Quilt Raffle Winner

The drawing took place today at 12:30pm after Atonement's 11:00am service and Don drew the winning ticket. Don's mother hand stitched the beautiful quilt which was donated for the fundraiser.

Congratulations to JoAnn - who purchased her tickets the first weekend of the raffle. Actually, her daughter bought them for her as a nice Mother's Day gift.

The Quilt Raffle was a success - We sold all but 7 of the 240 tickets that were printed and we raised over $950.

Many thanks and blessings to all who purchased tickets - We truly appreciate your participation and financial support toward our mission trip to Tanzania.
A special thanks to Cindy and Don - and of course, Don's mother for donating the quilt. Cindy did an awesome job this past weekend 'hawking" tickets. "Little bruce" (our giraffe mascot) did a great job, too!

International Health Partners US-TZ Web Site

Brooke sent out a long email with an update from Denny and Paula yesterday and it is full of great information and pix. Did you know that the same information is on the International Health Partners-TZ website?

There is a link to the IHPTZ.org website on the sidebar in the links list - Check it out! There is a lot of great info and their photo gallery has been updated recently, too.

A note from one of the IHPTZ volunteers:

I am Judy from Newton, Iowa. I am a senior citizen at the age of 74. I came to Mwanza because the Holy Spirit had told me that I could make a difference in other peoples’ lives and Denny and Paula’s was the place I chose.

I discovered the old fashion method of testing eyes was still available for me to use. God has sent 500 people to our clinic receiving the glasses and has changed all their lives for the better.

It’s so rewarding when a lady who couldn’t see me across the table and I fit her with a pair of glasses with a powerful prescription and she said “I can see, I can see!” and went flying out the door. She went around and shook hands with all her friends and looked them in the eye and said, “ I can see you again”. Then she went flying down the road to tell her family. This is what makes my work all worthwhile.

I booked my flight and came by myself and felt very much at ease all the time. Some of my friends were concerned but there was nothing at all that frightening.

I feel this makes me a better Christian and as long as God continues to open the doors I’ll walk through.

Memorial Day Weekend

We wish everyone a safe and relaxing holiday weekend. Cheers!

White Shirts for Mwanza

This touching video highlights Daniel, a med student from Canada, who sponsors school children in Mwanza.

Traditional Group in Mwanza

How to Make Ugali

This traditional East African dish is on the menu for out Tanzanian dinner this Thursday.

This video will be helpful for those who will be helping to make the ugali for our dinner.
Check out the post below as it shows how to eat ugali.

How to Eat Ugali

Swahili Song - Asante Sana Yesu

Molly, Beatrice & Edward in Nairobi are singing the song Pastor Ben taught us at our last Swahili lesson.

M4M Team Dinner and Meeting

This month’s M4M team meeting will include a Tanzanian meal and time for us to fellowship together as our trip to Africa is nearing.

It will be a great time for us to gather, work and share a meal as a team in a cozy atmoshere (and if everyone shows up it will be really cozy).

The dinner and meeting will be at Kari’s House.

We will start at 6:00pm with Swahili greetings and some team activities to get the dinner ready to serve as a group.
(Don't worry about major cooking - The main dishes will already be prepared )
The dinner will be served buffet style at 7:00pm.
Our team meeting will follow during dessert and we should be able to wrap up by 8:30pm.

The Bizarre Foods show will be shown after for those who would like to stay.

Please RSVP to Kari via email and she will reply back to you with specifics as for what you may bring to contribute to the dinner.
As mentioned above the main courses of a Tanzanian meal will already be prepared.
Individuals will be asked to bring other things to add to our menu and for our team activities - it should be fun!

For those of you with allergies, Teddy, the cat will be in the house, but hiding upstairs.
There is also wireless internet for you techies who need to stay connected.

Tanzanian Batik Art

Batik Art originated from Indonesia and the style was adopted in Tanzania. In Tanzania the art is made by dyeing white cotton cloth with prefered background colors and then after it dries, hot liquid wax is brushed onto a piece of cotton cloth in the desired pattern. Dye is then applied again to the cloth which adheres to all of the areas that are not covered by the wax. The wax is then removed and reapplied repeated for each color used. Many beautiful sceneries and images can be created on the cotton cloth.

This beautiful batik art is from Arusha, Tanzania. It depicts African women working in the village.

Check out the post below for more about batik and a video from Filex,a batik artist in Arusha.

An Artist in Tanzania ::: Filex's Batik Workshop

Meet Filex Jacobson, an artist in Arusha. Filex has been passionate about art since he was a child. It is what makes him happy and he is good at it. He used to sit at his father’s feet drawing pictures as a youngster, and now as an adult, his father disowned him because he wanted to be a professional artist instead of a driver, mechanic or other form of “normal” work in Arusha. Filex did not give up and he struggled to get the resources for training in several art forms, including that of the Batik painting.

Batiks are made with a special wax painting process and a layering of different paint colors. Originally from Indonesia, the Batik was used as a form of communication to send messages and was brought to Congo, Uganda and Tanzania through traders and missionaries. It takes a half of a day to make one Batik, you can watch Filex in action in the video.

Filex now owns and operates Sunset Art Studio which is located across from the Arusha International Conference Centre. In addition to selling paintings and providing workshops, he employs six people in his studio and his work supports the livelihood of several street vendor distributors.

When Jan and I are in Arusha we will have to stop by to say hello to Filex, to look at his work or perhaps to take a workshop.

Thanks to the blog of keely stevenson for this information about Felix.

Updated Team Calendar

The team calendar has been updated to show the rest of May, June and the first part of July.

Click on the calendar for a larger view. The calendar has been updated in Link List, too.

Only a little more than 8 weeks until we depart for Africa - if anyone has anything to be added to the calendar please comment below or send me an email with the information.

Bruce the Giraffe

Meet the newest member of our M4M Tanzania mission team, Bruce the giraffe. He is named after a member of our congregation who has been participating and been a huge contributor to our Walking to Tanzania Fundraiser.

The giraffe has been adopted as our team mascot and we have been "borrowing" an image of another cute giraffe for our Walking to Tanzania signs and updates. Now that we have Bruce we are legal to use him in our posts and publications.

Click on Bruce to see a larger image of him - he kind of looks like the real Bruce, glasses and all.

Walking to Tanzania Update

Bruce, our little walking giraffe is almost half way to Tanzania - only a few more miles and he will be able to get his hooves on the continent of Africa.

As of May 10 we have accumulated 4581 miles toward Bruce's trek to Tanzania - only 4743 miles left. Now that the weather is warmer we should all be able to get out and walk a few miles toward the total and keep Bruce going.

Keep Walking! Let's make sure that once he is on the ground in Africa, Bruce will be running (not walking) to get to his homeland of Tanzania!

Quilt Raffle to Benefit M4M Mission

This past weekend we kicked off our quilt raffle to benefit our mission trip and the eye clinic in Mwanza. Ticket will be sold for the next three weeks and the drawing will be on Sunday, May 31st.

Tickets are $5 each or 5 tickets for $20. Tickets are sold at the Tanzania Table in the narthex during the weekend services.

The queen size quilt is beautiful and was donated for the raffle by our team members, Cindy and Don. Here Cindy and a couple other gals from the TZ team are showing off the quilt at the Palm Sunday brunch. The actual size of the quilt is 86" x 102".

Don's 85 year old mother hand stitched the detail on the quilt with loving care. This is one of the 35 quilts she has made over the past 25 years.

The quilt is on display at the TZ Table in the narthex where you can see it up close, check out the detail in the stitching and feel how soft and cozy it is.

More information to come in future posts.

Quilt Tidbits

We sold another $90 worth of ticket for the quilt raffle over the second weekend.

Don told me that the pattern is called "Pennsylvania Folk Art" and a line drawing of the pattern is shown above. It takes Don's 85 year old mother 6 to 9 months to hand stitch her quilts - she has made over 35 during the past 25 years. She works on her beautiful quilts on her screened in porch when she's in Florida or in her living room when back home in the midwest.

World Fair Trade Day 09 May 09

Click here to link to see the drumming circling the earth in honour of World Fair Trade Day.

Blog from Lynda in Tanzania

Click here to check out this blog - It is by a woman named Lynda, who lives in Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. (Thanks Jan for sharing the link!)

Lynda writes,

This blog is about my life on the farm, life in Tanzania, my travels & lots of African recipes too, of course ! I am proud to be an African & am passionate about this Continent – my blog portrays the positive side of life in Africa & her wonderful people, & not what you see in the media! So “karibu” (welcome) come & join me for a while, & we can talk about food, fun … & farm life!

Giraffes are Coming!

Tanzania's national symbol is the giraffe, seen here on the tail of Air Tanzania's new airbus.

How appropriate that the Giraffe is our team mascot - I will start to update the display case this weekend with giraffes as the theme. So, get ready... the Giraffes are coming!

Lent Offering Update

Some great news -

The portion of Atonement's Lent offering going toward the Eye Clinic ended up being $2916.

National Day of Prayer 2009

The 58th Annual National Day of Prayer will take place Thursday, May 7, 2009.

Millions will unite in prayer as thousands of events will take place from coast to coast.

The theme for this year is "Prayer... America's Hope" and is based on the verse from Psalm 33:22 which states: "May your unfailing love rest upon us, O Lord, even as we put our hope in you."

Vaccination Session Tonight

Reminder...
Vaccinations with Dr. Powell tonight in Brooke's office - starting at 5:30 pm.

FYI - I was away for a long weekend to visit family in Chicago. I am back now and will hopefully get some new things posted later today.