charlotte - my first non-usa donation

i am knitting the charlotte sweater from the gorgeous dauphine (#14) book. first of all: beautiful, beautiful, beautiful!!!

one evening, several times, i read the decrease directions for the tops of the sleeves and i couldn’t figure it out. it just made no sense. i had to sleep on it and look at it again the next morning. no sense. and then again when i got home from work. nothing! in fact, i thought it was an error and googled “louisa harding pattern corrections”. the links i saw didn’t result in any corrections for the charlotte pattern. so i googled “louisa harding charlotte pattern corrections” and one of the first few links i saw took me to this purse pattern:



the funny thing is: i’m actually looking for an easy-to-make purse pattern.

i just got back a couple of weeks ago from africa where i taught orphans, their house moms, and even some of the cooks at the village of hope how to knit. my goal is to provide them with a trade for their futures, and in the meantime i’m going to show them how to make some simple items that can be sold and the money can be put back into the village of hope, so the village can become self-sustaining.

so when i happened upon this purse pattern, i thought, now wouldn’t that be funny if i looked at the charlotte sweater pattern again and it made perfect sense, and the only reason why it didn’t make sense before is because God wanted me to search for a correction and find this purse pattern??

and i swear to you i looked at the pattern again and i actually read it correctly and went, “OH! THAT’S what it’s saying, i've been reading it wrong.”

so.. as you may imagine, i couldn’t just let that go. there had to be a reason for it. i couldn't not do anything.

so i messaged the designer of the pattern (through ravelry, a site for knitters and crocheters. love it. if you're not on it, get on it. if you are - find me. i'm orangesque). i laid out this very story and asked her if she would be willing to donate the pattern for the kids to use and make product to sell for a profit for the village.

after several days of not hearing from her, i thought - ok. maybe i was just putting that in front of her for God to move her in another way (for i had no doubt God's hand was in this). i just prayed about it and if i heard from her - great! - and if i didn't, well that was great, too.

then i finally got an answer: "i would be honored."

she emailed me the pattern and even gave me permission to customize or embellish. and of course, she would love to see some of the finished pieces.

she's from england and so this is my first non-usa donation for this incredible knitting project.

OH! i cannot WAIT to teach the kids how to make this and then send photos back to louisa and i pray that she is blessed by her generosity.

and i am once again marinating in God's goodness and the truly amazing ways He works. that i even get to participate in this thrills me.

as an aside - here is another pattern i am going to teach the kids to make. heck - i'd wear it!!

the gift of joy

as we prepared for our last trip to the village of hope, i received a call from a friend telling me her child wanted to come by my work and donate her own money toward our fundraising. that child's name is joy and this is the story of her gift.

all of the first grade students at mcgowen elementary (among many others, i presume) received $1 each as part of the rachel's challenge project. the children were challenged to 'do good'...

at the bottom of the letter it says, Do something good. Do something great. Do something!

a dollar is a big deal to a first grader. well, to just about any kid. so to be told to do something with it (give it away?) is probably an even bigger deal. so what would joy do with her dollar?

several weeks prior to this, joy had learned in promiseland at christ fellowship about the children at the village of hope in uganda. and she learned that the offering collected from the kids in promiseland goes right to the village, so children are helping children.

to help educate the 'kids here' about the 'kids there' and what their offering money helps to accomplish, my husband came to promiseland one sunday to talk about the village and answer questions.



i was in the back and i recognized quite a few of the kids there, including joy.

apparently, she's been giving her very own money to the village of hope through promiseland for a while, which was later a surprise to her parents. she did it all on her own out of very big heart.

so... armed with this new dollar bill from her school, joy decides she wants to give to the village of hope, through donating it to our trip there. but at one point, she decided that $1 wasn't enough and she sat down to count out some of her own money. in quarters.



it got ziplocked up (but not after she got her mom to give some quarters of her own!) and hand delivered to me.

there was a moment where she thought about taking some of it back, but in the end gave all of her intended gift.



her mom prepped me before the visit so i knew what was up. good thing - or i would have blubbered all over the place. but i at least held it together until after they left. i couldn't stop hugging her though.

and perhaps it was my excitement at her gift, perhaps she experienced that true and lovely blessing God provides when we give of ourselves and our possessions, but there was talk of her wanting to give even more.

the baggie containing a one dollar bill and nineteen dollars in quarters helped pay for our trip to see the children where they began to learn to knit, learned to trust us more, and even shared some of their stories. we discipled them, loved on them, ate and slept with them. we showed them God's love and talked to them about how to honor him. we poured ourselves out for them.



it seems joy's gift went a long way. all the way to africa and back.

it also went deep. into my heart, scattering seeds of generosity and child-like faith. maybe it will make it into yours, too.

i hope mcgowen elementary knows where that dollar went and how it grew into something good. something great. Something!!

and i hope God blesses the little girl who gave what she had - away - to help others.

i am joy-inspired!!

the knitting debrief

  


robyn, aka the minimalist knitter, asked me how the knitting project went in uganda. my response came from the first time i've sat down to write anything out. so i'm including it here as an update:


robyn,

wow!

where do i begin? it was really awesome! here are a few photos




when the house moms saw me teaching the kids, they wanted to learn too. and when the kitchen workers saw me teaching the house moms, they wanted to learn too. even the ugandan director picked up some sticks and gave it a try. and so did the full time missionary woman who is living out there with her husband. everyone wanted in on it.

they were very good at learning the process and i laid out some foundational knitting for them. by the time we left, one of the house moms nearly had a scarf made!

each session would last several hours because the girls wouldn't stop knitting until the house moms told them to - either it was time for dinner or time for chores. and the time would go by so quickly (and quietly... it absorbed them).



on a seemingly unrelated note, we took some time to sit with the head mistress (principal) of their school to discuss how we can support them in the future with lessons, etc. we wanted what we teach them to supplement what the teachers were teaching, and that hopefully we could bring more ESL into it and maybe bring things from america that weren't readily available in uganda (like weather implements such as wind socks). when she presented us with the upcoming curriculum, it turned out that some of the art elements for the next two terms are knitting and crocheting. hmm... i can help with that.

then we were looking at some of the items that the village has been able to sell to help support themselves, like the bead project, and they were asking if i could teach the kids how to make things that would be marketable to sell. hmm... i can help with that, too!

so it seems that this knitting project (that has by far outgrown me) can be helpful in ways i hadn't considered.

i received several boxes from people saying they heard about me through your blog and it blessed me beyond measure that they would simply give! they don't know me. and they may not even know you. but they just... gave. their generosity and willingness to partner with me was touching and i found myself several times just tearing up for lack of a better response.



we took over 75 sets of needles and over 100 pounds of yarn to africa and i still have some stuff left over in my spare room (i saved the boucle and fuzzy yarns for later as it didn't lend itself well to beginner's efforts).

upon my return i found another box had been delivered in my absence and another box landed on my doorstep the next day. the generosity continues.

my next step, as i continue to collect donated materials, is to gather some patterns for products that will sell (mostly to americans that visit the village or to be sold here in the states), and hopefully items that can incorporate some of the beads. one idea i had is to have the kids make a basic pouch purse with a drawstring at the top and use beads at the ends of the drawstrings. maybe finish it with fringe at the bottom with beads, too.

if you or any of your readers have pattern ideas or submissions they would be greatly appreciated. :)

one last note: my husband and i sponsor four of the kids there. two girls and two boys. the two girls are both named vicky and one of them had been very closed off when we were there last. that may have even contributed to me being so drawn to her. i tend to be a little standoffish (shy) myself. since our last visit i've sent her some letters and prayed for her regularly.

a few days into our visit this time, she gave me a note that said she wanted to share her story with me. she led me around to the side of her home, sat me down, and began to tell me. it was... heartbreaking. no child in that village has a pretty story. it was all i could do not to cry (for fear of it being translated to her that i pity her).

the fact that she shared with me speaks of incredible trust. when we returned, it spoke volumes to those kids. it said we will be back for them. they can trust that. they can trust US. and they did... she wasn't the only one who opened up to me.

but it also told me that they are receiving such good care, such good, godly, healthy care, that they are healing from past hurts and beginning to open up. it was a beautiful testimony of how God can restore even the most broken of us. his love can 'knit' back together a heart with more fractures than we can count. yes, he knits! i am my Father's daughter. :)

thanks for all you have and are doing to push this project forward and increase awareness of the village of hope. i'm astounded by your kindness.

with gratitude,

trace