Thank you, thank you, thank you...

Thanks to all of my amazingly generous friends and family, my fundraising (to-date) is at $1,051.26!! I can't thank you enough for the support you've all given me... and I hope I can continue to raise money for this special cause. I'm almost half-way to my goal... so please find it in your heart to donate what you can.

During our group meeting last week, we kinda got an overall idea of what this trip is going to be about. I keep thinking of the little kids we'll be meeting at the newly developed pre-school in Arequipa, and all of the other families that get by with so little. I'm hoping to be able to take with me a bag full of supplies to distribute to these families and to the school, and I'm hoping some of you might know of a supplier that would be generous enough to want to donate. Items I'm looking for include:

-toothbrushes
-hair combs
-pencils
-packs of gum
-stickers

Anything I take with me will need to be lightweight and easy to pack. Medical supplies might also be taken down with us, but as you can imagine it's difficult to get through customs with bags of syringes and such. :)

SIX weeks and counting...

I got to meet Dr. Gehringer this week, along with the rest of the IMPACT Peru team from Affinity. What a great group of people!! I'm officially getting really excited about this trip and can't believe it's only six weeks away! Big change coming from my end... I'll be going about this mission on my own. We decided that because of a few personal snaffoos along with the difficulties in arranging childcare and so on, Troy will be staying back and I'll be taking on this adventure by myself. Well, that is, in the great company of my IMPACT Peru team, of course!

Now that this mission is finally becoming a reality, I need to really kick up the FUNDRAISING!! I appreciate all of the donations that have come in so far, but I've got a long way to go to raise my new goal of $2300! YIKES! (doesn't help that airfare has gone up a bit since our first estimated trip cost... boo!).

PLEASE CONSIDER DONATING... no amount is too small. Every little bit helps toward this amazing opportunity and worthwhile mission project!! You can donate online using the button to the right. It's completely safe (trust me, I tried it - donated to myself!) and it goes directly into my PayPal account, which will be used to pay my travel fees and housing. If you're not comfortable with that, there's always snail mail (email me and I'll send you my home address).

Finally, my new passport arrived!!

Well, I was happy to see in the mail a week or so ago my brand new shiny passport finally arrived. New name, new hair color and all...

Time is certainly flying by, we're down to just over seven weeks until the mission. I'm starting to get a little nervous, but that's mostly because I haven't traveled out of country in a while. I keep telling myself I should brush up on my espanol a bit before I leave, but much like everything else on my list of things to do, I'm forced to prioritize what's REALLY important for the day (shower, work, kids, meals, cleaning, etc, etc). Ahhhh... if only I could find more free time!

Our first meeting with Dr. Gehringer is next Wednesday. I'm excited to get together with our mission team and find out more details on the trip. I don't recognize any of their names but I'm sure we'll all end up sharing some special bond at the end of it all.

That's pretty much all the latest news I have... but stay tuned as we get closer to departure!