Piggery Pop Up

April 29, 2020Kids and Community ServiceKCDO, Kyamaganda Community Development Organizaton, micro-economies, Piggery, women entrepreneurhomeschoolhappymess Leave a comment

The Covid-19 pandemic has reached Uganda, and KCDO offices are being closed; the piggery is being temporarily disbanded. The many of you who contributed to the building of this piggery should feel very proud. This piggery has provided women with true independence through establishing multiple micro-economic opportunities.

Piglets, with their feed, ready to start individual piggeries

KCDO is using this opportunity to provide 20 local women with booster grants and materials to start their own businesses. KCDO has been teaching entrepreneurial skills for the past year. The women graduates are now provided with the tools for success.

As Jack Neighbor notes in a recent article in National Geographic, “Women have long been underestimated and underutilized in many societies, including across Africa. Now, through hard work, global commitments, and localized training initiatives, women entrepreneurs are making their mark on the economies of southern Africa.”

Willy writes, “Am happy to inform you that today, Saturday, we have been able to support 20 women with income generating projects to assist them in these trying moments. 10 women got pigs, animal feed and booster feeds to start their own piggery schemes at the household level. Others have got retail shops items like merchandise goods, drums for brewery, seedlings, fertilizers since its planting season, among others.”

And he says,

“We are grateful to WBS and the team who helped us start the piggery project that is supporting other small businesses for rural poor women in Kyamaganda community and Lwengo District.”

Please visit the Kyamaganda Community Development Organization to see the many ways we have united with this Catholic parish in the Lwengo District of Uganda.

The piggery distribution is a great example of successful micro-entrepreneurship, which started with a fund-raising pool party in the USA and 8 months later concludes with financial independence for 20 women and their families in Uganda.

“Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves.” Romans 12:10

Visiting the Rez

January 10, 2020Kids and Community Servicebook donations, Cheyenne River Reservation, children and community service, children's charities, donating children's books, Kids travel, Lame Deer Montana, Native American, Northern Cheyenne, Pine Ridge, Rosebud, USA camping, Wonderland BookSavershomeschoolhappymess Leave a comment

South Dakota and Montana are home to some of the most starkly beautiful locations on earth: American Indian Reservations, colloquially known as “The Rez.” American Indian children, like many children, love learning and reading. Unfortunately, the remote residences located across enormous numbers of acres means that many children lack access to books.

After a winter of book collecting, and a spring of organizing and boxing, we were ready for a summer of travel.The drive across country is very looong. Annabel searched ridiculous places to stop along the way, and this really helped our attitude,“Only 4 more hours to the Giant Pink Elephant!”“6 more hours to the Jolly Green Giant!” and of course we all loved being welcomed to Welcome!Camping added to our sense of adventure. Giant American flags are popular at the camp grounds!Our first stop was Lame Deer Montana, location of the 445,000-acre Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation. We brought children’s picture books to the Chief Wooden Leg Library, part of Chief Dull Knife College. These books will be shared with 8 Head Start programs located across the Northern Cheyenne Reservation. It was an honor to learn about Chief Wooden Leg who fought in both the Battle of Rosebud and the Battle of Little Big Horn, two locations we have visited several times.We next visited Rosebud Reservation, where we met with our friend Beth,and dropped off many boxes of books that will also be distributed across the reservation, enhancing 20 libraries we helped create at various community centers last summer.Our next two stops were both on Pine Ridge reservation. First, we went to our favorite school, Red Cloud Indian School. This successful school was originally started by Red Cloud and the Jesuits. Its aim is to provide Indian children with an extensive education that equally combines a Catholic education while honoring and adhering to Native American faith practices. This school also includes a Lakota language immersion program in which children as young as 18 months can learn Lakota as their native language. We have often contributed both books and funds supporting the Lakota language program and we were happy to be back bringing more books.After our stop at Red Cloud School we continued through the Pine Ridge Reservation to Red Shirt Table Elementary School. Here we met our many of our friends who are working with Laura to create a fun summer camp for children in the Red Shirt Table region. We brought our usual supply of picture books, along with a few toys.No trip across America would be complete without our travel adventures. These included attending church at the Air Force Academy in Colorado, Hiking Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs, Visiting churches and museums in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Spray painting cars at Cadillac Ranch in Amarillo, Texas, Visiting Ye Grand Old Opry in Nashville, Tennessee And riding roller coasters in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.From Sea to Shining Sea: One American Summer.And now, mid-winter, we are making plans to return to work at Summer Camp, and help build houses in the Children’s Village on the Cheyenne River Reservation in South Dakota. Would you like to join us?

Thank You Pawling Library! By Sebastian

December 13, 2019Kids and Community Servicebook donations, children and community service, children's book clubs, Community Service, donating books to Africa, donating children's books, kids and literacy, kids helping kids, kids service projects, Kyamaganda Community Development Organizaton, Pawling Library, Wonderland BookSavershomeschoolhappymess Leave a comment

During this season of reflecting on our blessings, we can’t help but think about our friends at the Pawling Library in Pawling, NY. The Friends of Pawling Library have been a true and constant blessing to the work of Wonderland BookSavers, and particularly Library Trustee Karen Franco and her husband Juan Franco, who have been generously and consistently donating and delivering hundreds of boxes of books every year to Wonderland since 2018.

A few years ago, I contacted Pawling Library about their annual book sale, hoping they would consider donating any remaindered books from their sale to WBS. The Friends of Pawling Library were not only willing to donate their leftover books, but Ms. Franco suggested continuing their support throughout the year! The Francos deliver boxes of beautiful childrens’ and young adults’ books into my family’s garage, even when we’re not there! We come home and boxes of books have miraculously appeared to be sorted and distributed around the world, to children in need.

Books from The Pawling Library have thus far been delivered to Zimbabwe, Ghana, and Kenya in Africa, as well as the Pine Ridge, Rosebud and Cheyenne River Reservations in South Dakota. Last year, when the Kyamaganda Community Development Organization in Uganda requested Bibles for their staff members that go out to the different villages they serve, the Francos came to the rescue, somehow procuring 45 used and remaindered bibles nearly overnight!

Several months later, this message came from Willy Bukenya who leads that organization: “With smiling heart and happy face, I am happy to inform you that your donated 52 boxes of books, learning materials and sports and games equipment have arrived today in Uganda and at Kyamaganda Community Development Organization. My team was happy too with the Bibles which will strengthen the spiritual nature of our project staff!”

In Mr. Bukenya’s perfect words, with smiling hearts and happy faces, we deeply thank The Friends of the Pawling Library for their ceaseless support and generosity in helping us bring books to children and communities in need. Their tireless help and support has been a great blessing to this organization, and we hope to continue our partnership for years to come.

Thank you Pawling Library! We Love you! PS Thank you for writing my name on every box, here you can see the very boxes you donated, in Uganda, with Sebastian written across the top!

Tough Mudder Reaches Uganda

December 11, 2019Kids and Community Servicechildren and community service, children's charities, donating books to Africa, donating children's books, kids and community service, kids service projects, Kyamaganda Community Development Organizaton, T-shirt Donations, Tough Mudder, US-Africa Children's Fellowship, Wonderland BookSavershomeschoolhappymess Leave a comment

Our reach across the divide from one world to another continues to grow. Today our T-shirt donations, in coordination with US-Africa Children’s Fellowship, reached the Kyamaganda Community Development Organization in Uganda.

As Mark (usacf.net) explained, “Tough Mudder is a for profit organization that runs sports competitions. Basically they set up huge obstacles courses that run for miles. Some of their events run for 24 hours. Contestants run up and down hills, climb over rope walls, splash through mud and crawl on their bellies. They run events across the United States and in England. Up to 400,000 people compete every year. They print about 450,000 T-shirts a year to make sure they have enough. Because I know one of the staff members of Tough Mudder, USACF gets all the extras. We have shipped full 40-foot containers with just their T-shirts in them. 50,000 T-shirts went to refugees in Somalia and 50,000 T-shirts went to refugees in Jordan.”

The children pictured below are all AIDS/HIV positive and face battles far more extreme than any Tough Mudder competition. We are grateful to play a role in the distribution of these T-shirts to parts of the world that personally know extreme hazards and competition.

Women and Children Benefit from Piggery

November 12, 2019Kids and Community ServiceBuilding a Piggery, children and community service, kids and community service, kids helping kids, kids service projects, Kyamaganda Community Development Organizaton, Wonderland BookSavershomeschoolhappymess Leave a comment

Our Make a Splash for Uganda fundraiser provided the needed funding to create a piggery for the Kyamaganda Community Development Organization located in the Lwengo District of Uganda.

The community has been hard at work ever since. The women and children began by planting cassava and other root vegetables to feed the piglets.

Classes in animal husbandry and business economics have been offered to the women, as the piggery is mainly their enterprise.

The men built a water catchment system that will provide clean water for the piglets. Rain water will run off the roof and into this tank.

They have built stys for 22 piglets, coating the wood with oil and tar to prevent rot.

Finally, the piglets have arrived!

We lack only one thing to complete this story: we are still searching for a qualified individual in the US who can act as an email-mentor to provide additional resources to the KCDO community.

We want to ensure that this first foray into pig farming will be a continuing success story. If you know of anyone with skills in pig farming, please contact us!

Somalia

November 7, 2019Kids and Community Servicebook donations, children and community service, children's charities, donating books to Africa, kids helping kids, US-Africa Children's Fellowship, Wonderland BookSavershomeschoolhappymess Leave a comment

In partnership with our friends from US-Africa Children’s Fellowship and United Muslin Relief, we have been able to send several containers of clothing, blankets, backpacks and books to refugees living in Somalia.

We are gratified to learn that books we have donated today, and those we will donate in the future will be used to promote learning in 3 newly established Somalian schools.

Little Labs…Big Imagination

November 4, 2019Kids and Community Servicebook donations, children and community service, children's charities, homeschooling community service, kids service projects, Native American, summer reading, Wonderland BookSavershomeschoolhappymess Leave a comment

Fairfield University hosts teachers from Bridgeport and beyond, creating a writing center that seeks to teach young children the joys of reading and creative writing. Our friend, Gina, asked us to contribute books that could be distributed throughout Bridgeport classrooms, enabling children to have better access to quality literature. We packed up 1,100 books, and brought them to the teachers.

Gina set up the books as a help-yourself free book shop, allowing the teachers to select books that would be a great fit for their classrooms. We are working with Gina to bring, along with books, some of the creative writing skills developed in Little Labs…Big Imagination to the Cheyenne River reservation this coming summer.

Nigeria, Ghana, South Africa and Zimbabwe

October 28, 2019Kids and Community Servicebook donations, children and community service, children's book clubs, children's charities, donating books to Africa, kids and community service, kids service projects, US-Africa Children's Fellowship, Wonderland BookSavershomeschoolhappymess Leave a comment

This summer we packed up 15,000 books for shipment to Africa.

It took our whole team days to prepare the books, and several hours to load the truck.

Even our new puppy, Legend hopped up to help us!

On loading day, our friend and partner, Mark from US-Africa Children’s Fellowship, met us in our garage.

We had to weigh every box and fill out the Bill of Lading.

Finally we were done! But for Mark, the adventure was just beginning!

Mark traveled to Nigeria, Ghana, South Africa and Zimbabwe, unloading boxes of books in every country!

All our boxes of books finding new homes on a new continent, and so many happy faces! Mark is our hero too!

Beads help support Baby Heroes Africa

October 23, 2019Kids and Community ServiceBaby Heroes Africa, baby supply donations, Bead donations, children and community service, donating books to Africa, kids and community service, kids service projects, US-Africa Children's Fellowship, Wonderland BookSavers, Zimbabwehomeschoolhappymess Leave a comment

Do you have a hobby that you no longer enjoy? Maybe you have all the parts and pieces in your attic or basement? Recently we were gifted with a massive bead donation. The collection included everything needed to set up a complete jewelry making operation: beads, wire, tools and more. We knew this collection could have a huge impact in Zimbabwe, and that the bead collection would provide the opportunity for women to create their own cottage industry. The impact has actually been even more profound than we imagined.

We sent the beads, with our partner Mark, to Zimbabwe. He shared them with an organization created to assist premature babies and their mothers, Baby Heroes Africa Foundation.

“Baby Heroes Africa Foundation is a non-profit organization founded in 2015 by Chengetai Makuni and Dr Norbertta Washaya with the aim of increasing the survival of preterm babies and enhancing their quality of life. Through the provision of technical, clinical and social support we have been able to aid institutions caring for preterm babies as well as the families of preterm babies. Our headquarters is in Bulawayo while our other offices are in Harare and Gweru. We work closely, Mpilo Hospital and United Bulawayo Hospitals, Maphisa Rural Hospital, Gweru Provincial Hospital and Chipinge District Hospital,Parirenyatwa and Harare Hospital.”

Baby Heroes Africa trains volunteers to assist mothers and babies during their stay at the local hospital. They have included beaded jewelry making as one component of their outreach, making jewelry to sell to support their mission.

Baby Heroes Africa said, “The beads and craft accessories donation helps us to support mothers of preterm babies who spend months on end in the hospital caring for their babies.”

Baby Heroes Africa also said, “The beading workshops are part of a bigger program called love our preemie mums which focuses on caring for and supporting mothers of preterm babies which in turn increases their capacity to provide that critical care to the babies.”

“Our social support involves giving care packages through “Bundles of Joy” project, to mothers for their babies; these packages include diapers, soap, petroleum jelly, blankets, wraps, clothes, baby tubs or buckets, cotton wool, maternity pads and methylated spirit. It also involves supporting mothers of preterm babies with home visits and skills development to assist them in improving their quality of life and that of their babies.”

Our next container leaves in under a month. If you have any baby items, beads or other craft projects which you would like to donate to Baby Heroes Africa, please contact us. We can arrange the donation.

“Giving care packages helps relieve the stress many of the mums have. Most of the mothers are unemployed and single I know you mentioned sending a container in 3 weeks. If there is anyway you can include any of the above listed items we would really appreciate it.”

Naturally, our donation included books for older siblings.

Baby Heroes Africa says, “Thank you once again for everything.”

Making a Splash for Uganda

September 4, 2019Kids and Community ServiceBuilding a Piggery, children and community service, children's charities, kids service projects, Kyamaganda Community Development Organizaton, Wonderland BookSavershomeschoolhappymess One comment

Our friends from the Kyamaganda Community Development Organization asked us to help them build a sustainable pig farm so that they could enjoy food and provide themselves with a source of income.
We decided that we would dedicate ourselves to this seemingly impossible task. How were we, sitting here in the US, going to build a pig farm in Uganda?

We began with a pool party fund raiser, A Piggery Party: Make A Splash for Uganda, and invited all our friends from our community.

We wanted our donation requests to be fun, and not too intimidating.

We took a box of envelopes and numbered them 1-100. We spent several weeks decorating them.

And we attached them to our board. Under the board was a picture of the women and children we hoped to help.Soon we were ready to host our party. We served hot dogs and lemonade.

Each guest was asked to choose an envelope. They could donate the amount of the number on the envelope. We included our favorite book quotes as book markers, inside each envelope.