I have been a busy beaver this past week or so! Let me explain. A few months ago (I think it was in June), our church, Grace Community Church, decided to cancel weekend services on the weekend of November 1 and 2, and instead send all the church attenders out into the community to do service projects.
What a great idea, huh?! So, to get the projects set up well in advance they asked for project ideas of all of the Outreach ministries. Our ministry, Hands of Hope International Adoption and Orphan Care Ministry, is one of those, and as the sponsor, I was asked to submit ideas. I took this message to our board, and they had a few ideas, one of which was to ask any contacts we had with agencies related to our ministry for service projects. In the end we submitted 3 ideas: 1. making cards for orphans, 2. planning a silent auction to fund our adoption fund, and 3. holding a garage sale to help fund our adoption fund.
Well, our church picked 2 of the 3 ideas along with many many other ideas from other ministries to go forward with providing 3000 volunteer opportunities! The time for signing up closed this past Monday, and it turns out that our #2 idea didn't have enough volunteers to make a go of it. So for Hands of Hope our only project left is making cards for orphans of which I happen to be the project leader AND the team leader both. I didn't really understand what that meant to be both the project leader and the team leader until this week.
As the project leader I've been responsible for getting everything ready, from contacting and working with the scrapbooking store where we're going to hold the sessions, gathering all the supplies for all the sessions, working with the Childrens Hope International contact that I have to get the information I need about the orphans, and in general getting all the planning done.
As the team leader I've been responsible for contacting each person that signed up and verifying which shift they are going to be working, trying to figure out how to accommodate everyones' request, and then also reminding each person that signed up of the date, time and location of the the sessions. And I will be responsible for leading all 4 sessions, which means that I'll be at the site from 9:30 Saturday morning until 4 p.m. Saturday afternoon, and then 11 a.m. Sunday morning until 5 p.m. Sunday afternoon! Wow! Did I sign up for alot?!
Anyway, I'm about 90% ready on both jobs. Turns out that we'll be making Christmas cards for orphans in Ethiopia. So because I'm not really crafty or creative in making cards, I decided about 2 weeks ago that it would be best for me to take DD1 and DD2 down to Archiver's (where the event is to be held), and practice making cards. We met another board member there, picked 4 card ideas that Archiver's had on the their website, and went around with one of the store clerks collecting all the necessary supplies to make those 4 cards. Well, 30 minutes , and $230 later!!!, we were ready to make our cards. We all faltered a little bit getting started, but soon we were off. The girls' imaginations took off, and we ended up making 7 cards in about 2 1/2 hours of time (Gretchen pointed out the each of the cards cost us a little over $30!, but we'll be able to use alot of the supplies again, so it's not as bad as it sounds).
After I finish up writing this post, I'll also post photos of the cards we made. I did learn lots on that card making adventure. First and foremost is: Don't buy card making supplies at a scrapbooking store! It's too darn expensive! I decided that I'd make trips to other stores and buy the additional supplies we need for this weekend. I went to Dollar Tree which quite a few things we could use, Walmart which didn't, and Hobby Lobby which was a gold mine!!!
All in all I've used about $260 of our ministries funds for this project that will have 4 sessions with 16 people at each session. We'll be passing out cards and return envelopes at the event for people to take home to consider making a donation to the Hands of Hope adoption fund which has been set up to provide interest free loans and matching grants to Grace adopting families to help bring an orphan home to their forever family. I also have had to print out the envelops and donation cards to support that, so there's additional minimal cost associated with that, but who's counting, right?!
I still have a couple of things I need to get: yellow or gold card stock, and brown or black card stock. But that's it, and I'll be ready!
I'm excited, and nervous about how this weekend will go. I'm excited because we had a really good time making the cards last weekend, so I know people will enjoy it. I'm nervous because, although Archiver's told me we could use their work room for the sessions, they didn't reserve it for us. So it's possible that other people from off the street could come in and take one of the 16 chairs that's available. That should'nt be a problem for the Saturday and Sunday morning sessions because we are there first thing when they open, but for the afternoon sessions there's just no guarantee.
So I've been praying alot over this event. I want it to go well. Not so much to show what a great planner I am, or to give me the glory for all of this event. But rather because for some people this is the first time they've done any service project at all, and I want it to be a good experience for them so they'll be more open to volunteering year round. Also because I want the Ethiopian children to enjoy the hand made cards and to know that they are loved not only by us but by God!
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