Happy Monday

What makes me happy?

The "Six Word Story" K left on the board in the kitchen before she left for Ghana...




"there's still no place like home"

I talked to her yesterday and she's in Accra and sounds good... I think she's heading back to her village in the next day or two.

I'm so happy that she loves her Peace Corps work...

Happy Monday

What makes me happy?

Pictures, posted on her facebook page, of K in Ghana...



(K's little friend is not in pain... she's trying to make a big smile for the camera!)



K, in a truck filled with supplies for a PC project she's been working on...



It's always good to see that K is still K... crazy, silly, full of life. (I wonder what the people in her little village think of Americans after having her living with them for almost two years?!)

~Happy Monday~

What makes me happy?

Knowing that K is safely back in Ghana. It look about 18 hours of flying but she's landed and is on her way back to her village (or might already be back in her village!).

Hurray for safe, uneventful, (although looong) travels!

I couldn't believe my eyes....

I'd never really known what that phrase meant until last night when K, our daughter who is serving in the Peace Corps in Ghana, "dropped in" on our family St Patrick's Day dinner. Our oldest daughter, E, was in on the surprise having arranged her travel and picked her up at the airport and brought her to the house. 

I honestly couldn't believe what I was seeing when I first saw her... It was an amazing, emotional, evening 

 Here is R and baby E (our youngest granddaughter) and K... still teary faced from the reunion. 

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 K and baby E during dinner (corned beef, potatoes colcannon, and soda bread of course...) 

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 The two "partners in crime"... they worked very well together planning K's surprise appearance and keeping it a secret from everyone.

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 I may not be blogging much for the next couple of weeks (the length of K's stay) but I will try and pop in now and then and share some photos...

Peace Corps Week

This week is Peace Corps Week...



Have you thought about Peace Corps lately?

It's more than just the history of President Kennedy starting the program back in 1961 with this purpose:

"To promote world peace and friendship through a Peace Corps, which shall make available to interested countries and areas men and women of the United States qualified for service abroad and willing to serve, under conditions of hardship if necessary, to help the peoples of such countries and areas in meeting their needs for trained manpower."

Over 200,000 American's have served in the Peace Corps since then, including my brother and my daughter (currently serving in Ghana).

The Peace Corps is history, but it's very much now too. There are currently over 7,000 Peace Corps volunteers serving in 139 countries throughout the world.

It's an adventure, but it's also a tremendous sacrifice.... leaving home, job, friends, and family for more than two years. Making a new home in a place that may not have electricity, running water, internet access (the average age of a PCV, Peace Corps Volunteer, is 28... this is a big deal!), and where you may not have access to a variety of foods or even enough food.

For my daughter it's sleeping under a mosquito net every night, and taking anti-malarial medication every day (and dealing with the side effects of this medication) with the awareness that, just months into K's service, another PCV in her area died from malaria. It's heat and dust and tiny beautiful brown children at her feet, and frustration, and opportunity, and being part of a world she otherwise could never have been a part of.

You can read through our daughter's PC blog here and get a little glimpse of her life in Africa.

A few more African PVC blogs are  here,  here and here.

Our daughter K, and a little friend...





Congratulations Peace Corps on your 53rd Anniversary Saturday. I'm off today to mail a package to my PCV, it seems like a good way to celebrate. :)

snapshots of home

Daughter K called from Ghana the other day and I told her about a little chair I had upcycled into a "desk" for for our youngest granddaughter. She asked me to post a picture of it, so...

... here you go K, a tiny little desk. :)



I started with a little unfinished child's chair I found at the thrift store. I removed the little wooden seat, then cut the back legs off level with the front legs. (The back legs had continued up to form the part of the back of the chair.) Then I put it back together again, using some of the unneeded back pieces to add bracing underneath. I used an old 1x6 as the top, cutting it in half, and attaching the halves together lengthwise. I rounded the corners and gave it a good sanding and attached it to the base I'd made. I finished it off with a little paint, stain, and polyurethane .



It's so fun to make something from nothing.... especially when it's for one of the grandkids...

She is the Lorax....

I love this picture of our daughter K (who is in Africa with the Peace Corps)...



She'd posted it on her PC blog as part of a post where she writes about the tree there that makes these huge (apparently edible) puff balls... and how they remind her of the Dr Suess book "The Lorax".





I'm pretty sure she's never seen the movie made from this classic book (it came out after she'd left for Africa) but she, and the rest of our kids, was raised on Dr Suess... I read some of his books so many times that I had them memorized.

You can read all of K's post here if you'd like.

Africa must agree with my girl... doesn't she look happy?

snapshots of home (snow curtained windows)

A few more snapshots of home for our daughter in Ghana...

An intense, but quick burst of snow blew through last night, leaving the windows on the north side of the house plastered with snow...



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I love the way the kitchen is reflected in the snowy glass...



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... the living room reflection in this picture looks dreamy to me.



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After I turned out the lights I noticed the neighbor's barn light, just barely visible through the snow, glowing on the hill.

Such a peaceful evening...

catching up with my "African" child

I am always hungry for pictures of our daughter K, who is serving with the Peace Corps in Ghana. I tend to FB "stalk" her... looking for photos she's posted or other PC volunteers have posted of her.  (She isn't able to post often, there is no electricity in her village, so finding pictures of her is a rare treat!)

This week she's been helping out with Operation Smile, leaving her little village to stay in Tamale where the program has set up.  Here are a couple of pictures I found of her...

She looks disguised here... only her eyes give away that it's her. ;)



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And I LOVE this one...

K with one of the patients, before surgery. It does my heart good to see K looking so happy and healthy!



They had a room set up for the children (and anyone else who would like) to make dolls. This little one seem pretty proud to be showing off her newly created doll.

This is typical K... sitting on the floor with the kids... helping to make dolls.



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One more look at the doll making...



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So my FB stalking paid off this time with several pictures of my girl... It feels a little like Christmas. ;)

I'm rich! (plus Ghana photos)

At least that's what this email I received says...

"You have been Granted with the sum of $950,000 by Western Union in the

2013 Western Union Program. We will be sending you $5,000 daily until the
$950,000 is completed. The first $5,000 has been sent already, contact Mr
John Smith with your Full Name, Sex, Country, Tel, so that he will be sure

Regards
Mr John Smith
Email:western.smith@pk-service.net
Tel:+2348152682681

Thank you for using the Western Union."
Cool.

I guess there were perks I never dreamed of connected to my wiring money to K in Ghana via Western Union.

Who would have thunk it?

Now I'm just going to sit back and wait for my $5,000. a day to start rolling in...   ;)

And... since we are talking about K and Ghana...

I thought I'd share a few pictures of K, my "African child":

I love the look on the little girl's face...



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Yes, K is going to have a hard time leaving these babies behind when she comes back home again...



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K at her village...



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And outside her house (she has one room in the "teacher's house)... She labeled this photo "chaos".



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She looks happy, doesn't she? I believe Ghana and the Peace Corps must agree with her.

(And of course, I know the email is a scam and there is no way I would reply, I did think it was funny though... as if anyone would fall for it!)

laziness + busy-ness = a quiet blog

But I'm going to work on not being too lazy (and busy) to update more often.

Lots going on here... prom, graduation planning and attending, finishing up the "big" house project I've been working on, garden planting, mandolin playing (thank you again Loren, it's crossed the line to obsession... :) mixed with more than a little just lazing around.

Yesterday was an exciting day, as we received a package from K (dd#3) who is in Ghana with the Peace Corps.

She sent a variety of gifts from Africa, most made as income producers by groups organized and supported by Peace Corps volunteers (a group for women with AIDS for example).



My favorite, of course, was my Mother's Day gift... A bag made by the tailor in K's village out of the same fabric as K's favorite head wrap.

I LOVE IT...





It makes me feel closer to my girl who is so far away...



That's it for now, hopefully some catch up pictures tomorrow. :)

Happy Monday (one day late)

Things that make me happy today:

**Letters from K (dd#3) that came yesterday from Ghana!

**And resources for M and R...

...we are so blessed to live in a community that offers so much for children and young adults with disabilities. Some examples are:

*Special Olympics! M is finishing up his basketball season and is also swimming, R is swimming and both are looking forward to Track and Field starting soon. We are part of Special Olympics Colorado, and an easy way to support them is by clicking on the link below to a YouTube video of the Colorado Rapids doing the "Harlem Shake" immediately before the Polar Plunge about a week ago. Each time the video is viewed, they will donate .10 to Special Olympics Colorado... up to $10,000!! So go watch the video... and then watch it again... and again... and again.. (you get the idea)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJhvD3DNHxc&feature=youtu.be

*The Rotary Community Corps (RCC) hosted by our town's Rotary Club. It's designed for young people with disabilities, and allows them the opportunity to give back to our community, while making friends, learning, and having fun. What an awesome program. You can read an early write-up for the program here  http://yourhub.denverpost.com/parker/rotary-community-corps-parker-first-colorado/pzD1bFOjiPQ443VsV7FXHP-ugc

*Our homeschool group. After 10 years with the group we still find support, friendship, and educational opportunities through the group. You can find them here: http://www.freewebs.com/cchf/

*I can't forget M's worksites... I'm so happy that we've found such wonderful places in our community where he can volunteer and learn job skills.  Back six years ago when I first had the idea of "internships" (there is a link to my post just above my header, unfortunately it's almost hidden by the search box...) I had no idea it would turn out so well. It's been a long road getting here... Being derailed in our first "internship" attempts by a poor choice of worksite (Chick-Fil-A just wasn't willing/able to accommodate), M's instability and his hips surgeries. And then following another path (the Bridge Transition Program through DCSD) which looked great but ended up being a dead end and causing more harm than good. Until finally, now six years later, M has two "internships" or worksites, is happy, learning, gaining skills, and we are looking to increase his time at one of the sites. Yes... this makes me happy.

Have a happy day!