Consumed

A couple of months ago, I lost the help of the folks helping me run the ministry I started at my church last year.  They need to move on, and I’m okay with that.  We each have our own passions, callings, and priorities and it’s important that people are always free to follow what they believe is right for their lives.  The timing, however, is pretty atrocious.  Starting study, I need to be able to focus on when my assignments are due and on settling my son into preschool.  I am instead finding myself trying to juggle these with needing to make some big decisions regarding the church ministry.

Consumed, obsessed, passionate, zealous, crazy, insane…

Some of these things have been said about me recently.  The others have most likely been thought, even if not voiced directly to me.  Heck, I sometimes say them to myself!

Have you ever thought about what Thomas Edison’s friends thought?  Even those in the scientific circle.  “Thomas, you’re obsessed with a light bulb.  You moron.  Like anything’s ever going to come out of that.”  He tried thousands of times to get electricity to run a lightbulb.  Literally thousands.  And didn’t give up.  Today, we applaud his dedication, his zeal, his passion.  But back then, people probably just thought he was a little cook-coo.   A little over the top.  Try, sure, but why give your life to something so mundane, so weird, so socially uncool.

The thing is, if I was consumed by study or overly passionate about my son that would probably be okay, wouldn’t it?  But because I am zealous over a ministry started to help the poorest of the poor, somehow it feels like that is too much.  Sigh.

But sometimes I think people don’t always get just how much time a ministry takes (or anything new for that matter).  If you don’t get it right, it will die out by default.  It has to have just the right amount of regular contact, exciting news, etc without overloading people with too much.  And when you’re left carrying most of the burden of it, yes, it does become all-consuming.

I am really pleased to have found the thing which I was made for after years of wondering.

But also scared.  And I find myself wishing sometimes that I could just ignore it, and have it all fade away.  Live a normal suburban life.  Indulge in those little luxuries, be a little obsessed with my own life instead of something that doesn’t fit our societies standards so well.  But I can’t.

If I don’t do this, no one else will.

If I don’t speak up, who will raise their voice?

Who will cry out for the destitute, the desperate?

For those of us who call ourselves Christians, how are we possibly ignoring this HUGE issue?  The Bible refers to alleviating poverty over 3,000 times. 

Yet we carry on with our daily lives, completely overlooking one of the single biggest commandments of Christianity.  To release the captives, share our food with the hungry, champion the down and out.  Perhaps even to give until we have nothing left to give (that’s what the New Testament church did).

I cannot in all conscience claim to be a follower of Christ if I do not love my neighbour as I love myself.  I cannot follow the one who poured out his life, gave his everything for me if I am not prepared to sacrifice at least a little of my free time, my resources, my compassion.

If it was my son starving to death, I’d want someone to speak for him.  I’d want someone to compel others to help us.

But what if I fail?  What if it folds, doesn’t work?  I’ve already given hours and hours to this.  A whole year of planning and praying and talking with people and launching and running this ministry.  There are plenty of other things I could have done instead.  More personally fulfilling things, easier and less costly. 

It’s hanging on the edge.  It would be so easy to give up now.  I tried.  I really did.  When I first launched this idea, people said it was amazing.  We could go national, have a website, do all these amazing things, they said.  It’s a good thing I did at least take the enthusiasm with a good dose of realism, because now those same people are too busy, too tired, too strapped for cash, too everything else.  And I’m left with my ‘fabulous’ ministry, six months in with no one to help run it.  And I find myself evaluating the cost.  Is it worth it?  Am I really making a difference?  If I just wanted to raise money for the poor, I could have done that by doing carwashes.  Or working, and giving what I earned.  Seriously, with the amount of hours this has taken, that would have been a more productive/efficient way of raising funds!  But I don’t want to just raise money.  I already give quite a bit.  I want to encourage others to give, to find God’s heart for those less fortunate than us, to realise and remember that we are some of the most blessed, prosperous people on earth.  And that with privilege comes certain responsibilities (to borrow a quote from the movie Ever After). 

But I can’t be at church every week, or even every month promoting it.  I cant’ be chasing after other people, trying to make them do something they might just not be ready for.  And there’s a thousand little things behind the scenes that have to be done to keep things running.  Emails, phone calls, photo editing, texts, tracking donations, talking with supporters, working out what to present next…the list is almost unending.   And it’s sucking away at my down-time.  Down-time that I do actually need.  I live a busy life, I do need some time that is not frazzled and rushed.

I could lose friends over this.

I could lose sleep.

I’m certainly losing free time.

When do you reach the point where enough is enough, where you say you’ve tried and it just didn’t work out?

And how do you tell whether something is worth it?

I really hope this is.

Because someone has to do it.  This issue simply isn’t being raised in my church, or in the vast majority of other churches around our country and the Western world.

Ever watched Amazing Grace?  It’s an incredible movie about William Wilberforce using his gifting and his passion in politics to fight for the abolition of slavery.  But what hits me hard is the personal cost.  He lost friends.  His health was bad his whole life long.  He lived in terrible emotional torment because he chose to open his heart to the call of God.  Would he say it was worth it?  Was it worth the personal torment, the hours of work, to see slavery banned?  To know that it was no longer okay to treat humans as working collateral, cattle to be used and abused?  I think he would say that it was.  He did what God asked of him.  But it came at great personal cost.

Am I prepared for the cost?  Am I willing to give to this?  Sometimes I’m not.  Sometimes I decide to watch TV instead.  But still, it sits there in the back of my mind.  I am compelled to do something.

The thing is, just as clearly as I know that I’m called to champion the poorest of the poor, I also know I’m meant to study this Early Years Degree and I’m meant to be Munchkin’s Mummy.  So there has to be room for those other two equally important things.  My life has to have some balance between the vying needs of the three.  Let alone my poor patient husband!  We’ve been talking about it a lot lately, trying to decide what to do.

Right now, I’m wallowing in exhaustion and wondering why on earth I’m trying.  The big question is when as an individual do you decide that you can’t carry it alone any more.  Someone said to me this week that if you’ve got too many rocks in your wheelbarrow, if they are too heavy, then you need to leave some behind.  That’s hard.  I find myself wanting to give my rock to someone else.  But what if they’ve already got too many themselves?  Well then, could I carefully wrap my rock in a blanket and tuck it into a little hillside cave, a little note attached “Very important rock, please carry for me!?”  Would someone come and pick it up?  Or would it simply be forgotten?

Where is the fine line between commitment and burn-out?  I don’t want to live a mediocre life, blaming circumstances or other’s actions for not doing what I’m passionate about.  But neither do I want to do it to the point that I lose even all the passion that got this started.  Sometimes people say to leave something like ministry.  Leave it for a time, and come back to it when you’re older, when things are more settled, when you have more finances (you know, just add when……whatever the thing that would help the most in here).  But I get the feeling that we do this too often.  Too often we delay things, waiting for the ‘perfect’ opportunity that never actually comes.  We spend our lives finding excuses for NOT doing what we believe in, for leaving it for another day.  I don’t want to do that.  But neither do I want to put everything into this, and then wish I’d spent that time doing something else.  After all, that’s about as pointless as the first option, isn’t it?  And despite what people might sometimes think about me, I do actually know that there are only so many hours in a day, and I am only capable of doing so many things in them (usually about half of my to-do list for any given day, hehe!).  And I’m concerned that in all my efforts to DO SOMETHING for God, even something he is this passionately concerned about, that I could end up missing out on GOD HIMSELF.  Because I could end up too busy to actually spend time with him.  That would be tragic.

If your passion becomes a burden, then what?  Can it turn around, and come full circle back to being a passion again, or does it end up dead?  What do you do when something becomes too heavy to carry alone, and there seems to be a scarcity of helping hands?

I’m really not sure.  I guess I’ll keep asking God.

Amy

The Great Opportunity

Following is a little fictional story that ran through my head this morning.  I hope you like it.  I haven’t fiddled around much with it, not a great deal of editing to make it read better, this is pretty much just the words that came to mind as I typed.  Typed and tried not to cry at times (surprising myself at how much emotion was sitting just below the surface).   I’d been reading “The International Bank of Bob” about some workers Bob met once, and suddenly it was as if a light switch went on and I realised how easily this could have been our story…now obviously if you know us and where we live, you would know we considered sending Boyo back to Australia to work for a year, because he couldn’t get work here.  This little writing is entirely fictional, though based on my own thoughts and feelings about how things might have been if we had been living in a country other than NZ and had gone to work in a country other than Australia (which for the most part has really good working conditions!).

The Great Opportunity

“It’s just for twelve months,” he said.  “The money’s so good, we could probably live on that for two or three years.”  “You can move back in with your parents, they’ll look after you.” “And I’ll email every day, I promise.”

He kissed me goodbye, and boarded the plane.

It seemed like a great idea.  It felt like our only option.  It wasn’t like there’s been work here, after all.  Years of trying, years of disappointment, slowly watching as my man gets more and more discouraged, as our finances dwindle ever smaller, as we feel more and more concerned about being able to raise our son.

He thought he’d make mega-bucks.  After all, it’s the land of opportunity, just across the ditch.  My husband, the eternal optimist.  I wanted to believe him, more than anything.  Wanted to, but wasn’t sure.  “What if you don’t find work?” I asked.  But he was so sure, so desperately sure that this was the only way.  And we kept reading about all these amazing jobs on Seek.  It was the recruiter that sealed it though.  Boyo responded to an online job advert, and within a hour Paul had called him.  Paul said he had just the right job for Boyo, good working conditions, nice boss, accommodation supplied, and the best part, great wages.  They provided meals and everything, so there’d be so much money left to send back, we’d really be able to make some headway.  It all happened so fast.  I told him to slow down a bit, but he reckoned Paul said the jobs would fill in days.  We had to make a snap decision, Paul had made it really clear that he could easily find someone else for the role.  So we did.

I brushed off my tears and headed home.  To our new home, in the basement at my parents.  My son asked where Daddy was.  “He’s gone to work hard and make money for us.” I said.  I checked my emails.  Nothing yet.  But then, he’d probably only just landed anyway.  The next day, nothing.  The following, still nothing.  “Well, he’s probably really busy settling in, after all it’s a new job.  Maybe he doesn’t get time off right away,” I reasoned with myself, trying to still the small voice of panic growing daily in my mind.

Three weeks later it came.  A small, dusty letter in the post.  A single piece of paper, signed by my husband.  A small amount of money.  “So little?”  I sat down and read,  “I’m so sorry it’s taken so long to write.  Would you believe, there’s no email here.  I’m working really hard.  It’s incredibly hot, and it’s so tiring, pretty much all I do is work and sleep.  The guys are great, there’s a lot of Kiwis as well as some guys from Indo, and the Philippines.  It’s really funny trying to communicate sometimes.  We’re out in the middle of nowhere, not much to do other than work.  They’ve changed our wages, too.  Said that profits have been lower this month, apparently it’s in our contract that it’s all based on that.  I’m so sorry, I’ve saved everything I can.  I’ll send more as soon as I’m able, and write again soon.  Things are sure to pick up in a week or two.  I love you. I hope you’re doing okay at your parents.  Give Munchkin a big hug and kiss from Daddy.”  There was no return address.  I couldn’t even write to encourage him, tell him we were doing okay, that we missed him, that I was proud of him.

I gave my baby the hug and kiss from his daddy..  Then I found a quiet corner while he played with his truck.  I held that letter to myself and just cried and cried.  It felt like the sobs would never end.  Then I picked myself up and carried on.

Three more months passed.  Munchkin stopped asking where Daddy was.  I worked every day in my parent’s garden, trying to supplement the wages from Boyo.  I found a small job at a local store, only on Saturdays.  Mum and Dad had Munchkin.  They were both exhausted from their working week, then being woken by us in the night.  I felt so guilty adding yet another burden on them, but there wasn’t any other way, especially since Munchkin had been sick and we’d used the last of Boyo’s wages on medicine.   We needed the money; we all did.  I couldn’t have them covering our expenses, they barely had enough for themselves. 

Finally, another letter.  One single flimsy scrap of paper, a jagged tear down the side, as if it had been torn from a notebook or something. “Really love my workmates, but miss you so much.  How are you both?  Wages still the same.  Tried to get out of it so I can look for something else, but the contract sounds so darn airtight, I have to wait it out till the end of the year.  Can’t wait to see you again.  Hug Munchy for me.  I love you.”

I didn’t tell Munchkin.  What was the point?  I just sat him on my knee and squeezed till he wriggled like a worm in a birds beak, while tears trickled down my face.  I handed the letter to my parents.  We didn’t talk about it.  They understood.  I did the only thing I could do.  I prayed.  I begged, I pleaded, and I bargained.  Not that I really had anything left to bargain with.  Then I carried on again.  We waited. I waited here, while he waited there.  I couldn’t even tell him I was waiting, that I was praying for hope and strength for him.

Finally, the year was up.  But there was no news.  When would my man come home?  Was he coming?  I just didn’t know anymore.  It had been six months since we’d heard anything from him.  What if he found another job, stayed longer, hoping to make good still?  What if he’d gotten sick, died even, over there far away from anyone he loves?  I just couldn’t handle the questions.  My mind shut down.  The numbness was a relief.

Then he came.  I was in the vege garden, trying to dig some horse manure into the garden.  We’d been given it last week, someone Dad did a job for.  I heard the familiar squeak of the gate, but assumed it must be one of my parents home from work.  But it wasn’t. There he was, standing in front of me.  Gaunt, so tired it looked like his legs might collapse under him at any moment.  The boyish smile was gone.  His hands were dark with calluses, his shoes looked like the were more holes than shoe.  I couldn’t believe my eyes.  Was I seeing things?  “Hi.”  He said.  And opened his arms.  I couldn’t seem to find my voice, but I did find my legs.  Before I knew it, we were hugging and sobbing together.

It’s so good to have him home.  I wish he’d never left; it wasn’t worth it.  All those false promises.  He reckons we’re lucky, some of the guys signed up for three year contracts.  One poor chap died of fever while the other workers watched on, helpless, the bosses refusing to get any medical assistance.  Boyo got sick too.  For two months he coughed and coughed all day and all night, before finally getting better.  I’ve noticed there’s still a lingering cough on cold nights.  Things are no better than they were before he left.  The last six month’s of those pitiful wages will last us maybe three, if we’re lucky.  He had to buy his airfare home out of it.  They’d promised return flights, just like they’d promised good working conditions.  Ten hour days, in the blistering heat?!  And as for the food and accommodation, our chickens do better.  Why are people allowed to do this?  They lied to us!  Recruiter Paul conned us into something that was inhumane, then disappeared off the face of the planet.  We tried to track him down, complained to the authorities, but while sympathetic, they just brushed it off.  “Not our jurisdiction,” they said.  “You signed a contract and went willingly,” they said.  Nothing they can do, it’s in another country.  Boyo said he tried to contact authorities over there, but his boss had his passport, and the people supposed to help him would have jailed him instead so he had to give up and go back to work.  I tremble, just thinking how close we came to being separated for good.  Things were bad, really bad, but they could have been so much worse.

So here we are, back at square one.  Still desperate, still without good work.  Still living with my parents, the three of us now.  My husband is terribly depressed.  It’s as if the year has just sucked every last ounce of courage out of him, a big vacuum hose that has left him flat and deflated.  I used to think he was too optimistic, that he needed to come down a peg or two.  Not anymore.  I wish I’d never thought that…to see him so down, so worried that he’s not providing for his family, it’s painful.  I wonder how we will manage.  He’s looking for work, but there’s so little out there at the moment.  Things have been so tough for years, and our ‘great opportunity’ nearly cost us everything.

This doesn’t have to be the end of the story.  I wanted to write a better ending, but to be honest I haven’t thought of one yet.  The basic idea is that while for so many people this is the reality of their lives, being either trapped into substandard labour conditions against their will, or alternatively struggling to survive on a pittance, for many their lives ARE changing.  A $25 loan can change their future.  That’s what Kiva.org is all about.  That’s what The International Bank of Bob is all about.  Amazing.  I’ll let you know if I come up with a good ending to my story, but in the meantime, I think it is simply enough that I’ve seen.  I’ve realised that but for the nation we were born into, this could so easily have been me.  It could have been my husband, my son, my life.  I am so grateful it is not, but also determined that it shouldn't have to be anyone else’s either.

Amy

Walking the Talk

A few weeks ago we went on a walk.


Now, you might be wondering what the big deal is. If you know Boyo, Munchy, and myself, you would know that we walk frequently. People are often surprised at how far, how often, and what weather we will walk in. Walking is part of our lifestyle. It's good for us, good for the environment, and quite frankly, it is something we love doing. To borrow a quote from Pride and Prejudice, "Walking is very beneficial exerise." Walking is also good for the soul. Feeling the breeze, listening to the birds, and having time to think, relax and recharge. Ah. Walking.

But this walk was different. Special.

See?

We were walking with a friend. We met her on the City to Surf walk and went part of the way with her. She was participating in the 12km walk in order to raise money for Tear Fund's Famine Relief Appeal. You know, the people in the Horn of Africa who are in severe drought and famine? She was walking for them. No one set her up for it. She just felt like she needed to do something, and as a Uni student didn't feel like she had much to give. So she decided to walk, and ask others to give. She raised $448.80!!!

We heard about Eve's walk through church. I wanted to donate, partly because I've been reading and hearing about how severe the famine in Ethiopia, Somalia and Kenya is and wanted to help. But there was another reason too, and in all honestly, this one was more personally compelling. I wanted to encourage Eve. I figured she had done something really brave, deciding to do such a long walk. Then to ask people to sponsor her, well that was extra brave! Asking people for money is never easy. Choosing to sacrifice for someone else is hard and I think we should honour those among us who do. In the Bible there's a verse that says we should not stop spuring one another on towards good deeds. Very true, I think. We should always be encouraging each other, patting one another on the back when we do something well or something good. Coming up with more creative ways to help each other.

So we walked with Eve as well as making a small donation to Tear Fund. I got a few photos along the way of the runners and walkers, the views, and of course, Eve's cool tshirt (made by one of her friends - another person honouring her commitment to help those in need!).

It was a fabulous morning and I'm really glad we did it! We even skipped church to go. Somehow it felt like God would be okay with that!

Amy

I Found the Photos!

Out of the blue, in a random occurrence, I finally relocated the missing photos sent in by Aynsley to Turn on the Tap!  Yay!  Thanks, Aynsley, for joining in!

Here they are:

Has anyone else managed to take photos of taps around their place to raise $2 towards safe drinking water for others?  It is still on my to-do list: I'm thinking of taking photos of my parents taps next!

Amy

Free Rice - May

Here is my monthly Free Rice update for May.  This month I had 4,650 grains donated, which means I correctly answered 465 English vocabulary questions.  2,000 of that was part of my Uganda action plan.  This has been my highest month in ages and ages.  Which does leave me wondering what other things I was doing instead, as it doesn't feel like I've really spent much time at all on Free Rice this month.

Have you been on and answered some questions lately?  I am always surprised at the interesting words I come across.  I've also discovered recently that they have maths and geography options instead of vocabulary.  Could be interesting...I'm hoping Boyo might give the Maths a go, seeing as that is more 'up his alley' than English.  Grin.

Amy

Uganda Meal

You may recall that I was compelled into action last week after reading World Vision's news regarding famine in Uganda.  On my list of things to do were Free Rice, and a simplified meal so that we could give a little more money toward the appeal.  I managed to get 2,000 grains of rice donated that day, which I am very pleased with.  Last night we had our 'Uganda Meal.'  It ended up being scrambled eggs on toast, because I had milk that needed to be used or risk it going off today (I have been trying hard to reduce the amount of food we waste!).  Munchkin had some veges from the freezer, and some blueberries I found in the back of the fridge.

After our meal last night I must admit to feeling a little virtuous about my 'help the people of the world' endeavours.  Then I put the remainder of the groceries away - a huge cabbage, decent cauli, and a celery.  ALL THIS was leftovers...bits of stem and such that I didn't feel were good enough to eat. 

I looked at that big bag of waste food and felt a little less glamorous than before.  I'm sure that for many people, they would never even consider throwing out celery stems and leaves.  Every single bit of edible, or even semi-edible food would be used.  The thing is that I don't know what to do with it.  I mean, we are a 2.5 person household.  We just don't need all the little bits on the top of a celery, or the stem on the broccoli.  I did think about freezing them, but where in our little freezer do I put them and that still doesn't solve the issue of what to actually DO with them.  At least I do get the slight relief of knowing that my food scraps from last night are going to help us in some way, even if we haven't eaten them.  They went to the worms.  So at least they are being put to some useful purpose, rather than putrefying in landfill.  But I still felt a bit, well, blah about how much we waste and take for granted.  At least we were able to do something though, to help others.  And in all honesty, eggs on toast is not really a hardship!

Amy

Live Below the Line?

I have been thinking about doing a challenge for the past six months or so.  I'm wanting to do something that connects me somehow with the 1.4billion people in the world who live on less than $1.50US a day.  This is both to help me understand a little more of what it must be like, raise awareness in others about how blessed we are in NZ, and also raise money to help end poverty in someone else's life.  Then just yesterday I came across this challenge by the Global Poverty Project!  The idea is to feed yourself on $2.25NZ a day....this is somewhere close to the figure for so many people in the world living in poverty, and yet so far from it as it is just for food - it doesn't include insurance, healthcare, housing, heating, water, and all the other things we take for granted in our day to day lives.  Just food.  This challenge is very similar to one I've been thinking of doing on my own...but putting off because it seemed too hard and too 'out there.'  So I've signed up for some more information.  It's in August.  Not a great time at all in NZ to be trying to live cheaply.  Not much fresh fruit.  Not much in the vege garden either (which I was hoping to use to supplement our food purchases!).  But hey, we'll see how we go. 

Then today, just to encourage me some more, I was reading about Eilleen doing the challenge in Australia.  She's one of the blogs I read from time to time.  You can read about her recent experiences Living Below the Line at her blog, Consumption Rebellion.

Time for us to have dinner.  And one I really enjoy tonight: chilli con carne and rice.  Yum.

Amy

Action

It sat there, staring at me. The letter came in the post and was deposited on our dining table by Boyo. I wanted to pretend it wasn't there. "If I ignore it, will it just go away?" But there it was, still sitting there, unopened inthe morning.  I just wanted to carry on with my day.  Pretend nothing was different.  Eat my porridge, go for a walk, maybe get a hot drink with a friend before our beach outing this afternoon.  But I couldn't.  There's something compelling me to do differently.  The letter?  Maybe.  But this was, after all, just one letter.  I get lots of letters like this, requests for help from one organisation or another.  And they all, invariably, drive me to tears.  Hence my desire to hermit, avoid, and otherwise ignore whatever crisis World Vision wanted to draw my attention to this time. 

I opened it.  I just couldn't handle it sitting there any longer.  And I've been guilty of throwing out a few without reading them lately...terrible guilty feelings are not changed by reading or not reading, I have discovered.  I'd hoped that if I didn't read, I couldn't be confronted with the realities of how much I have and how little they have.  But I still know.  Deep in my heart of hearts I know that there are people in desperate need, and despite how 'poor' I sometimes feel, I am not desperate.  I am by no means anywhere near desperate.  I have cash for fruit and vegetables this week.  We have money in the bank for next month's expenses, mostly...and we are still able to cull things back a bit more if we really have need to.  We are by no means desperate.
So I read the letter.  And cried (per usual).  And felt compelled to DO SOMETHING.  What though, was the question.  There are 1.3MILLON Ugandan's facing starvation.  These are not people just needing a top up.  These are people who will die without outside help.  Their last viable harvest was in 2005.  That's SIX YEARS ago!  I can't begin to imagine what it would be like if we'd not had good harvests for six years in New Zealand.  What on earth would we eat?  Well, in Uganda, they are eating pumpkin leaves, and not much else.  World Vision tells of one young woman walking 25km to sell an armful of firewood to buy food for her and her two young children...food which is not nearly enough.  Again, I can't imagine having to travel those kind of distances, and face the grief of not having food for my son. 
I sat and read, and suddenly didn't feel very hungry.  My porridge sat, turning cold and gelatinous (I did have to eat it later, couldn't bear the thought of wasting it when other people were going hungry!).  I knew that if I didn't do something right away, I'd most likely manage to talk myself out of it.  "We just don't have much available right now." I'd say.  Or, "Munchkin needs clothes." "Maybe next month."  "When we're both qualified and earning decently, I'll be able to give lots then."  The problem is that in the five years or so it takes us to improve our household finances, it will probably be too late for many of the children of Uganda.
I made a list on the back of the World Vision envelope.  It is titled "Action:"

I decided that we probably have some money spare from the groceries.  This is the last week before we move into June's budget, and we're currently still dining on leftover fruit and other goodies from Munchkin's birthday party on the weekend, which means we don't need to buy what I thought we would this week.  So that's $15.

Somehow that doesn't seem like enough.  Ah, ha.  Maybe I can talk Boyo into having eggs or baked beans on toast for dinner one night this week.  Then we could give maybe $5 as the money we would have probably spent on meat and veges.  It's not like a simple meal like that once every so often is going to hurt us.  And frankly, it is probably still better nutritionally than the takeaways we periodically buy!

Still not enough.  I mean, what difference will $20 make to such a huge humanitarian crisis?  How long will it feed a family?  Is it really going to make enough difference?  But then I realised that the World Food Programme is matching personal donations 6:1.  That means that for every $1 I donate, $6 worth of food is given (governments and such get on board and donate to match personal donations to make this possible).  So $20 x 6 is $120.  That sounds better.  Still not going to change much long term, but World Vision and other agencies are working with people to help them develop reliable, long term food sources as well as providing the immediate aid relief, so it does all help.

That's about the end of our current financial ability.  But then I realised, there are still two more things I can do.

I can FREE RICE!  Each correct word I get gives 10 grains of rice through advertising sponsorship.  I decided I'll spend 30 minutes today, answering vocabulary.  I've already done 1600 grains!  This doesn't cost me money, just time.  I figured that I should be able to spend a few minutes to save someone else's life.

And here I am doing the last thing on my list.  I am blogging.  This is one of the things I blog about.  If you don't like hearing about the plight of others, this is probably not a good blog for you to read.  I am passionately concerned about ending extreme poverty.  As one person, my resources are limited.  But together, we have the ability to effect so much change!  If we were each to give just a little, sacrifice our comfort and convenience just a tad, change something small we do, think about someone else's needs just occassionally, we can make a HUGE difference in someone else's life.  So I'm asking you to join me in helping the families of Uganda.  Is there something small you can do?  Could you have a simpler meal this week and make a donation?  Could you play Free Rice for 10 minutes tonight before bed?  Could you sell an old possession that's been collecting dust in your garage, and give that money?  The options are endless, really.  Some of us have time.  Some of us have money.  Some of us don't have much of either, but we are still blessed to have food to eat, and family to love.  Why not share a little of our blessings with those who don't?

Let me tell you, I feel SO much better for having done something.  No more avoiding the dining table because the letter has been read, the heart moved, the mind activited, and action taken.  Ahhhh.  I can continue with the rest of my day feeling a little more at peace with the world.

Amy

Free Rice - May

I have decided that I'd like to do a few monthly posts. I thought that this might be more managable than trying to do weekly ones? My thinking at this point is to do a monthly post updating you on my Free Rice totals for the month (to guilt trip me into remembering to answer at least a few words and feed a few people each month!). I might do a Meatless Monday Meal once a month too, a Word for the Month (rather than for the week!), and a Garden Update. How does that sound? Do-able?

I set up an account with Free Rice because it tracks how many vocabulary words I answer correctly, and how many grains of rice are donated from them.

Monthly totals for this year so far are:
January 2,530 grains of rice.
February 1,020
March 1,180
April 1,500
May - no stats available yet

To give you an idea of the time involved in this, I just answered 20 questions in less than 2 minutes (on the easiest level). That's 200 grains of rice donated to the World Food Programme!!!

Have you had a go at the Free Rice game lately?

Amy

Thursday, 5th May, 2011

More Tap Photos?

It is with sincere apologies to the lovely Aynsley that I write this post. I had meant to come on and post some Turn on the Tap photos that she emailed me some months ago. I THOUGHT they were in my inbox 'blog' folder. I have just spent half an hour ploughing through my emails, without avail. I seem to have lost them! I've looked in my inbox, in my blog tab, in friends, in family, in deleted...basically everywhere I can think of. I even checked my writing folder just in case I had saved them there. Nope. Vanished. I feel like a right moron. This is what happens when you don't do something when you should have.

Aynsley, would you mind terribly sending them to me again (if you can find them easily)?

Amy

Thursday, 5th May, 2011

Simple Double Blessing

Another tap around my place. This one is outside, on the front of the house. It has a matching partner on the rear of the unit which I have yet to get to. What saddens me is that the water I get from this tap, which I use to water the garden, is better quality water than most of the world is able to drink. I was bucketing water onto the garden before being given this hose a few months ago - it has made looking after the garden so much easier! A real blessing. The job is so much faster, and easier on my back. Again, it is really such a privilege to have something this simple which we often take for granted in New Zealand. I know that so many women (and men and often children too) around the world have to carry their water kilometres. I am so blessed to be able to turn on a tap and have it provide water gushing out: clean, drinkable, and loads of it.

Amy

Saturday, 1st January, 2011

Disappointed

I'm feeling a bit disappointed, really. I had gotten myself all excited thinking about the different tap photos people might send in. And no one has even commented. I even put it on my Facebook page, where it appears to have been ignored. My husband has consoled me, with the sage advice that people are busy and I really shouldn't have expected much. I have been a little rash, perhaps...it has only been a couple of days, so maybe you are all still out there with cameras clicking away? I guess I didn't really expect much, just hoped. It is frustrating, because I can do so little at the moment to help those in desperate need. And I believe it is just so wrong that here in New Zealand (and other developed countries) we have sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo much, while others have nothing (and there are great disparities within our own society too, I am not wishing to overlook that, but at least in NZ you can get government assistance to help pay rent and buy food, get your kids to the doctor or into school, etc). So I'm disappointed. I just wanted to make a little difference in someone's life who is facing the desperation of not having a safe water source. I can't even imagine what that must be like. We currently have a broken cold tap in the kitchen. It is waiting repair. It drips constantly, and we have stopped using it, for fear that once we get it on again we might not get it off! So when I want a cold drink, I head into the bathroom and fill up one of our tallest glasses, which I then sit on the dining table and sip from until I need to refill it again. It feels like such a drama. I know it really isn't. It is still purified, drinkable water. I'm not going to get sick from it. It comes from the same place the kitchen stuff does anyway. And it is such a long way to go. Not. I mean, it is all of 10 paces or something. Not like I have to head out with a bucket and hike around our local walkway for half an hour to get a drink. Anyway, I was wanting to do more, without actually doing more myself...because I have limited time and resources, and particularly at the moment, limited money. I figured that if we all did something little, like sending in a tap photo to raise $2 for safe drinking water, that together it would make a much bigger difference than anything I could do on my own.

I guess we are all too busy. I keep forgetting that it is the end of the year, and that Christmas is nearly here. I am the least busy I have been all year, you see. I have finished study for the year. And we have a simple Christmas planned, without much shopping or preparation involved at all. So I forget that for most people there's the kids presents to get and wrap and such, and the family gatherings to prepare for. And to top it all off, in the Southern Hemisphere, there's the countless end of year gatherings, and family summer holidays to plan. It is our summer holidays you see. School has just finished for the year. Kids get six weeks or so of summer freedom, and it just seems like everything combines into one big, mad rush. So it is understandable that there's not much interest in taking photos of taps for people we've never met. Maybe I will try again in February, after all the holiday hype is over? How bizzare is that - we are too busy because of Christmas! Christmas, of all things.

Amy
Sunday, 19th December, 2010

Taps - how many do you have around the place?

I just uploaded 4 photos to Turn on the Tap:

This initiative is run by Samaritan's Purse, to give clean drinking water to some of the many people in the world who do not have it. A sponsor is donating $2 for every tap photo that is uploaded to their website!!! I took the photos months ago, and am pleased to have finally done something with them. This was my decision regarding World Water Day (written about in a previous post months ago!) - I took ages and ages thinking about what to do, way past World Water Day, between multiple assignments and baby commitments, and ended up not doing anything. Which is very slack and not at all suitable, as far as I am concerned. So finally I have done something. It is a very small something really, but even very small somethings can make a world of difference to someone living in extreme poverty.

Could you spare a few minutes, and help change a person's life by taking a few photos of the taps around your place? I am hoping to do some more in the coming week...watch this space. Please let me know in the comments if you've uploaded any, so I can go and check them out! This is where you go: http://turnonthetap.org.au/gallery/recent.php?id=1

If you email me your photos, I can post them here on my blog. I wonder how many we can get? So upload them at Turn on the Tap, then email me a copy at: soonarmy at gmail dot com. How creative can you get? What unusual places might you find a tap around your place? What kind of different photography do you think we could do? I am so excited about this! A patchwork quilt of tap photos, that's what we'll have. And the knowledge that we've helped others while having fun!

Amy

Ps...the thing that amazed me when I was looking for taps to photograph, is just how MANY we have in our 2 bedroom unit. I mean, there's the kitchen taps, the handbasin, the shower, the washing machine, and the laundry tub. Then there's another 2 taps outside that I haven't got photos of yet. I did this once when I lived in North QLD and ended up sending in taps from local parks, rest areas, public bathrooms, etc. I was just blown away by how frequently and easily we can access potable, clean, safe drinking water. We water our lawns with it, for crying out loud. While so many people in the world walk kilometres every day, to collect dirty, disease-ridden water for their family. Because that's all they have available and they don't have the money or resources to change it. I'm so glad organisations like Samaritan's Purse do have the resources, and that they can find the money through such a fun activity like this Tap photography. I'm so looking forward to seeing yours! Grin.

Friday, 17th December, 2010

Eating

I was thinking about Munchkin's food yesterday. He loves his solids and we have been gradually trying lots of new tastes. This week, he tried out silverbeet and peaches (an odd combination, I know!). For his dinner last night he had: carrot, potato, kumara (sweet potato), silverbeet and peaches (to sweeten up the silverbeet!). Yesterday I bought our fruit and veges for the week. Half of my shopping was for Munchy baby. There was the box of baby rice, which I use to thicken up his pear and apple for breakfast and sometimes mix with his mashed banana at lunchtime. Then there was some broccoli and zucchini to try in the coming week or so. And some pork and chicken too. He's tried fish recently, so I thought we could try a couple of other meats now, along with some lentils and rice which I still need to prepare. I spent awhile cooking, pureeing and freezing it all in tablespoon-sized amounts.

So what I was getting to with all this, as that as I fed him dinner, I thought about this very careful process of introduction to solids. The way I'm trying to introduce him to varied tastes and textures. And the varied nutritional value each food provides. Banana gives potassium. Silverbeet has good iron. Each food offers him something special, and that is why we are encouraged to give babies a range of foods, even when they are little and just starting out like this.

I thought about other families in the world, and found myself wondering what babies in Africa or India eat. I realised how blessed Munchkin really is. He gets to have all these different foods. So many babies of his age would be having just one. Rice, maybe? Or corn? I'm not sure. I just know that for so many mothers around the world, meal times is not a matter of choosing what to feed baby, but rather wondering if there IS anything to feed baby.

The World Food Programme identifies the first 2 years of a person's life as critical in terms of nutrition. I've read in some of my Child Development paper this past year that nutritional deficiencies in infancy and toddlerhood contribute quite a lot to a child's future growth, in terms of physical size, but also in terms of their ability to relate to others, manage emotions, perform mental tasks...the list is phenomenal - basically, early nutrition sets the stage for a child's later abilities in all areas of life. I had no idea it was so crucial. I'd not thought about whether nutrition could affect a child's brain capabilities, their grades in school or their socialisation skills, but now that I think about it, it makes sense. Our bodies are highly complex organisms. They are incredibly adaptable. Amazingly so. Just look at the ability of the brain to compensate for damage to parts of itself. But the body can only adapt so far. It relies heavily on receiving the fuel it needs to function.

In all this thought process, I find myself more aware. Firstly, more aware that Munchkin has dietary needs and that he is very much relient on me. My knowledge of food. My eating habits. These all greatly influence how he will treat food. I can't expect him to eat well if I am not providing a good eating example. I can't hope he avoids lollies and chocolate and all that, if I eat it in front of him constantly. I can't expect him to be able to make good food choices if he is constantly presented with salty, faty or sugary foods...of course he is going to want to eat those, they taste so good (after all, our bodies are hard wired for these foods - not God's fault that we happened to create a whole lot of them!).

Secondly, I find myself more aware that food is in many ways a luxury. It is a luxury that far too many people cannot afford. I can't even begin to imagine the trauma of having to decide which of my family will eat or not eat today (something I think many mothers do have to choose on a daily basis). And I can't imagine being able to give my baby only one food, and precious little of that. And hope that somehow that one food will provide him with everything he needs to grow into a strong, healthy boy when I know full well it can't possibly do that. I can't imagine not seeing those funny faces as he tries something new. Seeing his wide open, gaping mouth waiting for some more banana or apple, and his slightly shocked, questioning look when he tasted silverbeet for the first time (what on earth is this, Mum, and are you really sure it is meant to be eaten?!?!).

Well, my baby has managed to roll himself off his plastic mat several times while I have been typing. I think it might be time for a nappy and his apple and pear. He will, no doubt, sit there with mouth wide open, arms waving madly, gulping each delicious mouthful. And I will think about how blessed we are to eat today. Opps, there he goes again...carpet, carpet, carpet, please do not pee on the nice new rental carpet! Better run.

Amy
Wednesday, 15th December, 2010

Another One?!

I want another baby. I feel compelled. This urge could be said to almost border upon obsession. It feels as if I almost NEED another baby.

Before you get carried away thinking that I’m all clucky after having Munchkin, let me just clarify that I have absolutely NO desire to be pregnant or give birth again. Nope, much as I love our little one, I don’t want THAT kind of baby. Now I’ve probably got you wondering if there are in fact more than one kind of baby. There are. And I want one.

Not this kind. At least not now, at any rate. Give me a few years to think about it…

Nope, not this kind either:

I could totally go with it, but my husband would be horrified. Sad.

No, I want one of these:

Every time I read about the benefits child sponsorship offers to kids, I want to do more. Every time I get a letter from our sponsored kids, I feel the same. And it’s not just what sponsoring does for children, although amazing for sure (clean water, clothes and pencils for school, immunisations, food assistance, schooling, and so on are not to be sneezed at). It goes beyond that. Sponsoring a child tells them that someone (me) somewhere (far, far away in New Zealand) thinks about them. Cares about them. Has decided that their life is worth investing in. Sponsorship tells a child living in desperate poverty that their life matters. It tells them that they can be someone, and help someone, and get somewhere in life. But on top of this incredible difference I get to make in one child’s life, are the differences that spread across their community, and across the generations. For instance, giving girls a chance at an education increases their self esteem, their position in society, and in turn the welfare of their future families as they later invest in the health, education and welbeing of their children. Then there’s the community wells that are dug, the agricultural training that can be accessed, the midwives that are trained, the businesses that can start, and on and on it goes, each benefit flowing outwards to enable more and more and more.

So, I want another sponsored child. The thing is that we already have 3. Most people are somewhat surprised by this. Don’t be. There is just no reason why children should be dying of hunger and water-bourne disease. Not while there’s something I can do about it. Why should I sit back and enjoy my cruisey middle-class, suburban life with my filtered tap water, electricity, and supermarket fare when other’s, through no fault of their own, have nothing? I want a large family. I just don’t plan on them being my birth-kids. I see this as one way I can change the world. One child at a time. One $45 sponsorship a month at a time. One letter wending its way to Tanzania, or Nicaragua, or Bangladesh at a time.

At the moment, I have to wait. Now is not the time. We are living on a student allowance, and managing okay, but there’s not much extra to go round and at present it is going on yet more clothes for the Munchkin. But I don’t want my son to become my excuse for ignoring the plight of others. Yes, he is my first responsibility. Yes, I need to make sure he is fed and clothed and loved. But this shouldn’t become my over-riding pursuit. After all, he is well-cared for. It won’t hurt him to have a few less toys and a few less treats, and to grow up learning that there are other people in the world who don’t get to live with the wonderful things we do.

I’m still hoping that someday soon I can have another baby. I’m wondering if there’s some way I can find that $45 a month…maybe I could make and sell stuff. Yeah, don’t have time to keep my house clean, let alone get out the sewing machine. Maybe we could eat less. Well, that is always an option, but I find that my mind is telling me that I ‘need’ to eat what I eat. Considering how much people eat (or rather don’t eat) and survive on, this is probably something I could debate with my self-centredness. But how much of this is me being selfish though, and how much is to do with our cultural expectations - we grow up surrounded by them, it can be so hard at times to work out how much something is a need, and how much it is an expectation built by what society says is a need. So for eating, if I were to eat less, eat lower quality, or eat different foods than what I do now would that be truly depriving myself of needed nutrients or is it that my society thinks it might? I'm still not sure on this one.

Funny how there’s always something more that we ‘need.’ Like more clothes (the truth is that I can probably get by with very little), and a garden hose (how many people in the world do you think bucket water to their garden?). Either way, it doesn’t seem right to me to just sit back and wait out the next 2-3 years, hoping that we’ll be able to ‘afford’ to sponsor another child after that. In the meantime, who is going to give these kids hope? And will we really be able to afford it later, if we can’t now? It is not as if we are expecting a huge windfall of money or anything. Our income will hopefully improve, but I don’t imagine it will be dramatically and instantly…and besides, there will be other pulls on it then, such as buying a house and sending Munchkin to school. So I’m just going to have a little chat with God about all this, and see what He thinks. When will it be ‘time’ for another baby from Africa? Whose life does He want to change, through my actions? And how can I go about enabling that to happen?

Whose life are you changing? Do you have room in your family for one more?

Amy
Saturday, 30th October, 2010

Birthdays

Boyo's birthday is coming up. I suspect he might have turned into an adrenaline junkie...last year he had a bungee jump from my parents for his birthday. This year he has told the whole family that the ONLY thing he wants is a skydive. I think he will enjoy it. Just as long as he doesn't expect me to do any of these things with him, I am quite happy for him to do them (I do not like jumping!)! I figure that it is better he has a great time off on an adventure somewhere for his birthday, than gets given lots of stuff that then isn't used (not that this is always the case by any means, he has had many enjoyable birthday presents that still get used frequently, it is just that we are trying to cut back on the amount of stuff we own, and getting more stuff doesn't really help with that!).

Usually I start thinking about what I would like for my birthday after I've organised his. Mine is 3 months later. In my family, we have always been asked what we would like...and my parents have always put a lot of effort into giving great birthday gifts. So here's my list. Now, you will think that this is very, very early and taking planning to a whole other level, and you are right. But let me tell you a little secret that will make you absolutely sure I have lost the plot. I made this list in January. 9 months before my birthday! Yep, crazy lady. The thing is, I was thinking about birthdays and gifts and stuff a lot at that time (I think it was probably a post-Christmas reflection on consumerism that started it all). I kind of just ended up writing a list because I was thinking about it so much. The interesting part of all this is that I have added only 1 item to this list since January...the children's picture books to use in my teaching career. Everything else has remained pretty much just as I wrote it 6 months ago. I think that's probably a good sign that I am on the right track. So here you are, have a chuckle at my birthday wish list!

For my birthday I want:
Chooks
Guinea pigs
An acre or so

As I am not going to be getting any of these (at least for some time!) then I would like the following:

Wool 8ply (double knit) pure wool, or at least 80% wool, any colour, any quantity
For Operation Cover Up knitting (blankets, hats, etc)

Material At least ½m in size per piece is best, odds and ends are okay, cotton/easy to sew/well-wearing fabrics
You could include cotton thread and elastic to sew if you liked…
To sew bags or skirts (elastic waist) for Operation Christmas Child

World Vision Gift Cards
Pigs, chickens, goats, seeds, gardening tools, etc
If I can’t have my own livestock at present then I’d like to make sure someone who needs it gets to have theirs!

I know gift giving at someone’s birthday means a lot and I really do love getting presents, but I am trying to cut back on the amount of stuff I am collecting that doesn’t get used. With our tight budget at present I’m unlikely to be able to get these sorts of things myself as I normally would. With these gifts I then get the double blessing of a gift, that I then get to give on to someone else after I have had a chance to be creative with it! Which is something that I get an incredible sense of satisfaction out of (both the creativity and the giving!).

Other related ideas:
Small shoe boxes (empty)
Christmas or coloured wrapping paper
Buttons (to use with sewing and/or card making projects)
Fabric Ribbons (to use with sewing and/or card making projects)
Excellent children’s picture books (for my teaching career – and because I just love books!)


So there you have it. The wish list of a mad woman. Do you have a wish list (for birthdays or just because)?

Amy

Wind up the Light

The Operation Christmas Child stash has not been growing nearly as quickly as I would like.

I put this down to a combination of several things: lack of time and brainpower (study and baby preparation has been somewhat all-consuming of late!), and lack of funds (we are just starting to get properly on our feet after moving into a unit a few months back).

Dynamo, or wind-up LED torches. They fit in the palm of your hand. To recharge them you pull the grey handle.

We did pick up these fabulous little additions a month or so back though. It is quite amusing really...Boyo works at a supermarket, and noticed these cool little wind up torches attached to some Toilet Duck bowl cleaners. In other words, the torches were a freebie if you bought the loo thingy. Now, we don't use loo thingys. We have good old baking soda with essential oil and that seems to do the trick nicely. In recent years, we've moved away from using chemicals at home, so generally they are limited to instances of extreme desperation. Such as stain removal (have yet to find something really, really organic/natural that does a great job), or the kitchen sink blockage this week (I still can't believe we actually went and bought Drain-O...but it was desperate - several lots of boiling water, vinegar, and baking soda plus plunging had not done the job).

So the issue was that I really wanted these cool torches to go in the Christmas Child boxes, but didn't by any means want to have any loo stuff. My parents-in-law gave us a really nice Dynamo emergency torch a few years back, which even has a radio and we've found it so useful to have around - it is also reassuring knowing that we don't have to locate batteries or radio in a civil emergency as we don't tend to have either just lying around. Since then, I have thought many times how useful a wind-up torch would be in the Christmas Child boxes (they ask you not to send anything that uses batteries as they just end up as landfill). I'd never found any that were either a reasonable size or a reasonable price. Until now. So in the end, we compromised. I got the torches, and the Toilet Duck is going to my in-law's church...they have a fair few toilets that they apparently already use these cleaners for, so at least I am not contributing to any extra chemical use. Grin.

Another amusing aspect of the whole story is that we liked the torches so much, that we got 3 for ourselves...one for me, one for Boyo and one for in the car. Oh, plus one for my dad because he is a bit of a torch fanatic. They are getting a good workout too.

Amy

Word for the Week!

The word for this week is: discombobulated
Meaning: bewildered

I have taken it from http://www.freerice.com/
I find it so much fun to try and work out what some of the more obscure words on free rice mean! Plus there's the added bonus of knowing that each word I get correct helps someone in desperate need.

Don't you just love how DISCOMBOBULATED sounds...like someone is lurching around drunkenly, tripping over themself, dazed, limbs hanging loosely, brain in a cloud of confusion...it really sounds like its meaning. So cool. I really like words that sound like they mean.

And now for the really fun part. How can we use this word?

"The reading on Anthroposophy has left me feeling a little discombobulated."
Which I must say it did. I've been doing a report on Steiner education for my degree, and while I found the philosophies and curriculum information facinating as a whole, and some ideas very applicable for early years educators, Steiner's manner of writing/speaking and the depth of some of his underlying concepts (of Anthroposophy) left me reeling! So discombobulated is a good descriptive word.

I challenge you to use this word at least once this week, within its correct context, meaning and pronunciation! Hope you have fun with it!
Amy

Blankets and Blankets

Here is my latest Operation Cover Up Blanket. Well, half of it at any rate. I had it out to check the pattern was working correctly and check how many squares I have left to knit. And a good thing it was too, as I have discovered I only need another 4 squares to be finished! YAY!!!! As an average blanket takes me about a year to complete, you can imagine the relief and excitement when I get to this stage!!

Half a blanket - I only managed to get 4 colours in enough quantity so this is the pattern I came up with using 4 colours!

Operation Cover Up is a ministry of Mission Without Borders here in New Zealand. They send hand-knitted blankets and clothing each year to orphanages and families in Europe. These children live in countries like Romania and Moldovia. There is often little internal heating during their cold, harsh, snowy winters so woolen blankets are a god-send. I first started doing Cover Up knitting around 5 years ago. I was sick with undiagnosed chronic fatigue, so had very little energy for anything. My mother-in-law was doing these peggy squares for blankets, so I thought it might be something I would enjoy doing - easy to pick up and put down, to do on the couch between naps, and feel like I was contributing to something bigger than myself without exhausting myself further. So she set me up with the basic instructions, showed me how to cast on and off (I first learned to knit when I was little by my Granny died when I was 12 and I hadn't knitted since), and away I went. To start with, I would just do a square, and give it to her whenever we met. Then I started keeping them...here is my first ever blanket. It was HUGE. I accidentally used 4.25mm needles instead of 4mm so whoever got this blanket got a really good deal. Grin.

Blanket #1 = easily covered a double bed!

Well, by the time I had finished this first blanket, I was totally hooked on peggy squares! I've been knitting Cover Up blankets ever since. Here is my 4th completed blanket.

This one was so much fun to knit - the 'squares' are actually knitted in rows, half the normal size of a square then the rows crocheted together as I went.

And another one...this one I did not complete myself. It contains many of my squares though. When we moved back to New Zealand in May last year, I started knitting squares and sending them to my mother-in-law's knitting group, thinking that I would probably only have a little free time before starting full time work. Well, the work plans did not eventuate, so I ended up knitting 56 squares between May and the end of the year...most of them before I started study in mid July. 56 squares is actually the exact amount needed for a blanket, so I could have kept them all after all! Never mind, this finished blanket looks gorgeous!

I love how the lady who crocheted this together changed the direction of the squares - doesn't it look gorgeous!?!

So now you know. I am addicted to knitting. But not just any knitting. While I can knit hats and have recently extended my repertoire to include booties, knitting squares is my first love. I knit during the ad breaks on tv (so much nicer than having to listen to all the sell-sell-sell rubbish!). I knit if I have a few minutes spare before leaving the house for work or whatever. I knit whenever I visit my mother-in-law. Sometimes I knit before bed, sometimes I knit when I get up. Some months I hardly knit at all (like the past few!), but eventually I get this feeling that something is missing from my life, and I pick up my knitting needles again. I sit there, knitting row after row of uniform stitches, and sigh a deep sigh of contentment. Ah, this is where it is at. It genuinely feels like I have come home. Knitting for me is a dual activity. It gives me a sense of satisfaction, seeing every row take shape, every square finished, each blanket sent off to someone in need. But that's not all. Knitting provides me with some space. It is my 'me' time. A lot of 'contemplation of the world at large and me in particular' takes place during my knitting times. Because it is so repetitive and squares are so easy to knit, there's plenty of space for me to think about the things that are going on in my life, what I am learning about God and this world, how I am feeling, and what I'd like to be doing. Knitting is just me! I think Granny would be proud. She was an incredible knitter. Most of my childhood memories of Granny include a set of knitting needles. She used to knit teeny tiny baby patterns and gift them to Wellington Women's premmie ward. She'd knit every single baby born into our church a pair of booties, complete with fluffy sheepskin soles. I'd love to be able to knit like that, but I think for me, I have found my niche.

Who knows how long it might be before this current blanket gets crocheted together. For now, I am just happy that it is almost finished.

I hope you've enjoyed the colour and pattern of all my blankets. Do you knit? What is it that appeals to you about knitting?

Have you ever thought about knitting a square or two for a good cause? It's satisfying, believe me...whether 56 or 1!

Amy

World Water Day

An email from Tear Fund has just advised me that 22 March (Monday week) is World Water Day.

Samaritan's Purse, another organisation I support, considers safe drinking water such a vital need that they have a project site dedicated to it: Turn on the Tap.

You can take photos of taps around your home and email them in. A corporate sponsor donates $2 when you do! It makes a huge difference. For $100 Samaritan's Purse can give a family a water filter. $250 provides a community (yes, a whole community) with a well and pump.

http://turnonthetap.org.au/

According to Turn on the Tap, a child dies every 20 seconds from water-related diseases. Unsafe drinking water is the second greatest killer of children in the world today. Yes, you did read that correctly.

UNSAFE DRINKING WATER KILLS a child every 20 seconds.

The second greatest killer in the world is completely preventable.

It's hard to believe that something so basic could be such a threat to someone's welfare. I mean, we just 'turn on the tap' right? I remember my brother getting giardia on a camping trip once - that was pretty awful. I can't imagine what it must be like to live with that kind of illness every day.

One in 8 people in the world do not have access to save drinking water (that's over 800million).

Most people in the developing world would love to have 10 litres of safe water a day. We probably flush that down our toilet with every single flush.

Flooding in on our street in Townsville, North QLD...just an inconvenience for us, as we don't rely on this water for drinking!

So, it seems to me that there is a little inequality here and that this is an issue I can, and should, be doing something about. I don't have to save the world. I can start by being aware of just how precious fresh, clean, filtered water is. Then remember to be grateful that it arrives at my house in a pipe, saving me hours of walking and carrying to fetch it. Sheesh, a nice hot water cylinder even heats it up for me.

I can decide to take my gratitude and position of privilege and do something with it.
What, I am still trying to decide. I do have a week, after all...hmmm.

Do you ever think about how much water we use, and how easy it is to take it for granted? Is there something you can do to help those who don't have the same access we do? Maybe you could send a photo of your tap into Turn on the Tap?

Amy