Pin It!

We are half way through the month of September and about half way to the goal of having 3,108 children sponsored! Yay!

To keep the momentum going, the wizards behind Compassion Bloggers have created a Pinterest contest. Each of us have been encouraged to create a board on Pinterest called 'My Sponsored Child'. The exciting thing about this contest is the winners will be selected randomly and our sponsored kids and their families will be the recipients of the prize money! Isn't that so cool! Love it!

I have already 'pinned' a few things to this newly created board and hope to pin more items throughout the week. There are so many creative paper crafts to be found on Pinterest to send to our sponsored kids. Pinterest is my go-to source for our monthly sponsor letter writing night projects!

Time for InstaFriday!

It's InstaFriday time! Here is a recap of my Instagram photos from the last week:

 

Saturday was our anniversary! We spent the day in the city at the Ghirardelli Chocolate Festival. We were able to get 15 samples of different chocolate items: brownies, tarts, ice cream sundaes, malts, cookies, and of course, Ghirardelli chocolate. It ended up being a little different than we expected, but it was a beautiful, clear day in the city... :o)

For dinner that night, we were able to use our Buca di Beppo gift card. We had never been there before. This bowl of spaghetti and meatballs was meant for 2 people, but it could have fed at least four people! So glad we didn't order appetizers or salad. Maybe when we have the kids with us.

Since Kev bought our tickets for the chocolate festival early, we received two $10 gift cards to Macy's. On our way home from the city, we stopped at a Macy's and found these cute fall mugs. We both thought they would be great for tea and a reminder of our day together.

I have been enjoying the Hello Mornings Challenge. This has been a great way for me to get my mornings started the right way. Our fall Hello Mornings Bible study is in 1 Peter. I love digging into God's Word this way.

Tuesday found me at jury duty. It was really strange being at jury duty on 9/11 and the court house is on 11th Street. I spent the morning reading and looking through some magazines. We were let out early for lunch, so I ran a couple of errands. Once we returned from lunch, most of us were called into court rooms for jury selection. I ended up in a court room for a month long murder case. Because I am the primary caregiver for my daughter, I was excused from service. Maybe I will be able to serve next time.

Months ago, I found an idea on Pinterest to send to our Compassion kids. We traced our hands, cut them out, and wrote a Bible verse on them. We mailed along extra paper and a note asking the kids to do the same, then mail them back to us. This week, we received our first hand back!

My camera has been off being serviced, so I thought I would make a new camera strap while it was away. This strap has a pocket to hold the lens cap. So handy!

Still making progress on the baby blanket...126 rows done, 95 to go. I usually will sit down and knit two rows at a time. There are quite a few mistakes, but I don't think anyone will really be able to tell. Can you see the hearts?

Yesterday, there was a group of us that headed over to the National Heirloom Expo. My friend and I went last year and really enjoyed ourselves. This year, there were five of us that spent the day learning about how to grow better tomatoes, basil, and garlic and what to do with some of the herbs your might be growing. It was a fun day out with friends!

Have you been Instagramming this week? Join us for InstaFriday!

Happy Mail!! :o) ...and sad mail :o(

On Monday, there was a Compassion cream colored envelope in mail addressed to me!

The envelope held not just one, but two letters from Lina!

 

Letter number one was dated May 25:

 

"Dear Yvonne,

I salute you with a great hug, hoping you and your family are doing well, it's very pleasurable to receive news from you. Thank you for the sponsorship you give me and all of your details. I really liked everything you sent me, the cards I am going to used them to make art as well as the colors, pens and the sharpener. I shared the candies with my brother and my parents, the balls are very pretty and really like them, the tweezers I will use them tomorrow to go visit a great friend who lives in another neighborhood. Do you like to go and visit your friends? What do you do with them? I ask you to pray for my family I will be praying for your family and for you. I want you to read Psalms 139:13. Farewell with love, Lina."

 

In the spring, I was able to send a package of items with someone who was traveling to Colombia. These were the gift items that Lina thanked me for in the letter. One thing I noticed in this letter that I hadn't seen before is that the questions were typed in bold. I know on the Compassion web site, they suggest that we number questions to the kids or highlight them in our letters. Something to remember as we prepare to write letters again this Friday!

 

Letter number two was dated July 12:

 

"Dear Yvonne,

Loved Yvonne I am glad to be able to write to you, thank you for being so special, I am fascinated because I have your sponsorship, I love the letters, the stickers, the cards and the bible verses, those were nice gifts. My peers would like to have a sponsor like you, thank you for showing me your love. I want you to know that bonus you send was a great blessing to me, I got a skirt and a yellow blouse because it is my favorite color. Do you like yellow? In one of your letters you asked me about my country, well it is the door of south America, it's big, and it has a great variety of flora and fauna and weather, according to the regions, its people is valuable, there is people like you: Loving, generous, kind and with a nice heart, here we only have two seasons, winter and summer, my favorite is winter because it's cooler and I can play under the rain. Please send a warm salute to your family from me and tell them I appreciate theirs prayers, I will be praying so God's grace will leak upon your lives. I think it's great you enjoy learning about Jesus, Jesus is my favorite hero. This year I have liked the most my natural science class and I can say it's my favorite. Who is your best friend? Mine is called Karen and we have been friends for 10 years, I really love her and I like to count with her. I send you a Bible verse I really like about friendship and it's in Proverbs 17:17. As for the Christmas letter I tell you we had a great time, we spend it in family, I got a lot of giftss and of course I was praying so God would bless you. I ask you to pray for my family, especially for my dad so he does well in his job. Farewell, remember that I love you until heaven. Lina"

 

In the two years that we have been sponsoring Lina, this is by far the longest letter we have received from her!

 

With these letters, we received something extra! Months ago, I had found a project on Pinterest where you trace your hand onto cardstock, cut it out, and write a Bible verse on the 'hand'. We did this for each one of the kids and sent additional paper along, with a note asking them to do the same, then mail it back to us. Imagine how happy I was when I saw this with the letters:

 

 

I will treasure this!

 

 

Then today, I received a letter from Compassion in a plain white envelope from the Sponsor and Donar Relations Director. This letter said:

 

 

"We appreciate your involvement in the lives of God's precious children by serving as a correspondent. We have just learned that the supporter for Xiomara in Peru has ended their sponsorship; therefore, you will not be able to continue correspondence with this child."

 

 

 

 

Over the last year, I have been corresponding with Xiomara and have just loved this young lady. I have known this could happen, and it is one of the reasons why we have not taken on any more sponsored kids. However, because we are working on paying off some debt, this may not be the best time to add one more sponsored child to our family.

 

 

I posted about this on Facebook and said we would be praying about this. Then I received a message from a friend that made me cry! She has been considering sponsoring and was wondering if they can take on Xiomara! We will both be praying about this over the next few days. I will be seeing her next week and will show her the letters I have received so far. If you are reading this post, could you be praying for this situation also?

 

 

So even though I this post the title of  'Happy Mail!!! :o) ...and sad mail :o(', there is a chance that even the sad part of this post could end up being a blessing! I know that God will provide and I need to remember that and trust Him to watch over Xiomara and her family.

 



Compassion Blogger Assignment: Dear God

In case you didn't know, September is Blog Month at Compassion. There is a goal to have at least 3,108 children sponsored this month through the internet. As of the e-mail we received this morning, 837 children have been sponsored because of Compassion Bloggers! Yay! Isn't this exciting!

Last week, we were encouraged to share about Blog Month on our blogs and have our readers prayerfully consider sponsoring a child. This week's assignment is just a little different. Here goes:

Dear God,

Little did I know how becoming a sponsor with Compassion would change my life, but You knew. To me, these children are not just a picture in a packet. They are living, breathing human beings who deserve a chance to make a difference in their little corner of the world. Thank You for moving in our hearts to add to our family in this way!

Never before have we spent so much time praying for people we have never even met. However, we feel like these children are a part of our family, and they are. They are our brothers and sisters in Christ, and we love each one of them. We know You love them too, and You planned for them to be a part of our lives.

If it is Your will, Lord, I pray that You continue to watch over these children, protect them, give them a hunger to know more about You, and help them to make a difference in their families and in their communities. Thank You for always being there to hear our prayers for these children.

In Jesus' name...Amen!

How about you? Have you ever written a letter to God about your Compassion kids?

Have you ever considered...?

...sponsoring a child?

 

 

 

 

I know before we started sponsoring a child through Compassion, we were skeptical. Are these kids real? Does the money really help these kids? How does it all work?

 

 

At concerts we had attended, I would see the child packets being handed out and I just couldn't bring myself to raise my hand to take one. "We don't have enough money to do this", was one of the lies I believed.

 

The reality, we do have enough money to do this! For most families, you can make a $38 a month sacrifice to make the difference in the life of a child.

 

Make iced coffee at home instead of buying Starbucks, make pizza at home instead of having it delivered, rent a movie at the Redbox instead of going to the theater, cut your cable, eat rice and beans once a week. There are so many creative ways that most families can squeek out $38 a month to be that one family that can make a difference in the life of one child.

 

If you are willing to make the sacrifice, be sure to visit the Compassion web site. Pray about the children on the web site, pray for God to help you select a child that you can add to your family today! I challenge you to seriously pray about this. And if you do decided to sponsor a child, please let me know. Knowing that one more child has a family to love on them just makes my day!