Hurricane Irene & Schools

Hi Friends,

Just a short post. I've been really really REALLY busy with shoes.

We survived hurricane Irene. Lost power at 11pm on Saturday evening and had none on Sunday until 9:30pm. We lost some lunch meat and a few frozen peas....

We gained some good family game time, everyone out doing clean-up of their yards, an ice cream party galore, a glow stick party in the evening and some really great grilling from neighbors. Love those peas!!!!

The warehouse that has been donated to me was fine and so was our home. No structural damage at either location.

I've been busy working with getting many Howard County Schools and churches on board with collecting. I'm also looking forward to working with the Girl Scouts and the Boy Scouts. I'm inundated with shoes and quite frankly... I LOVE IT.

Just the other day, Danny from the Tasty T-Shirt company offered to help me out with pallets, boxes and shrink wrap. I made those famous chocolate chip cookies for him today as a thank you. Since the oven is working now... I can do that and I really appreciate his pleasant attitude and willingness to help show me the how and why of a warehouse.

So... I'm a busy woman. No school today for the first day of school due to lack of electricity.

Please keep others who are still without power and their needs not being met in your thoughts. Treat others the way you would want to be treated.

Hugs
Rachel

A Slide Show I Put Together After My Trip with Soles4Souls

A Deep Breath Of Life

Ok... so much has happened within the last 24 hours. I am completely amazed at how sharing my story and believing in a purpose is changing people. When I first went to Africa with Soles4Souls to put shoes on children in orphanages.... I thought it was to see the world and be able to give it and others something back. Little did I know this was going to be the course or path I would be on. The shoe drive has taken off in leaps and bounds. So many people are telling me what an inspiration I am and all I did was listen to my heart and not my head. Lately, my heart has been telling me to take deep breaths and realize... I am living the dreams I have had. To be able to give.

People are reaching out from all areas. I'm trying to tweet and well... I'm trying. I tried to put that graph/meter on my blog and well... it doesn't look right either... but... I'm NOT giving up on technology... nope, nope, nope.... I am not going to let it get the best of me.

For tonight let me just say... I made the time to take my daughter and her friend to the new American Girl store in Tyson's Corner for her 10th birthday. She smiled and laughed and took her doll as well and we were able to have dinner there. Something we didn't think we would be able to do. At the end of it all, she was bubbling over with joy and looked at me and said... "Mom, that was really cool. Thanks." It's moments like those that I will cherrish for years and moments I hope I can recall when she's learning how to drive or going out on a date.

My heart does not lie to me. Therefore, I listen to it. I am sincerely grateful for the outpouring of support and love that I have gotten in attempting to collect 50,000 pairs of shoes. For tonight, I'm gonna lay my body down, take a deep breath of life, and thank the power greater than myself for giving me another day to be a positive part of the world.

Hugs
Rachel

Columbia woman hopes to collect 50,000 pairs of shoes for African children

Columbia woman hopes to collect 50,000 pairs of shoes for African children

50,000 Pairs of Shoes

That's a lot of shoes!!!

That's the goal I have set to attain by end of October. Once I can educate myself more on how to put my flier on this blog I'll add that and all those that are working with me in achieving my goals. I hope to also add a thermometer to show where I'm at in collection. I can tell you the recipe from the back of the bag to make chocolate chip cookies because I've made them so many times. My blogging skills are no where near as good as my cookies taste. So bear with me. I need to get the Queen of Blogging over again to help me with this. She is a whole entire different blog about how much she has been a friend to me and what a WONDERFUL job she is doing at raising her beautiful, compassionate and caring children. Back to shoes...

So far I have many many many people involved. I'd like to give a shout out to the following:
Most importantly, my Mom for giving me compassion, patience and love that she did. My Mom made me the person I am today. I know there were many times when she would have liked to as she put it... "take me out of this world..." but she didn't.

My husband Bill and our three children, Stephen, Grace and Sarah. They continually walk over piles of shoes in my house and give me a constant source of energy, entertainment and love.

Guy Guzzone and EZ Storage on Route 1 for getting and donating warehouse space to house all these shoes until the end of October.
To Father Miller and Denise Stanley at St. Bernadine's off of Edmondson's Avenue in Baltimore
To Emily Wofford, Tina Ferguson, and Bill Schneider - my cheering section
To Emily Aubrey-Frock for the countless collection of shoes in Towson Baltimore
To Msgr Luca at St. Louis Church in Clarksville, follow the message in my heart, not my head.
To My sister Cathy who helped me design my flier and continually entertains my children with her antics
Michelle James for her sharing her insight and expertise and experience with compassion and patience.
The NAACP Howard County Youth Council
The Columbia Village Association, Carol Wasser and the Village Managers for allowing me to place a drop off box in their office.
Our Pediatricians, Pediatric Associates in Ellicott City.
The Girl Scouts of Central Maryland
Nicole Langford at Soles4Souls Headquarters in Nashville, TN for her guidance and laughter.

There are so many people who have helped me and those are just the few that are on my mind today. I'm sure I've forgotten someone, but I COMPLETELY believe in the "village" concept. I couldn't do this without a lot of help from a lot of people.

An article will be coming out in this Thursday's Columbia Flier and Howard County Times with more information on the drive/collection.

Is a collection of 50,000 pairs of shoes possible? I don't know, but I'm about to find out and I hope I can say at the end of October.... "WOW WHAT A RIDE!!!"

Hugs
Rachel

Being Human

Hi All,



I've been wondering what I wanted my next topic to blog about to be and am struggling maintaing my computer skills and trying to figure out how to do things. This file goes here, click that button, then do this. It all becomes a little confusing to me, but I haven't given up hope yet that I'll get it. I do need to reach out and ask for help or simply sit down and take the time to ... read the instructions in the "how to" section however many times it takes to figure something out.






My lack of skills at blogging caused me to laugh and say to myself... "Hey Rachel... anyone tell you you're a human being not a human doing lately". Of course I smiled and took the moment to simply be in the present.



Summer is coming to an end and everyone is out school shopping. Young adults are preparing to head off to college and I've begun walking with our 3 children in the morning a little earlier each day. Just yesterday I noted that there was a chill in the air as the kids said... "C'mon Mom get in the pool".



Recently I have been able to tell the stories of so many children I met in Africa to others. I am currently working on a shoe drive/collection in the Columbia/Baltimore/DC area and am bringing incrediable awareness to the fact that others truly do not own a pair of shoes. In talking with others, I find that I am able to look at them in the eye and am amazed that we as Americans just sort of forget how good we have it in our country. We get up, many of us get up from a nice bed and have breakfast of a cup of coffee. We get dressed and go about our daily litney of things to do eventually ending the day by going back to our nice bed to re-energize for the next day.

The Thoughts in My Mind Today

Today I woke and still found myself laughing about this picture. I'm so glad that Ben took it. It has given me a constant reminder that it is important to play and laugh.

This is me swinging from a vine in Gombe National Park. It was very hard to hang onto that vine, but I'm glad I gave it a shot. It was one of those "hang on" moments where I said to myself... "you're in for a ride girl!"

After just two days of helping kids I didn't really think I needed to go "chimpanzee treking". But the people at Soles4Souls knew we would need a break and arranged for us to have some play time. Play is important and I really needed the break from seeing so much devastation in little people.

This picture is me sitting with Brandy and simply taking in all the beauty around me. I was completely covered with clothing to avoid mosquito's and my clothes were drenched from the heat, but I'm so glad that I went.

I loved seeing the shoe truck behind us. Yes those shoe were with us everywhere we went and there were always people there to help us with them.

I also really liked playing soccer with the kids. They were really good at it. Note the bottle of water in hand. Some kids that didn't have a soccer ball used old t-shirts and string and stuff that they had found to make a soccer ball. Regardless, we all took turns running and playing with the kids.

Oh how patient the kids would sit and wait. Lines and lines of them.... so many.

Harriet held this little one for the longest time. Sometimes all we need is a hug. It the human connection factor. When things get crazy all many people want is to simply be loved. This picture captured that for a few moments this child got to know love.

Note the fingernail polish. The kids were fascinated with it. I don't know that they had ever seen it. Something so simple put a smile on faces. I think I speak for the group that none of us thought or were worried about getting aids, malaria, or yellow fever when it came to simply showing acts of kindness on this entire trip.

I'll leave you with a favorite image of mine. It has stayed with me for years.

A simple drop of water.

Water is so valuable in Africa. They teach us in elementary school food, water and shelter are the three things you need in order to survive. I like to take it a step further and say that even a drop of water has a ripple effect. It matters to so many others the simple actions of one individual. One can make a difference. Perhaps that's one of the reasons I life the Soles4Souls motto of "changing the world, one pair at a time".

Hugs,

Rachel