How do you see your Compassion journey ending?

We are at the end of Compassion's Blog Month, on a journey to do what we can to find sponsors for 3,108 children. As of this morning, we are 715 children away from meeting this goal!

Well, the folks at Compassion Bloggers have pulled out a very creative way to end our month. Our new assignment is to blog as if you are a sponsored child. You are a child living in extreme poverty. What do you have to say?

The top 3 blog posts (as determined by a panel of judges at Compassion) will win money for their Compassion child's family! But the overall goal of all these blog posts this month is to have more children sponsored with Compassion. If you are not currently sponsoring a child with Compassion, please prayerfully consider it as you read through my post.

In this post, I have decided to write 2 letters, and here is letter #1:

"Dear Mr. and Mrs. Smith,

I want to thank you for the many years that you have provided my sponsorship with Compassion. Because of your investment in my life, I know who Jesus is because I was able to attend the project center each and every week and hear many lessons about this man who saved me from my sins.

Each week, I would share the stories I was learning with my family, and they also know who Jesus is. For this, I will always be grateful for your sponsorship.

As I prepare to leave the Compassion program, I am excited about the opportunities I will have in my community. Opportunities to earn money for my family, share about Jesus with others, and help at the Compassion project.

There is just one thing I wish had been different. Many of my friends received so many letters of encouragement from their sponsors. Even though I never received any letters from you, I am still so thankful for the blessing you have been in my life. I just would have loved to been able to learn more about you and your family.

Thank you for being a part of my life over these past 15 years. I will continue to pray for you every day.

Love,
Natalia

Letter #2:

Dear Mr. and Mrs. Smith,

I am not sure whether to be extremely happy or extremely sad writing this letter to you! For the past 15 years, your family has been such a blessing and encouragment to me. You and your family consistently sent letters and pictures to me, which I have kept every one and will treasure through out my life.

Through my struggles, your prayers and letters pointed me to continually trust in Jesus. I am not sure where I would be today without your constant love and support. I pray that every Compassion child could have such dedicated sponsors like you have been for me.

Now that my time at the Compassion center is done, I am looking forward to being a part of the Leadership Development Program. I never would have even attempted to apply for this program if it hadn't been for your family continually sending me such encouraging words. I thank you for making me feel like I really am a part of your family.

I know that we were never able to meet in person during my time at the Compassion center, but I look forward to the day when we are all in heaven together, rejoicing at the feet of Jesus, because you took the time to invest in the life of one child, living thousands of miles away from you. Thank you just doesn't describe how much your family means to me.

I love you all so much,
Natalia

Both of these letters are creations from my thoughts about what a child might write at the end of their journey with Compassion. Which letter would you prefer to receive?

Learner, Belief, Input, Achiever, Intellection

A few weeks ago, Shaun Groves had a blog post about Strength Finder 2.0. The title of his post made me want to read more: "One Thing That Made Me a Better Husband, Parent & Worker". Being the book person that I am, I went ahead and ordered the book. Because I am usually working through quite a stack of books at any one time, the book has been in my pile until just a couple of days ago.

At first glance, the book is a little intimidating. After all, it is 174 pages, which depending on the content can take a few days to get through. But in reality, you only read about 30 pages, then you open a little packet in the back of the book which contains a code for you to be able to take the Strength Finder 'test' online.

Once you have taken the test and received your results, the web site generates a report for you with your Top 5 Strengths of which mine were: Learner, Belief, Input, Achiever, and Intellection. Part 2 of the book is the application part for your list of strengths. In all, there are 34 strength themes. Each strength theme contains a description, as well as, Ideas for Action and Working With Others that have that theme as a strength.

Now, I need to spend a little more time reading through each of the themes, but what are my initial thoughts on my results?
Learner: Oh yeah, I love to learn things!
Belief: The Bible is my guide!
Input: I love to read about new topics!
Achiever: I really do like to accomplish tasks!
Intellection: I do enjoy my time alone to think through things!

So what about you? Have you taken the Strength Finder test? What were your results?

Time for InstaFriday...a little late

Here is a recap of my week of Instagram photos...

 

Last Friday, we held our monthly Compassion sponsor letter writing night. Found this idea on Pinterest! I also found some cute fall stickers at Michaels to send along with this month's letters.

 Saturday was our annual beach trip with our church family. It was a beautiful sunny day, and as tradition would have it, we ended our day together singing worship songs before heading home.

 

 Sunday was an exciting day at church! We started the service in our old building, squished together and just a little warm like usual. Just before it was time for our pastor to deliver the message, he invited us all over to our new building! Many faithful workers have set aside many hours to complete our new church building!

 

 Last time we went through Mystery of History, I was teaching both kids. This time, Kelsey gets to do all the projects on her own. We just finished reading about the early Egyptians. Project time was to construct a pyramid. She did a great job working on her own!

 

 The mornings have started to get just a little bit chilly here, decided to have my first cup of hot tea in quite a while! Harney & Sons Vanilla Comoro is so yummy with a little bit of raw sugar... :o)

 

 Time to start learning how to use my Photoshop Elements 6.0 program. So glad the library has these books so I can decide which one to look for used.

 

 Found a couple of cloth book kits on our last trip to Wal-Mart. I love making these types of gifts!

 

 Compassion Event Time! We signed up to be volunteers at the first stop on The City Harmonic's new tour as a headline band. Matthew and I had heard these guys a couple of times already this year. We knew this would be a great event to work at because Bob Lenz would be speaking! And it was a great event! 28 Compassion kids were sponsored that night! Yay!

 

Since I didn't get my InstaFriday post up yesterday, there is one more picture to share with you. Today is the first day of autumn and I finally took down all of my summer decorations... :o(

 

Want to join in the IntsaFriday fun? Be sure to visit the link at Life Rearranged's blog!

 

 



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!