Habitat Update!

I've been meaning to post an update on how our Habitat with Humanity volunteer day went. We worked with a project called a Brush with Kindness, that basically takes homes that are already built and helps fix them up. Our job that day was to do a little roofing action! I (Blanca) was honestly a little scared about getting on the roof at first, but once you get up there, it's not so bad. :) We were split into groups, and some of us laid shingles, while others did prep work.

We had a great time, and the homeowner was there as well, so it was cool to get to meet the person whose house we were helping to fix. I had a great time! Roofing is actually kind of fun! And we got to use really cool tools. :)

We're hoping to continue volunteering with Habitat twice a year.

Thanks to those of you who volunteered!

And sorry I have no pictures to post...it's funny how i'm a photographer, and yet I always seem to forget to bring my camera along when I'm not working...

IJM Fundraiser

A few of us will be hosting a silent auction/benefit concert this Saturday, November 15, featuring performances by Cecilia Vergara, Ashlynn Walker, and Thomas Q. Brady. (yeah!!) We will be auctioning off and selling bags from Thailand and Indonesia, as well as other fun journals, jewelry and accessories. All proceeds benefit International Justice Mission, "a human rights agency that secures justice for victims of slavery, sexual exploitation and other forms of violent oppression." (you can visit their website at www.ijm.org) The benefit will be held at Blanca, Liz, and Renee's house - 1704 Winsted Lane - from 2-5pm. I encourage you guys to stop by, check out the cool items for sale, and listen to some awesome music!!

(click on image to view it bigger)

OCC

Hey everyone,
Just a little heads up, Operation Christmas Child is only 6 weeks away. Start collecting those shoeboxes! We are hoping to have a get together time to hang out and put together shoeboxes in November before the Nov 23rd deadline. If you need a refresher as to what to collect/buy and more about the project go to http://www.samaritanspurse.org/index.php/OCC/index/

Call+Response

"CALL+RESPONSE is a first of its kind feature documentary film that reveals the world's 27 million dirtiest secrets: there are more slaves today than ever before in human history. CALL+RESPONSE goes deep undercover where slavery is thriving from the child brothels of Cambodia to the slave brick kilns of rural India to reveal that in 2007, Slave Traders made more money than Google, Nike and Starbucks combined."

The movie is playing at Cinemark Tinseltown 17 on Stassney the week of Oct 17-24th. It already sold out a night of shows at the Dobbie Theater on Thursday. A few of us are planning on seeing the 8pm show on Monday the 20th or Wednesday the 22nd. Let me (michelebennett@gmail.com) know if you are interested and want to join us.

For trailers and more info: http://www.callandresponse.com/trailer.html
and http://www.whatsyourresponse.com/ and http://www.callandresponse.com

Habitat for Humanity!

Just a heads up that we are signed up to volunteer with Habitat for Humanity on October 25. It will be an all day thing...8-4 I believe... They won't know any more details for us until the week of.. If you're interested in signing up, please email me or Michele. We will also have a sign up at church beginning the first week in October.

Blood Donations!

Just a reminder that next Sunday, Sept 21, at 10:30am, we will be donating blood at the Blood & Tissue Center of Central Texas, located at 4300 North Lamar. I know for me personally, it's always nice to have support from a friends when I'm doing something like this...I'm a big chicken when it comes to needles... We had a great turnout last year, and are hoping that you all can join us again this year. You must make an appointment online at www.bloodandtissue.org. We are also planning on having lunch together afterwards before heading off to church. Please feel free to contact me (ilikeyoursocks@gmail.com) or Michele (michelebennett@gmail.com) if you have any questions.

Please join us as we help saves lives!!!

Taken from the center's website:

Each year, The Blood Center of Central Texas needs to collect over 55,000 blood donations in order to have blood products available for as many as 150,000 area patients.

International Justice Mission

A group of us were talking last week about this tour and International Justice Mission so I figured I'd post this here as it does go along with serving. You can find out more about International Justice Mission at http://www.ijm.org/ but here is a blurb off their website as to what they do: "International Justice Mission is a human rights agency that secures justice for victims of slavery, sexual exploitation and other forms of violent oppression. IJM lawyers, investigators and aftercare professionals work with local officials to ensure immediate victim rescue and aftercare, to prosecute perpetrators and to promote functioning public justice systems."

And a group of artists are doing a tour where 90% of the proceeds go to IJM. You can find more about the tour at http://www.myspace.com/artmusicjustice . The closest they are coming to here is Houston. So now you are in the know AND you can download a sampler of the artists music below. Or go to www.noisetrade.com to download it and a ton of other music (legally). For some reason it seems to work better on firefox or safari.

LL Party

WHOA! The date got moved up without my knowledge. If anyone wants to bake cookies or rice krispie treats or something like that (finger food, not too messy) than let Blanca or me know as soon as you can. We will need them by THIS Sunday as the Party is MONDAY NIGHT the 25th. Thanks team.

This Fall

I know we don't update this very often. Sorry about that. We kind of took a little break over the summer but we are back. This fall we are planning a variety of serving opportunities. We'll have more details later but here's what we are looking at so far.

August 25 - bake stuff for the Longhorn Life Party
Sept 21- Give Blood at 10:30am then go for lunch
Oct - Habitat for Humanity hopefully
November 22 (date may change) - something special :0)~
November 23 - Operation Christmas Child
December 13 - Central Texas Food Bank

Groovy. Hope y'all can join us.

Austin Pregnancy Center

For Mothers Day we donated goods to the Pregnancy Center. Thanks all for helping out with that! I'll need Heidi to give ya'll a better update. :0)~

Austin One April 12th

Register for AustinONE Saturday, April 12! Sign up to be a part of God's plan of restoration and freedom. (I got that off the website :0)~ Register online at www.austinone.org where you can get all the information you need. It is an all day "event" but the service projects are from 1-5pm and then there is dinner afterwards. A few of us Liveoakers did it last year. It's great to work beside believers from all over Austin helping out the community.

Here is their project list for this year:
Paint at Austin Brethren Church
Painting at Glory House
Repairs and yard work at Mrs. Ivory's
Repairs and yard work at Mrs. Hart's House
Activities with Children
Austin Pregnancy Resource Center
Clothing Drive
Curb Painting

You can go to the website (http://www.austinone.org/) to signup, view a little slideshow (you might recognize a couple people), or for more info. Groovy.

Habitat

So, last Saturday 6 of us pulled ourselves out of bed and drove down to the eastside to help fix up a house with Habitat for Humanity. It went well. Nathan and Laura helped demolish a carport that needed to come down and Liz, Karina, Katelyn (how does she spell it), and I hauled some debris and painted (primed actually) the shed. It ended up being a 1/2 day of work instead of all day so then we all went to Juan in a Million for lunch. Groovy.
Nathan being cut in half by the carport (or so it would appear). Also Nathan was using the hammer as a pick axe or something and not really trying to hammer with the wrong end.
Nathan looking very handyman like.

The girls painting. We didn't have rollers for a while so we started with brushes. Not the fastest way to paint a shed.
We also didn't have the proper painting containers but we made do.
Laura found a coffee can.
then we got rollers. yeah.
and here is the freaky big furry moth we found on the side of the house. It was about 5 inches across.

Woohoo - New Projects

We have two projects coming up that YOU want to be involved in. :0)~ The first is working with Habitat for Humanity on March 15 from 8-4pm (http://www.austinhabitat.org/) And the second project is with AustinOne (http://www.austinone.org/) on April 12 which the service projects are 1-5pm but the "event" is all day. So, roll up your shelves and get involved helping the community. More info on both of those projects coming soon.

Also stay tuned for more fun projects like Giving Blood. he-he. Oh, and we did have a few people give to Heifer International and I think we bought like half a cow with our $77 which got quadrupled to $308. I like my steak medium rare. ok, thats mean. Plus I think we provided a dairy cow and they won't be eating it. Did you know that rams are boy sheep? How did I make it this far in my life without putting that together?

Give A Cow

A "save the world" club at Katie Robinson's school is collecting money for Heifer International (http://www.heifer.org). It's a humanitarian organization that is working to end hunger and poverty and to care for the earth (according to their mission statement). One of their projects is providing livestock - cows, goats, sheep, etc - to families and through the animal teaching them to care and sustain themselves and help the community. I've heard of the organization and I thought it sounded groovy (yes, I've researched them also and they are for real). What's even MORE groovy is that an organization is matching what the school raises and then someone else is matching that so for every $1000 raised, $4000 will be given to Heifer International. Now I am not great at math but that sounds like quite a return! (ok, I am actually decent at math.) Anyway - just wanted to make you aware of this opportunity to help out our neighbors in need. I'll have a cow can at church with me on Sunday (2/10) if any of you would like to give. The school deadline is next week so we'll just be collecting this weekend.

-m


Heifer envisions…A world of communities living together in peace and equitably sharing the resources of a healthy planet.

Heifer's mission is…To work with communities to end hunger and poverty and to care for the earth.

Heifer's strategy is…To "pass on the gift." As people share their animals' offspring with others – along with their knowledge, resources, and skills – an expanding network of hope, dignity, and self-reliance is created that reaches around the globe.