instead of 1.5 cups, which left me completely without a white layer to go on top of the chocolate layer. The crust got hard in the refrigerator waiting for me to assemble the rest of the dessert.

What I ended up with is something passable enough for pictures:

And actually still pretty tasty (but not up to my good-enough-to-take-to-work standards).

When made right, though, it's fantastic.

I really recommend you give it a whirl, like Merrio's mom and her friends have been doing for a long time (I love the "vintage" look of the recipe):

Once you try it (and do a better job than I did of following the directions), you'll know why the dessert's nickname is "Better Than Sex" cake!

Nom nom nom.

Horsing Around at the Red Hills Horse/Human Trials

It would be hard to find another town in the United States that finds more ways to combine running with fun as well as Tallahassee does. Case in point: today's Access Tallahassee Cross Country Challenge.

It all sounded pretty innocuous: go out to the cross country course at the Red Hills Horse Trials and run the course!

That would be the 2.4 mile course with approximately 25 horse-sized jumps:

Including two "wet" jumps like this:

Some would say the idea itself was "squirrel-y":

But it had plenty of opportunities to rediscover our "inner child" and "jump for joy" (or survival):

It was no "picnic":

(Imagine the scale; this is a horse jump/human jump.)

But the things that take us out of our comfort zones rarely are a picnic.

Thank you Access Tallahassee for a fun and challenging event!

(Access Tallahassee is a young professionals' organization created by the Tallahassee Chamber of Commerce. Visit their website here.)

(You can visit my entire album from my experience here. I was a bit limited as I had a disposable camera and was trying to run the course while navigating those jumps!)

Wordless Wednesday (#StyleMeMarch - Week One Edition)

With the Poetic Winter Photo Challenge over, I am left to my own devices for Wordless Wednesdays once again. That is why I was all too happy to join the "#StyleMeMarch" challenge from Hilary Rushford of the Bow Ties and Bettys Style Blog.

I was intrigued when my friend Annie tweeted that she was considering going out of her comfort zone and joining the challenge. Here's the deal:

The goal is to achieve each day's challenge without spending lots of money (good thing).

So far here's what March has held for me.

On favorite color day (March 1), nothing in my favorite color (red) was work-appropriate, so I dressed in a color I gravitate to often:

[March 2 was "hair braid" day. I took a pass on that one!]

On "Parisian" day (March 3), I was stumped. Hilary encouraged sophisticated black and white, along with pearls. I didn't really arrive at "sophisticated," but I checked off black, white, and pearls. The salesperson at Coach complimented me on my skirt. Ooh la la!

For "bought on sale" day (March 4), that was a breeze since pretty much everything I own qualifies! I got this dress for $10 from Marshall's. These things that hang off it are weird but once you wrap them around your waist and knot them, it works! I love the fact that I can wear navy, black, or gray shoes with the dress. And of course that green color surfaces again.

Even though we are encouraged not to buy anything new, "bold lipstick day" (March 5) necessitated a purchase. This "ruby" lipstick definitely ratchets things up. (Old color on top, ruby on bottom.)

Today (March 6) was "pattern" day, so I wore argyle:

I'll never be a fashion plate but I have really let things deteriorate, blaming family budget issues, time crunches, and a host of other things.

The challenge is making me pay attention. Being in touch with the little details doesn't take a credit card with a high limit or a wad of cash. It takes caring about yourself. That doesn't cost a cent.

Across Town and Around the World - Celebrating Astounding Women for International Women's Day

If you are like me, a run-of-the-mill American, you have undoubtedly heard the words "get a job." You may have heard them muttered by a passerby at a homeless person. You may have thought it when thinking about the pros and cons of public assistance. You may have thought or said it yourself.

This Thursday, March 8, Oxfam America encourages us to think about mothers worldwide, especially in developing countries, who want to feed and provide for their kids but face hardships that make it nearly impossible. They're among the one in seven people who go to bed hungry every night. This isn't because there isn't enough food to go around. It's because there are deep imbalances in access to resources like fertile lands and water. More than 40 percent of the world's population - 2.5 billion people - live in poverty, and many of them are women.

Women need equal access to the resources that can help them overcome poverty. They need, when they are not able to manifest it for themselves, a voice. Sometimes we must be that voice for them.

To give you a little more background:

• Sixty-six percent of the world's work falls on women's shoulders, yet they earn only 10% of the world's income.
• If women were given the same level of access to resources that men have, they could increase yields on their farms by 20-30%.
• Hunger and poverty are about power and inequality, and women and girls face the biggest inequalities of all. 

This International Women's Day, Oxfam America encourages us to show women everywhere that we appreciate their contributions to the world. The ways to do this are simple.

1. Send an International Women's Day eCard to a woman you know, to say thank you for all that she does. I sent eCards to:

Mary McManus, to thank her for her involvement in the Yoga Reaches Out Yogathon, which benefits the Africa Yoga Project.

Suzanne Harrell, owner of Tallahassee's Journeys in Yoga, to thank her for contributing proceeds from donation yoga classes to America's Second Harvest of the Big Bend, as part of the studio's Community Service (Seva) commitment.

Cristina Hentzen, wife of CFCA founder Bob Hentzen, who shares Bob's vision of helping children, youth, and aging in 22 countries who face poverty. (In this video, Cristina discusses her participation in Walk2gether, a solidarity walk of 8,000 miles through 12 countries.)

The Mothers of Ciudad Vieja, Guatemala, who make candy, ribbon embroidery, and other items to sell in Antigua (a popular tourist destination) in order to support their families. These mothers teach other mothers; they all support each other.

The mothers of Ciudad Vieja shared songs with us when I visited.

July 2011

A sample of the ribbon embroidery created by the Ana Lucrecia of Ciudad Vieja.

(This is an appliance cover.)

Melanie Monroe, who along with her husband Lloyd, runs the Porch de Salomon ministry in Panajachel, Guatemala. The ministry strives to serve "the lost, the least, and the last." Their ministry has helped countless families in Guatemala by coordinating mission teams who build homes, provide dental care, and serve in many ways.

Robin Dunn-Bryant, who contributed her time to teach an "intention" yoga class this past October as part of my effort to help Carla from Guatemala find a sponsor.

Tenley Kiger (my 15-year-old daughter), because I appreciate her being willing to accompany me to Guatemala last summer, as well as taking Estela into her heart and agreeing to be her sponsor (by providing financial support each month and exchanging letters).

Tenley and Estela meet. July 2011

To send your own eCard (or as many as you'd like!), click here.

2.  Give the Oxfam America International Women's Day 2012 award to a woman you think has made a difference to the world. She could be a teacher, your mom, a non-profit leader, a woman entrepreneur, the neighbor who always checks up on you when you're ill...the possibilities are endless.

I chose to give an International Women's Day 2012 award to Chika Okoro. Chika and I have known each other for a while, but I got to know her better when we were on a Relay for Life team. While I slept, she kept up the trips around the track. I don't know how many or if she was running the whole time (I was asleep, remember?!) but she never gave up. I know she is the same way about her passion for helping the hungry in our community through America's Second Harvest of the Big Bend. She combines humility with tenacity; it is a combination worth being recognized and celebrated.

If we come together, we may not be able to remove the imbalances between men and women immediately. But we will show women around the world ... and in our own neighborhoods ... that we care about them.

That's not too much to ask for half the world's population, is it?