Juggling priorities

I have been busy today preparing stuff for sewing. Bob is out all day Saturday so I may move the machines downstairs then and take over the dining table. Anyway, I have been cutting out pencil rolls and juggling bags.

Here are the pieces for the juggling bags - which will be made up into sets [a drawstring bag containing three small rice-filled bags, plus instructions on 'How to Juggle'] And here are the pieces for the pencil rolls - which will each contain 12 coloured pencils and fasten with a ribbon tie.

I am making these for the Coffee Morning my friend Alyson is organising for Tom and Alex Gill.These two brothers are going out to Tanzania this summer,to help develop some sports facilities in the village which Tom visited last summer, when he was working with the Leicester Diocese. They need to raise a fair bit of money,so I hope my stuff will sell!

I made quite a few of these before Christmas, when I had a Craft Evening in support of the Mizpah Orphanage in Ootacamund - here are the juggling bags I made then. Another of our young people, Elizabeth Toon, teaches in the Hebron School in Ooty, and through her, our church has forged a link with Mizpah. When Elizabeth's parents visited her at Christmas, they took lots of photos. I was really thrilled to see a picture of an Indian child trying to juggle with three of my bags!

These are some of the pencil rolls I made in November. I did some with half-length crayons, but they did not sell so well. I am just sticking to the ordinary long crayons this time.

I think it is great that these young people are so willing to give their time to go abroad and work with others like this, and I believe it is important to encourage them, and support them both financially and prayerfully. Such opportunities weren't really available thirty five years ago when I was a student - and I am not sure I would have had the confidence to do it then anyway!

Such trips do seem to be very worthwhile though. Elizabeth went out to Hebron initially as a volunteer, and has now returned as a full member of staff. Our Steph spent the summer of 2005 in Sao Paolo, Brazil, working in the favelas with the street children, and I know how much she has benefited from the experience.

I have just sponsored Steph as she is doing the Race for Life next month. She just phoned to say she had been training for it after work.

Too many people seem too ready to dismiss young people as self-obsessed and materialistic, spending all their time with Playstations and Facebook, texting each other and shopping. It is thrilling that young Christians like Steph, Elizabeth, Alex and Tom are actually out there serving others and putting their faith into practice.