Here we are on the eve of another new year, ripe with possibilities. There are so many things we can count on experiencing in 2013. There will be surprises, tragedies, and triumphs. There will be love and there will be loss. Some things we will be able to control, and some things we will not. I am not making resolutions this year, but I AM making some wishes, the way children make wishes, with all of their hearts, and my wishes are for YOU (and for me too). Here goes… image credit: from artist Lisa Congdon’s 365 Days of Lettering Bravery. I wish for you the guts to pursue whatever it is that calls you, without delay. Life is short, and a rewarding life demands courage. An ability to let go of worry and embrace the unknown. A life without anxiety is a much better life. If you can remain calm and open, you’ll be better able to cope with whatever challenges you face, and you won’t waste your energy worrying about hypothetical problems. Self-acceptance. Trying to be something you’re not is exhausting. I wish for you the freedom to feel comfortable in your own skin and to stop judging [...]
About a year ago I embarked on an exciting new project that would be different from anything I had ever done before. My goal was to create a special dress to raise money for a very effective, life-changing charity called Canada Mathare Education Trust (CMETrust.org), and the dress at the centre of that project was called The Love Dress. The dress was launched in March 2012, and was featured in Canadian Family Magazine, ParentsCanada Magazine, and on the morning show Cityline. A few of my wonderful stores: Planet Kid, Elm Hill Kids, Kid Culture and 100 Mile Child created special displays to promote The Love Dress, featuring beautiful posters that were designed by graphic designer Eric Parker, and printed by Lamin-8 Services in Toronto, both of whom generously donated these services. CMETrust promoted the dress through its own channels, and a great many people helped spread the word. “Making Love” feature in Canadian Family magazine The cheque is off to CMETrust this week, and I want to say a heartfelt thank you to everyone who has supported this project in one way or another. I hope it’s helped to spread the word about this amazing charity, so that the [...]
Nine years ago today, I met my daughter Samantha. Meeting your daughter in an office building in China is a tiny bit different from giving birth. She was 9.5 months old, and not happy to be there. She had just been driven for four hours in the arms of an orphanage worker to meet her new parents, who probably looked to her like space aliens. Her first few minutes in my arms were spent crying and pushing against my chest. Her clothes were soaked with pee from a bursting diaper, and snot was pouring out of her nose. I cried too. I don’t know what I felt more strongly – love or empathy. Sam cried and cried, with a determined persistence that I would soon learn is a hallmark of her personality. I knew that this was a very healthy reaction, and was grateful to see her tears even as I tried to calm them. When Sam finally stopped crying, she became very quiet and looked around her intently to assess the situation. By the following morning she was laughing. Her transformation was stunning and quick. Here’s a photo of her the day after we met, right after we signed [...]
For about a year, I have been working on a special project. You know how sometimes an idea pops into your head, and you wonder “Could I really do that?” This is one of those. I am frequently asked to donate dresses to charities, mostly for silent auction fundraisers. My customers have causes that they care deeply about, and they ask, so I give. It’s easy. But sometimes we want to do meaningful things that are not so easy, that require thought, investment, time and risk. And sometimes a cause or an organization strikes our heart in a different, more persistent way. The Canada Mathare Education Trust felt like that to me. It’s a secular, volunteer-run, registered Canadian charity that provides high school scholarships for children living in the Mathare Valley slum in Nairobi. Mathare is one of the largest and most impoverished slums in Kenya, and most of its 800,000 residents live on less than a dollar a day. Thanks to the opportunities CMETrust provides, kids who would otherwise not have access to a high school education are thriving, and several graduates are now starting university. The students are seizing these opportunities, working hard, and taking on leadership roles [...]
First in a series of tributes to some of the amazing people I’ve met on my Red Thread journey. Many people are very comfortable with the status quo. Especially when we’re busy raising families, it’s hard to look beyond our everyday responsibilities and embrace broader challenges. But that’s exactly what Alison Fraser chose to do, creating life-changing impact for a group of children and young women in rural Tanzania, a world away from her home in Cambridge, Ontario. The story of Salome, a young mother of two, was moving and inspiring to Alison. Salome is currently completing high school, fully funded by Mom2Mom Africa. A full-time environmental toxicologist and mother of three young daughters, Alison doesn’t have a lot of spare time on her hands. But for the past few years she’s built a project called Mom2Mom Africa (http://www.mom2momafrica.ca/) that’s grown from an annual book and school supplies drive into a community fundraising project that’s been paying for the education of 11 children and 4 young women in Tanzania. Most of the money is raised through an annual event she holds in her backyard! This year’s event was held last weekend, featuring lots of live music and an impressive silent [...]
Here we are on the eve of another new year, ripe with possibilities. There are so many things we can count on experiencing in 2013. There will be surprises, tragedies, and triumphs. There will be love and there will be loss. Some things we will be able to control, and some things we will not. I am not making resolutions this year, but I AM making some wishes, the way children make wishes, with all of their hearts, and my wishes are for YOU (and for me too). Here goes… image credit: from artist Lisa Congdon’s 365 Days of Lettering Bravery. I wish for you the guts to pursue whatever it is that calls you, without delay. Life is short, and a rewarding life demands courage. An ability to let go of worry and embrace the unknown. A life without anxiety is a much better life. If you can remain calm and open, you’ll be better able to cope with whatever challenges you face, and you won’t waste your energy worrying about hypothetical problems. Self-acceptance. Trying to be something you’re not is exhausting. I wish for you the freedom to feel comfortable in your own skin and to stop judging [...]
About a year ago I embarked on an exciting new project that would be different from anything I had ever done before. My goal was to create a special dress to raise money for a very effective, life-changing charity called Canada Mathare Education Trust (CMETrust.org), and the dress at the centre of that project was called The Love Dress. The dress was launched in March 2012, and was featured in Canadian Family Magazine, ParentsCanada Magazine, and on the morning show Cityline. A few of my wonderful stores: Planet Kid, Elm Hill Kids, Kid Culture and 100 Mile Child created special displays to promote The Love Dress, featuring beautiful posters that were designed by graphic designer Eric Parker, and printed by Lamin-8 Services in Toronto, both of whom generously donated these services. CMETrust promoted the dress through its own channels, and a great many people helped spread the word. “Making Love” feature in Canadian Family magazine The cheque is off to CMETrust this week, and I want to say a heartfelt thank you to everyone who has supported this project in one way or another. I hope it’s helped to spread the word about this amazing charity, so that the [...]
Nine years ago today, I met my daughter Samantha. Meeting your daughter in an office building in China is a tiny bit different from giving birth. She was 9.5 months old, and not happy to be there. She had just been driven for four hours in the arms of an orphanage worker to meet her new parents, who probably looked to her like space aliens. Her first few minutes in my arms were spent crying and pushing against my chest. Her clothes were soaked with pee from a bursting diaper, and snot was pouring out of her nose. I cried too. I don’t know what I felt more strongly – love or empathy. Sam cried and cried, with a determined persistence that I would soon learn is a hallmark of her personality. I knew that this was a very healthy reaction, and was grateful to see her tears even as I tried to calm them. When Sam finally stopped crying, she became very quiet and looked around her intently to assess the situation. By the following morning she was laughing. Her transformation was stunning and quick. Here’s a photo of her the day after we met, right after we signed [...]
For about a year, I have been working on a special project. You know how sometimes an idea pops into your head, and you wonder “Could I really do that?” This is one of those. I am frequently asked to donate dresses to charities, mostly for silent auction fundraisers. My customers have causes that they care deeply about, and they ask, so I give. It’s easy. But sometimes we want to do meaningful things that are not so easy, that require thought, investment, time and risk. And sometimes a cause or an organization strikes our heart in a different, more persistent way. The Canada Mathare Education Trust felt like that to me. It’s a secular, volunteer-run, registered Canadian charity that provides high school scholarships for children living in the Mathare Valley slum in Nairobi. Mathare is one of the largest and most impoverished slums in Kenya, and most of its 800,000 residents live on less than a dollar a day. Thanks to the opportunities CMETrust provides, kids who would otherwise not have access to a high school education are thriving, and several graduates are now starting university. The students are seizing these opportunities, working hard, and taking on leadership roles [...]
First in a series of tributes to some of the amazing people I’ve met on my Red Thread journey. Many people are very comfortable with the status quo. Especially when we’re busy raising families, it’s hard to look beyond our everyday responsibilities and embrace broader challenges. But that’s exactly what Alison Fraser chose to do, creating life-changing impact for a group of children and young women in rural Tanzania, a world away from her home in Cambridge, Ontario. The story of Salome, a young mother of two, was moving and inspiring to Alison. Salome is currently completing high school, fully funded by Mom2Mom Africa. A full-time environmental toxicologist and mother of three young daughters, Alison doesn’t have a lot of spare time on her hands. But for the past few years she’s built a project called Mom2Mom Africa (http://www.mom2momafrica.ca/) that’s grown from an annual book and school supplies drive into a community fundraising project that’s been paying for the education of 11 children and 4 young women in Tanzania. Most of the money is raised through an annual event she holds in her backyard! This year’s event was held last weekend, featuring lots of live music and an impressive silent [...]