Giving the Same Gift...Twice

Everyone is concerned about the economy lately, wondering about the certainty of our financial futures. When the global economy gets chilly, countries like America may sneeze, but the poor of the world catch a cold, if not pneumonia. 

If you are looking for some nice--and reasonably priced!--gifts for the upcoming holiday season, consider giving fair trade gifts this year. That way, you not only give a gift to the person receiving your present, but you also give the gift of financial livelihood to the struggling artisan who made that gift. These artisans aren't looking to buy video games or new outfits for their children for Christmas--often, their sales mean the difference between heat or no heat in cold weather, or food on the table, or their child's school tuition.

If you live in the Tampa Bay area, consider attending our Fair Trade Holiday Market at the Franciscan Retreat Center in Tampa on Sunday afternoon, November 23rd. If you don't live nearby, or live up north, consider giving a handmade gift like these lovely "gloves-to-mittens" convertible mittens, made by our friends, the women of Kullakas. They're only $23, and every cent of your purchase goes to the women themselves. They're especially handy if you work outside at all in the cold, or like to have your fingers free for driving but need the warmth of mittens when you get out of the car. They come in a variety of nice colors, but the nicest thing about them is how warm you'll feel inside, knowing you've helped a woman like yourself continue to care for her family in difficult times. 

Check out Kullakas web site at www.alpacaartisans.com . This is a new web site, and if you're experiencing any problems trying to put an order through, don't hesitate to email me at karen_rushen@yahoo.com, and I will be sure you get whatever it is you need. 

You may not be able to depend on the stock market or any given bank, but you can rely on the fact that when you help those far less fortunate than yourself in a generous and compassionate manner, you WILL find your own life blessed! 

A Creative Spin on Addressing Hunger

Debra McMasters of Clearwater, Florida is truly a creative soul.  She creates beautiful beaded jewelry to wear and sell, and she holds monthly spirituality evenings at her home where she facilitates viewing and creating art for spiritual growth and discernment. Debra is studying spiritual direction at the Shalem Center in Washington D.C. (she commutes for their distance learning program that meets throughout the year) and is especially drawn to the labyrinth as a spiritual tool. In fact, Debra has designed and facilitates canned goods labyrinths, whereby she works with a faith community to collect and lay out canned goods donations in the pattern of a labyrinth. Not only do people have a powerful sense of their collective efforts viewing all the canned goods laid out, but they are able to literally see how care for the poor and disenfranchised is integral to their own spiritual path as they walk the labyrinth. Walking the canned goods labyrinth, people are able to meditate on the reality of hunger in their communities, and what their possible response to hunger might be. Recently Debra held canned goods labyrinths at Church of the Ascension and Prince of Peace Parishes in Clearwater. Over three thousand pounds of food, and over a thousand dollars in financial donations, were collected.

Dollies Delivered to the Village of Benito Juarez

Here are some photos that were sent to me by our dear friend Pastora Gutierrez Reyes, who is the founder and leader of the Zapotec Indian women's cooperative Vida Nueva in the village of Teotitlan del Valle, Oaxaca State, Mexico. Pastora and the women of the cooperative have a heart for the poor, and from their modest earnings, fund many project to provide for the indigenous Mexican people in the surrounding pueblos. Recently, Pastora (above holding the bag of balls) and some of the women of the cooperative visited the tiny mountain pueblo of Benito Juarez to hand out the forty dolls our women made in August at the Doll Making Marathon Retreat.

Pastora writes, "Dear Friends, Many thanks to you for the gifts you sent us at Vida Nueva Women's cooperative. We planned a meeting to bring the dolls you sent along with the games we purchased to the girls and boys of Benito Juarez elementary school and kindergarten. The children's parents and teachers wanted to know about who sent the gifts, and we told them about you and the project between yourselves and the cooperative. They send their thanks to you and your community, and wanted to let you know that you have friends in the pueblo and are always welcome there. You have done a lovely thing, and every doll you made by hand is now in the hands of a child in the mountains of Oaxaca. The children were very happy, grateful for your generosity, and thought the dolls were beautiful. It was a privilege for the women of the collective, myself included, to deliver you gifts, and to see the children's happiness at receiving them. Thank you from all of us at Vida Nueva, Pastora.

Of course, it has truly been OUR privilege to be involved in this sort of exchange, and we are indebted to the women of Vida Nueva for giving us the opportunity to do something for the children of this poor and tiny village. In looking at these lovely photos, we've certainly received far more than we gave.

Another Doll Making Marathon....

It was doll making marathon number 2 at the home of Audrey Steele, where the goal was to finish 30 dolls to accompany Anna Reschar, RN, on a medical mission to Chulucanas, Peru in November. By 6 pm, the women had secured 31 handmade dolls to go to the Peruvian children. Everyone had a great time, there was more food than we could have possibly eaten, and several women brought their moms or daughters with them for a little mother-daughter bonding time. A lot of us learned we have more creative talent than we would have dreamed. Thank you once again to Audrey Steele, who worked with Anna Reschar to come up with this idea of making dolls for the children of Chulucanas, and for then opening her home and her heart to this project, and to the following women, who all contributed: Nancy Alonzo, Venisa Alonzo, Mauri Barnes, Holly Dodson, Sara Gallet, Jennifer Hall, Judy Hall, Charlotte Hoo, Cathy Naghitorabi, Carmen Ruiz, Pat Sams, Ellen Shelby, Christina Smith and Sonia Smith. 

Warm Wishes from Bolivia

The women of Kullakas knitting cooperative are sending a warm and cozy gift of hope and love to a suffering woman in Ethiopia. The women, from the impoverished district of El Alto, La Paz, Bolivia, prepared and sent this gorgeous hand knit blanket to an Ethiopian woman undergoing surgery for an obstetric fistula at the Addis Ababa Fistula Hospital. Patients are typically in residence at the hospital recovering for two to three weeks, and use blankets as wraps and throws over their shoulders to shield them from  the chilly weather. Kullakas' mission statement states that they are committed to responding in solidarity to the situation of marginalized and discriminated women everywhere. Few women suffer marginalization and discrimination to the extent of fistula sufferers. A special thank you to "kullaka" (sister) Maria Villa, who knit this blanket with affection and best wishes for a rapid recovery and new life for its recipient.

www.alpacaartisans.com  

News from Marcela of Minerva's Circle

Look at the beautiful picture I received from Marcela Andrades Alfaro from her trip back to Chile, and her visit delivering handmade dolls and toys, made by the women of Minerva's Circle, to a children's home. 

If you want to get further details about Marcela's trip and be truly inspired to new crafting heights by an exciting site, visit Marcela's blog www.minervascircle.blogspot.com. The stuff these women are doing is so gorgeous that three of us are doing a road trip this winter and driving from St. Petersburg to Gainesville to finally meet these crafty women face to face and, hopefully, share crafting ideas (we'll come out the winners on that one, I'm afraid.) 

So many wonderful women doing so many crafty things. Let me hear from you if you have anything you want to share with us.

More Crafting with the Crones

A blogging rule of thumb appears to be that the more you have to report, the less time you have to sit down and write about it. 

Back from a summer hiatus, eight women from our craft group sat down with Carol Mitchell to learn how to crochet this past Monday evening. We have this idea that we're going to crochet blankets for charity as one of this year's projects, which may wind up being more a dream than a reality. But Carol, who very generously gave three hour's of her precious time to teach eight novices basic crocheting techniques, is encouraging us to think big. We shall see where it all goes. In the interim, the women are collecting items for Christmas gift stockings for five elderly Navajo women in Adopt-a-Native-Elder's Christmas program (www.anelder.org ). We are sending them, among other things, mittens knit by our dear friends and sisters at Kullakas (www.alpacaartisans.com) . At least the Navajo women won't have to wait three years for something warm and cozy.

On Tuesday, Carol Mitchell and Olivia Hurst came with me to teach crocheting to my senior crafting group at the assisted living home. Two of the women sat down to learn crocheting for the first time, and two others took to this neglected skill with a sense of renewed purpose and energy. One woman left our group with three skeins of yarn tucked under her arm, to head back to her room and continue making a lap blanket for someone in need. It never ceases to amaze me what generous lives most of these elderly women have led, and how much they still long to give back and be productive, even in old age battling a laundry list of infirmities.

Olivia herself is a remarkable woman. Not much older than me, she has had severe arthritis for years that has led to numerous knee and hip replacement surgeries and has left her hands bent and crippled. Olivia, however, is a demon with a crochet hook, and has produced some absolutely gorgeous crocheted items that look like they came out of a designer boutique. A lovely, gentle and grounded individual, it was touching to watch her work patiently showing our elderly women how to hold the crochet hook in their arthritic hands. I kept thinking to myself how wonderful it would be to get her working with patients in long term rehab, whose hospital stays can be one to three months and often very boring for them. We'll see where that all might go...