Stamp out Hunger Food Drive-National Association of Letter Carriers

Wow, that is a mouthful for the title of this blog post…but, it is what it says it is.  The National Association of Letter Carriers have committed themselves once again to their annual food drive.   They do this to help combat hunger.  In the last two years in the United States, more than 50 million people have found themselves living in homes that don’t have enough food.  This is outrageous, we can all do something to help.  No one should go hungry in a country that supplies other nations with food from our surplus produce that farmers work so hard to grow.

You may say, I am only one person…what can i do?  You can support the National Association of Letter Carriers help stamp out hunger by leaving a bag at your mail box, on Saturday May 14, 2011, with non-perishable food items.  That is only 2 days from now.   Make sure that the items you are donating are not out of date or in danger of expiring any time soon.   Don’t have a lot to give; give what you can.  If you are blessed enough to have the means to give…give generously; we all have a responsibility to share our blessings with others.

Support businesses and organizations that sponsor the annual Stamp Out Hunger food drive.  This is an amazing grass roots program that blesses your local food banks.  All the food collected by your local mail carrier stays in your local area.  The people you help may be your own friends, family or neighbors. With the economy being so challenging in recent years more people are affected by not having enough to eat.  The numbers of children in homes without enough food is rising.  The elderly are having a harder time making ends meet.  Young wage earners are finding themselves without steady income to support their families sufficiently.   Natural disasters have hurt many families and those people still need to eat.  Churches can’t do it all…they need our help to provide food for those who are struggling with hunger!  Won’t you help?

Would you like to learn more?  Visit their website here:  Stamp Out Hunger and if you happen to have a Facebook account or a Twitter account…then Like them or Follow them to lend your support.  Spread the work online and off.  Tell others about the food drive…encourage others to donate.

Remember to thank your mail carrier.  They are dedicated to helping people stamp out hunger in your community.   Do you know someone who has had to use food from a food pantry or food bank?  Tell them about my friend Connie who heads up a website that teaches people how to eat healthier with the food that they bring into their homes through SNAP, food pantries, commodities, and farmer’s markets.  She does this in a way to help people stretch their budgets and to encourage the people who visit her website to form a community to share tips and ideas with one another.  Her site isn’t just for food stamp users…but for anyone on a tight budget who wants and needs to eat well.  Food Stamp Cooking Club

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Business Friends Help Kids With Cancer And Their Families

 

 

 

Business Friends Help Kids With Cancer And Their Families Feb 16th, 2011 by Rainy Friends Like Us is a wonderful nonprofit that reaches out to families of children who have been diagnosed with cancer. What they do for families goes over and above just sending those children a cuddly bear to hold when they are scared, lonely and needing something to cling to while they go through treatment for a disease that they don’t understand; even though, Friends Like Us does do that too.

The extra mile is what this organization does provide. They often listen to a parent, of a young cancer patient, express their fears, anxieties and questions about what to expect when cancer hits their family. Mark and Deloris Bailey, founders of the organization know what it is like as they have been in that position when their son was diagnosed and treated for cancer. So they created Friends Like Us to meet the needs of young cancer patients by providing them with a chemo bear.

This chemo bear comes with a medical bag which has tools that doctors and nurses can use to help explain treatments and procedures that the young child may be having to go through. It is a wonderful tool. This chemo bear even may have a port just like the child and can have it removed in a bear clinic when the child has his or her port removed. In the meantime, the bear can be of service when the child is at it most vulnerable going through tests or long lonely nights in the hospital.

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Raise The Standards

Do you ever look around you and become discouraged by the standards with which people live their lives either in business, or on a personal level?  I am a people watcher  by nature.  I can’t help it.  It seems to me that as a society we are slipping in the area of personal conduct; we need to raise the standards of acceptable behavior.  Not only do people not treat each other well, they often don’t expect to be treated well themselves.  A lot of that is due to the fact that many people don’t even realize or accept the fact that they deserve to be treated better and everyone else is just going their own way.

It has become a way of life to do what feels good at the moment and not worry about having a high standard of conduct.  Live and let live…don’t make waves…be politically correct at all times; even at the cost of what you believe to be the appropriate conduct, right?  Wrong…lowering the standards of acceptable behavior can lead to… If you would like to finish reading this post click here: Writewhereyouare

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Carnage-Evil, Detached, Loners-Glorified Acts Of Violence

When are people going to wake up to the fact that we need to stop allowing instances of evil and violence to be glorified on television, movies, books and in our music?  Isn’t it obvious that the world has been turning this garbage into “entertainment” and that it is having a terrible influence on our society?  Today there was two distinctive situations that destroyed lives that is shockingly cruel in the fact that the victims of violence were totally innocent.

A nursing home in Carthage, North Carolina has 8 dead people , 7 residents and a nurse, because a young man came into the nursing home and started shooting at people.  The reason is unclear at this point.  It is alleged that his estranged wife works at this nursing home although that is not confirmed.   An unprovoked attack on innocent people that would have been much worse had it not been for the heroic actions of a 25 year old police officer who was able to stop the shooter.   While the news media covers these terrible bursts of violence…we must learn to carefully balance how these things are addressed in the media; so that they do not become gloried examples for those with similar thoughts.

Another equally upsetting situation; an ex-con attacks his sisters and kills two of them…one a five year old child on her birthday.  He kills his 17 year old sister by brutally stabbing her…then, he goes after the five year old and decapitates her as the police come in.  She is found near her birthday cake.     The nine year old sister had called the officers…some how she was stabbed as well; she is in the hospital with injuries.  Not only has she been injured, she lost members of her family and she has to live with the images of death and violence.  This brother was clearly a person out of control; it was alleged that he had some kind of a run-in with a neighbor the evening before as well.

We have people who dont know how to resolve their personal problems…committing violence and killing innocent people.  We have loners, and mentally ill people who do not get treatment.   Our economy is so tight that those who desperately need mental health treatment do not get it because of cost.  We need to seriously consider spending more money for preventative well-care programs for people at risk for such behaviors.

I would really like to see people stop supporting slasher/shoot them up shows and movies with their dollars.  These type of entertainments only serve to encourage those who are bent on venting their anger and revenge or for those who are mentally unstable on taking out their rage on innocent people.  How do you protect yourself and your loved ones from random violence?  It is impossible.   Is anyone else sick and tired of these things  happening in schools, shopping malls, nursing homes and colleges, etc?

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Christmas Cookies & Grandkids

        Today is a day that I have been looking forward to.  I get to travel some distance to go see my daughter and grandchildren.  I have promised them their first experience of making Christmas cookies with Grandma. 

         They are only 2 & 3 years old…so this will be fun.  Momma is on bed rest due to pregnancy.  So we will take a try over to her and let her help decorate once they are baked.

         The only thing better would be to get to do this also with my other grandchildren who live out of state.  This makes me blue because i would love to do the same wonderful thing with them.  Those grandchildren are a bit older and so the experience would be a bit more artistic.  Maybe next year Grandma will get to see them during Christmas. 

          In the meantime…we are going to enjoy Christmas, cookies, and the gift of Grandchildren! 

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Snow Day

Just a little white blanket to dress things up!

      Depending on your view of a snow day, that probably tells me about your age, unless,  you are an excitable kid at heart.  Many adults find it hard to remember the extreme joy of a snow day.  Adults get bogged down in the difficulty of driving in it, the danger of slipping on the snow and ice, the cost of heating their homes, and the inconvience of having heavy snow and ice removed from the sidewalk and the driveway.  It’s not that those aren’t legitimate concerns…but, there is another side to a snow day; do you remember?

 

         Kids, on the other hand, look at the rare snow day as a gift from God!  LOL   A sn0w day is like a reprieve from death row (school) to a kid.   It is a day filled with endless possiblities, such as: sledding, ice skating, snow boarding, making snow angels, building a snowman, skiing, snowshoeing, snowmobiling, cross-country skiing, ice fishing, throwing snowballs…in other words…having a blast in the white stuff.

         Thinking about the pristine, sparkly white snow; glittering on the surface of the trees and homes…what beautiful photos that would make.  Send a photo to your friends, in other warmer states, who don’t get to enjoy the fluffy, white blanket that covers everything as far as  the eyes can see.

         So, depending on where you live; what will you do with your next “snow day”.  Today, hmmmmm…it is full of possibilities to the kid in all of us.  Maybe even for some of us older kids…it might just include snuggling up with a comforting cup of  frothy, hot chocolate; and, reliving some of yesterday’s memories of  OUR favorite snow day! 

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If At First You Don’t Succeed…Try, Try, and Try Again

     On the celeb newsfront, the word is that Pamela Anderson and her ex-Tommy Lee are back together again…giving it another try.  Most of you will probably remember that they have given their relationship, a try or two; but, they seem to be like fireworks…burning hot one minute and exploding the next.  They were married in back in 1995 but it didn’t last…they two sons together.  They continue to orbit one another…drawn to each other over and over again…only to be pulled apart.   I think their relationship truly embodies the old saying, if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again!

       They have each gone on to have headline making relationships with partners like Kid Rock, Heather Locklear, and Rick Soloman.  There have been brushes with the law over domestic violence; a much viewed and talked about video of their intimate relationship, and a child’s accidental death at their young son’s pool birthday party.   Both Tommy and Pam have  hepatitis.  Through it all, they have continued to come back to each other. 

     Let’s hope that they are able to make it work this time because it must cause devastation to their sons to keep getting their hopes up about their parents staying together, only to go through another seperation.  Best of luck in this attempt at another chance of peace and love.

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A Good Cause

         It’s a good cause; if i have heard that phrase once, i have heard it a million times.  How do you know if a cause is good enough to support.  Hmmmmmmmmm…you really dont.  🙂  You have to trust your own instincts.   How is that for clarity? 

         With the economy being so depressed and everyone feeling the pinch…schools, churches, communities, and organizations are pulling out all the stops when it comes to fundraising.

          Every young child that comes to get you to purchase a non-essential item to help fund a band booster program,  scouts needing to sell more and more items each year to provide a positive influence on the girls , communities trying to fund activity centers to keep kids off the streets and out of trouble, the groups fighting a debilitating illness or disease; the list goes on and on, and the needs of each group or individual are no less important than the one before them.

         What it really comes down to is, that most of these causes are good ones, it is true.  So, how do you decide where to throw your own dwindling funds?  Personally, i have to make a judgement call; which cause most affects those that i care about? 

          Often, i have to remind myself that those causes don’t just need MONEY; they volunteers, organizers, fundraisers, problem solvers etc.  So, if lack of money is an issue…maybe there is another way you can support the “Good Cause”.  Don’t just file the request in the back of your to do list…get creative if the cause pulls at your heart strings; make a commitment…find another way to “donate to the cause” whatever that cause may be!

       

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Bathing Beauties

        Our two new pups became bathing beauties today.  They did not appreciate the experience!  LOL  Evidently (they are only 6 weeks old), they have had the pleasure of a bath before because, they started whinning as soon as they saw the tub of water.

         They are adorable black lab mixed dogs.  By nature they should love water.   The pups then thought it was a house of torture to be toweled; and then fluffed with the hair dryer on the lowest setting.  Their hair just shines now.  Such pretty babies they are.

          It was absolutely entertaining watching them then, put their heads down and push their shoulders and whatever other body parts they could along on the carpet and the edge of the couch in an attempt to dry off more and get comfortable again.

           The kids loved being their heros after the experience by cuddling and laughing at them as they snuggled in for comfort.

           I can’t say much for the smell of wet dog except to say that on the kids movie, Monster’s Inc, when they talk about putting on stinky under arm “orderant” called wet dog everyone knows exactly the smell they are talking about.  Not very pleasant…good thing they are absolutely cute puppies!

          It is too bad puppies can’t stay so adorable as they age.  They will have their own adorability as they age but there is nothing like a baby puppy to entertain and warm your heart with their antics!

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Holiday Traditions

       I was talking with my adult daughter today about tradtions.  Now that she and her husband have two small children under the age of three; they are looking to create some family traditions.

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