So, I took a little leave of absence...

Wipe those brows, I've returned to blog-dom. In my attempts to cure "Senioritis", the blog got thrown to the wayside, but my attempts were unsuccessful and I have returned. Most importantly I am here to tell you about my Haiti project, it is FINALLY under way! I am about to send out my first support letter (I want to and will be sending it to everyone, because I want everyone to know about it not because I expect everyone to donate...is that necessary to say, I hope its implied...)

Heres a blurb about my project from the letter...

"The Agricultural Reinvestment Initiative is a program with two main goals; to boost the economy and provide food to the hungry. First, the project will boost the Haitian economy by investing money in local farmers in the areas of Gonaives, located in the center of Haiti, and in areas around Cap-Haitien on the northern shore. Our goals are to eventually make the farmers self-sustainable by providing start up support and a buyer for their product (us). Over time we will decrease our investment as we establish buyers for their product.  These “buyers” will eventually be new businesses. By putting an increasing number of people back to work, we will aid in bettering their lifestyle and it will increase their purchasing power to further stimulate the local economies. Second, the food grown by these farmers and purchased by us will be distributed free through churches and clinics to the malnourished population of Haiti within these communities."

 Do I sound formal, adult-like, and clear? I'm so excited. I am also in the first steps to applying for a grant from SLU, its called the "Big Ideas Grant"... I have to attend various 'idea-developing' workshops throughout the year and then at the end I apply against other students for one of the two $2000 grants...wouldn't that be amazing to get this off the ground!

The name is still in the works; the working title is more descriptive of the project rather than being catchy or creative. The letter explains it so much better, maybe I should just put that up here? Isn't it more fun getting snail mail though?  (Its always refreshing to open something that is NOT a bill, growing up you never expected those things to come so often! My dad is currently laughing at me and incredibly thankful I am not saying that about credit card bills)

So, that is where a lot of my time has been invested (I suppose school work could be in there, too). Oh...AND, our friend, Tommy, is on a bowling league and asked Rachel and I to go with him one night. Somehow I offered to score that night (its a bowling alley from 1929 that hasn't changed...so theres NO automatic scoring). And since I could reference my handy-dandy Magnificat education where we learned to score bowling in gym, I leaped for the job ( because my ACTUAL bowling skills are definitely sub-par).  So, I am now on the team as an official scorer...

We got shirts.

From New Album 9/20/08 6:11 PM

The girls of the team (Me, Rach, Mary, and Cat)

And (obviously) the scorer would win the raffel that night.

[I look almost frightened (or frightening) by my excitement...]

From New Album 9/20/08 6:11 PM

Have a great day!!!