Fun video and some bowling!

So, I have to share this! At church, we are fortunate to have some great videos (the church sermon for one campus is broadcast live every Sunday on the website) and this video announcement shows the fun of some of the girls going with us to Honduras this year!  The kids and teens at the project love these girls, and I think you can see why!

This is advertising our bowling event this weekend!  The event is open to everyone of all ages, whether you attend our church or not, so please pop along to support us!  We'll also have some Sarris candy and cross necklaces for sale, as well as information on sponsoring the kids at the project. You can learn more about their lives before and after going to live at Manuelito Project!

There are a few more opportunities to help with the project.  In the past 6 months I became an independent consultant for Jafra, offering free facial and spa parties! It's a lot of fun, as you can imagine. If you would like to know more about the products, visit www.Jafra.com/Danielle -- I ship anywhere and you can order online too!! To book a party, or learn more, contact me! All of my commission is used to sponsor the team or be added to missions in some other way. Between now and Easter, all my commission will be donated to the vehicle fund for the Manuelito Project.

Thanks for your support!

Team building, fundraising and a guest!

We're only in March (we're already in March?!) and already we have had several great meetings and fundraisers!  A couple of car washes and a chicken dinner have got us off to a great start.

At one of our team meetings recently, we had a very special guest. David Medina spent much of his childhood living at the Manuelito Project. At the age of 6 (SIX!) he was on the streets: begging, sleeping rough, and drawn into the reality of drugs as a means to stave off hunger, cold and pain. However, thanks to the great work--bold and compassionate work--of Pastor Pinto, founder of the Project, David was eventually brought to live at the children's home after 3 years living on the streets. Pastor Pinto (called Papi by the kids) was once raised in a similar project and he was called to the ministry of helping street kids a couple of decades ago. Through a program of swapping their drugs for food, the children on the streets were able to get to know Pastor Pinto and to learn about places like Manuelito Project.

David's story is one of great success. His siblings also found refuge at the project. Some still live there, another graduated and became a school teacher.  Today, as an adult, David is well rounded, a father to an infant, and grateful for the opportunity given to him to have a normal healthy life.

The Project that saved David and his siblings relies on donations and volunteers.  Recently we were told of a pressing need. For several months, the Project has been working without the use of a working vehicle.  The vehicles are vital to get the kids to doctors appointments, special classes, emergency care and to continue their outreach into the poorest communities.  With David's help, our church kicked off a drive to raise $15,000 towards the new vehicle.

Upcoming events!

April 2, 5:30pm-8:30pm: "Build a School" Bowlathon at Family Bowlaway, Butler.
April 22 9am-2pm: Craft and Vendor Spring Show, Butler Library
May 19/20: Huge Rummage Sale, Crossfire

Past fundraising and volunteering helped the project immensely. Recent photos show the kids in their new school building, with Phase II underway: a vocational training school! 
If you would like to donate to the car fund, message me or mail a check to Butler FUMC with "Honduras Vehicle Fund" in the memo.We are also selling Disciple Crosses for $10 each, These make great Easter gifts and can be shipped anywhere in the world.

Mission progress

One of my favorite things about the lead up to our mission trip is the team meetings and fundraisers. Don't get me wrong--fundraising is really hard, and I find it very difficult to ask people for money or to come to yet another event, but the comraderie and support is well worth the effort.

What happens during these 6 months?

We study the bible together: what is God leading us to do on this trip, how can God help us to overcome our anxieties, how can we overcome our selfish desires so that we land on Honduran soil with a heart of servitude and love?

We bond.  I know it's only a week in Honduras and that doesn't seem like a lot. But this is no vacation by the pool. We share a dorm, we listen to each other snore, we sweat in the heat together, we dig holes and carry bricks and then we play with dozens of kids together, we sometimes get sick together and nurse one another, some of us get homesick or irritated by one another, we adapt to a very different culture, most of us nod in ignorance at a language we don't understand. All this is hard enough, but doing it with strangers would be even tougher so we take time to get to know one another, to become family to each other so we can be the best team we can possibly be.

Prepping take out at the Chicken Dinner

And of course, we raise funds. Why?  Some people ask why do we raise funds when we are choosing to go. We raise funds for several reasons: 
1) we are not picking people to go based on their wealth but on their heart.  In fact, I wouldn't say that we pick the team so much as God brings the team together.

2) a good chunk of the money we raise is used to fund the home we are visiting, to feed and educate the children.

Chicken dinner

3) On top of the minimum we need to raise, we raise extra so we can help the project with their urgent needs. In the past, our church has raised enough to help start building a new school, to buy toilets for the boys' dorm, a fridge, a stove, tables and chairs, dirt for a road. We also want to have fun with the kids so we take toys, games, sports equipment and treats!

And the #1 question: why not just send money?  Over time I have learned that building relationships with the children and staff goes much further than dollars alone. Rather like the saying, Give a man a fish and he eats for a day. Teach him to fish and he eats for a lifetime. Much more about that in future posts!

2017 Bold Compassion Boot Up

After a long year off, as we re-charged and listened for direction, it's time to boot up and fire up again!  When we left Honduras in 2015, we really thought we'd be back again in 2016 but it wasn't to be.  But that's okay, we had plenty of important things to do. We're back again though, heading back to Honduras in August.

It seems to me that in the past 18 months, parts of the world and our society have become a slightly darker place, people seem meaner to one another, more critical of what others support or don't support. My belief is that if you are showing love, compassion and kindness to anyone, then you are moving in the right direction. My cause might not be your cause. You might support sick kids, or a cure for cancer, or animal rescue, homeless veterans or addiction recovery. That's all fantastic, and I am so glad that your heart beats for a great cause! It's wonderful that God gave us different passions so we can all work towards making the world a better place!

Over the coming weeks and months, I will share more about this year's trip, our fundraising efforts and, of course, about the children at the Manuelito Project.

To learn more about the Project, watch this great video!
If you would like to support our trip, we have a Paypal button on the side bar! 

Honduras Mission Team video

Each year we put together a little video montage of the trip. This year's video is here. Check out the great photos and some thoughts about the trip from some of the team members.

View it in full screen here: https://vimeo.com/139668651

Manuelito Missionaries visiting Butler, FUMC

This weekend, the US Missionary Justin Guest and Manuelito Project director, Mauricio Flores, will be visiting us at First Church. They will speak at each of the 5 services, and everyone is welcome to join them for a luncheon on Sunday afternoon.

Please do come along to show your support of the work they do!

Where: Connection Center, E. North St, Butler (next to the downtown chuch campus)
When: Noon, Sunday Sept 13
Cost: Free!

3rd year... and the best yet!

For friends who have been awaiting news of our trip, I do apologize for my lack of communication during our trip this year. It was a busy week, and an emotional one. And though I have been home a couple of weeks, I was hit with some exhaustion, fevers, and insomnia.

All that said, thank you to those who have supported these trips in any way. It was a great blessing to be welcomed back to the Manuelito Project this year as family, and it was a true honor to be able to serve the kids and staff once more.

If you are in our area, Wednesday Aug 19th there will be a presentation at Crossfire at 6:45pm. Several people will talk about the trip, and there will be details of how you can get involved with the project in future - either visiting on a team or in other ways without leaving home!

I will share more here soon, but wanted to show a few photos at least, to give a sense of the week!

2 new children at the project, taking their total to 42 living there.
Another 80+ attend the school

Jessica with 2 of the boys. Good friends.

Josh flying a kite with some of the boys

Musical chairs - a fun night!

Josh with Okaren

The school volleyball match against another nearby school

Jason, Wendy & Joyce: working on the new school building.
Check out that scaffolding! I was not climbing that this year!

Our trip to the cross. It's a killer hike up the hill.
Edith, one of the girls at the project, & I did it together.

Nightly devotionals. A great way to end each evening with the team.

Wendy and Yeni. They struck up a great relationship 3 years ago
and Wendy is now a sponsor.

A couple of the boys trying to find their new tie dye shirts.
The day before we all made the shirts - controlled chaos!

Every chance they could get to spin!

Jump!

The kids don't often do this hike anymore, they have been so often.
We were touched that they accompanied us up again!

Costs of a mission trip, financial and others

As much as we try to inject "fun" into fundraising, it's a time consuming and tiring business. I have not sent out the usual request letters this year, instead focusing on raising the funds through events, making and selling things and similar. Car wash, soap making, crocheting, rummage sale, selling candy and the like. It's a slow business, and inch by inch we head towards our goal. Three of us in my family are headed to Honduras this summer, as well as one embarking on other ministry trips this year.

This gets expensive. The cost of the Honduras trip starts at $1,875 per person. On top of that, we need more shots this year, others need passport updates, and there are usually other unexpected costs that pop up - items to take to the kids, tools that might be needed for projects, materials for crafts and fun things to do with the kids.

How does that $1,875 per person get used?

• Approx $875 of the funds will be used on airfare - getting us from Pittsburgh to Honduras. 
• Approx $100 will be spent on projects - buying supplies like paint, tools or whatever we will need to work down there. About 6 to 7 hours per day are spent working. We've painted walls, tied rebar, hung drywall, made metal screens for windows and so on.
  Typically that $100 won't buy as much as we need, so we do try to raise a lot more. Honduras has little in the way of manufacturing so many supplies are imported into their stores and can be pricey.
• Room and Board - taking out the cost of food, the amount we pay to stay in the dorms goes to the Project and helps with the overall running costs.

So that puts about half of the $1,875 per person going to benefit the project itself. Any extra we raise will also go towards the Project. In the past 2 years funds raised by our church have gone to:

• Beginning the building of the new school, so more children from the nearby town can be educated.
  This money was raising by our VBS in 2013.
• Buying a new stove for the kitchen
• Buying tables and chairs for the dining hall
• Putting metal screens on the kitchen windows to keep out flies
• Installing a wire mesh ceiling onto a store room so it could be used for a small shop that the kids could earn & buy treats for themselves
• Purchasing new toilets for the boys dorms
• Installing ceilings in the bedrooms of the missionary directors' home so they could sleep without scorpions and other bugs falling on them & their children.

The new school classrooms

New toilets for the boys dorms

This was all made possible from the hard work of the teams raising money, and the very generous donations of friends, family and our church.

What's the benefit of us flying down there to do this? Couldn't we send the money?
We could send the money. But going down there provides important extras.

1) We are able to bring extra labor and skills. Honduras is a 3rd world country, and we are able to bring some of our skills to help them.

2) We are able to see the needs first hand, which gives an extra passion to raise more for them.

3) Most importantly, we are lead by the Lord. We are lead to serve them, love them and help them. Yes, the money alone would help them but for them to see people who spend half a year fundraising, give up work vacation (and pay), pray for them and love them... well that's priceless to them. They feel more hope than we can imagine - kids who were abandoned, neglected to live on the streets, to beg for food or join gangs - showing them this passionate care gives them the hope and drive to succeed and hopefully to live for Christ as well.

The kids show their love

If you would like to help, we are having several events in the coming weeks - please come along, or share the details with others!

April 18: Vendor & Craft Show at Thorn Creek UM Church, Rockdale Rd, Butler
May 15/ 16: Rummage Sale at Crossfire, Butler
May 30: Car Wash at Wendy's, Clearview Mall.

Until  May 1: Online flower bulb sales: http://www.flowerpowerfundraising.com/i/t/449941/69rIap8d3EWa

You can also donate directly.

Paypal or Credit Card:

If you don't have a paypal account
you can still use this tab & just pay by card

Check - US Dollars Make checks payable to FUMC, and send to Fannins, PO Box 107, West Sunbury, PA 16061.  Please put HONDURAS - FANNIN on the memo line.
If you would like a tax receipt, please include a return address!

Toilets for Honduras!

Yes, that's right. Toilets. No, I am not doing a weird fundraiser involving the loo.  The Manuelito Project was able to purchase new toilets for the kids' dorms as a result of the wonderful donations to our team's trip last year. How awesome is that!  While the fundraising pays for our tickets down there, it also makes a difference in other ways. Working on the new school, putting up metal bug screens.... and buying toilets!

Thanks to everyone who contributed!

Manuelito Project growth

It's important to share how much the Manueltio Project has grown in just the 13 months since we were last there. Prayers, time, finances, gifts, love have been given and it's always good to know if people are giving in the right ways, if their prayers are being answered, if the money is being spent well. Do they kids even benefit from it?

Here are just a few things I saw in my last visit to the Manuelito Project:

- The children seem to be more content, more mature, more settled. This campus has been in place for about 8 or 9 years, some kids there the whole time, others new. All the kids have suffered, some in terrible ways, and they don't have the resources for professional counseling and therapy. But they are loved and taken care of, and that shows.

- The school has grown in two ways:

•  In addition to the 40 kids living at the project (3 more than last year), they provide schooling for the poorest kids in town - kids who sleep on floors, who collect recycling from garbage so their family can eat, who would otherwise beg on the streets and never see the inside of a school.
  Last year they helped approx 40 of those children, this year they help 74. They come to school & are entered into the appropriate grade. Older children may be put into an accelerated program to cover 2 grades per year. Their education is good - their 8th graders were learning algebra just like ours.
  
  As an aside, I wanted to point out some of the extras that these teachers do. Not only will they stay after school for tutoring, but they will help the children with things they wouldn't get at home - such as the Kindergarten teacher staying back to wash the children's hair after school.
• The new school started to be built this year. Phase 1 will have 5 classrooms. This will accommodate the extra children (currently some classes sit outdoors). The walls are half up already. It's a long process. While we were there 2 builders worked on it, with old building techniques (even whittling fixtures by machete), helped along by us slower non-handy Americans ;)
  This school project began with funds donated by First United Methodist Church, Butler in 2014.
  From November the kids have their 3 month break - I wonder if they will start the new 2015 school year in the new classrooms!

- Health & Hygiene. While we were there last year, Jason began a project of attaching metal screens to the kitchen windows. In the past year other teams continued that project on the cafeteria and the kids' dorms, almost eliminating the flies from the eating areas and the mosquitoes from the bedrooms.

- Food. The kids were always fed a good amount - not what the American teams ate but a staple including tortilla, rice, beans, maybe egg, some meat a few times a week. Breakfast, lunch and dinner where often a combination on those. This year we saw the children eat more variety, the same staples but with additions of fruit salads and fresh vegetables.
Nutrition is so important - some of the children came to the project as teens but look 5 years younger due to poor nutrition.

- Rewards program. A small store was installed (prepped by Jason & Craig in 2013). This sells things like pop, cookies, t-shirts and so on. The volunteer teams use cash to buy from it (and so fund it), and the kids can shop from it with points they earn for good behavior. It is staffed by one of the older girls on the project, Josselin, during lunch and dinner times. The kids love it and it's a great incentive for them to be doing extra chores and working on behavior issues.

- Staff & Volunteers. The Project had a little overhaul of staff, finding teachers, house parents for the dorms and volunteers that are passionate about the work done in the project, that truly care about the future of the kids and that are fully invested in bringing Christ-like love and compassion to their lives.

There are so many more ways that we saw changes in that short time, but these are the ones that stand out to me the most and I hope reassure you, as it did us, that the Project is moving forward in tremendous ways, providing a hope and future to many kids in Honduras.

The light of Christ

Getting to know more of the stories of these kids, one cannot deny the power of God working here. You see the Holy Spirit giving strength alongside the compassion of the volunteers and staff. You see the light of Christ in many of the kids.

It is a place filled with hard working, passionate people who give up luxury and a 'normal' life to give these kids a good hope and future. To let Christ work through them.

It was a greater pleasure, even more than last year, to be here and be part of that. These are not perfect people and they have struggles, but they let God lead them. I am thankful to have had this time with them.

Some of us spent several hours a day working on the new school. No doubt many people could have worked much faster than us, but the Honduran builder Carlos and his helper Eric were so good natured and patient with us, and we found ways to communicate through the language barrier. Carlos is a pastor of a nearyby church and is one example of the great kind of Godly men that the street kids get to have in their lives.

Today we head to Tegucigalpa. It was an emotional farewell for everyone. We built wonderful relationships that I pray we can sustain. 

Sent from my Verizon Wireless 4G LTE smartphone

Passing days

Despite cold showers, burning sun, no coffee and swollen ankles, this is an incredible week.  

Knowing some of the tragic stories of these kids then seeing the love they still have to give and the smiles of joy they have, is a great testament to the wonderful work done here. 

Sent from my Verizon Wireless 4G LTE smartphone

Monday at the project

An amazing day!  The school now takes 114 kids, 74 kids from the nearby town, some walking 5 miles to be there and having classes outside because of lack of space. 

The new school is being built! 

So much great work is done here and it is easy to see the Holy Spirit present. 

Sent from my Verizon Wireless 4G LTE smartphone