Paola is the little girl I sponsor so she can go to a Christian school in Guatemala. Here she is in her brand new school uniform. Thanks Ginny for sending me this precious photo!

Legacy Treasures Kit by Royanna Fritschmann www.divinedigital.com
Fonts: 2peas scrapbook, green pillow

As you know, I have made two trips to Guatemala, most recently this past June with my dad. Due to circumstances I will not go into here, a new ministry has formed to help the same poorest of the poor in Guatemala. It is being spearheaded by Ginny and Kevin Holmes and Randy and Rachel Stauner.

They have some exciting news to share and some ways you can help them. Some of you who’ve been to Guatemala may know Manuel who works with the ministry and his wonderful family. Manuel has officially resigned from The Servant’s Heart and is moving his family into the new home the Holmes/Stauners have rented. Ruth (see below) has also joined them and is hard at work, helping clean the new house and get things ready as this new ministry grows.

They are working on finding sponsors for Manuel’s children, so they can continue with their schooling. His children along with Oscar Tocay’s family are in need of sponsors for school.

This is their immediate need for sponsorships as these children need to start school next week. They will add more kids as they get sponsors, but will not add any more until these are fully sponsored.

Would you be willing to sponsor one or more of these children, or at least pass this information on? 100% of the money coming in will go toward the child’s schooling. No other costs are involved with this. If you cannot commit to sponsoring a child, but would like to make a one-time contribution, that is of course welcome!

Immediate Needs:

*$250 per child for initial registration fees (includes January tuition, books, uniforms and some school supplies)
* 2 sponsors at $30/mo or 1 sponsor at $60/mo per child

If you would like more information, please contact Rachel Holmes Stauner at beachnote@aol.com. She can answer any questions you may have.

Please also keep the Holmes and Stauners and the Guatemalans in your prayers.

Blessings,
Amy

Anywho, here are a couple pages I’ve done recently. I also have a couple fun projects in progress. I can’t wait to show you guys!

ETA:

ooo, and a few other things…

1. holly and I have an exciting project in the works. who knows when we’ll actually finish it, but I promise it will be awesome!
2. I will soon be offering some freelance writing services here… including web-friendly bios and other short copy writing services. Want to see some examples? Click here and here and here. I will be offering some introductory pricing DEALS so stay tuned to my blog for that!
3. Etsy Sale through Sept 1. Most items are 15-30% off! Click here to check it out!
4. I’m totally hooked on the Twilight Series by Stephenie Meyer. Of course, thanks to my Plurk friends!

Font: Papyrus
Frames: Rockstar by DigitalGinger at www.inspiration-lane.com
Beaded embellishments: Lemonade Kit by Holly McCaig at www.inspiration-lane.com
Papers: Down Inspiration Lane Kit by Design Team at www.inspiration-lane.com
Poem: by Gene Hill

Then, the following are a couple of the layouts I made last weekend while on vacation in Minnesota:

All elements: Kate Hadfield, www.the-lilypad.com
Font: Papyrus

Font: Papyrus
Paper, embellishments: Krystal Hartley, www.PolkaDotPotato.com (swirly embellishment altered using Atomic Cupcake acrylic action, papers altered with Atomic Cupcake actions)
Frames: Holly McCaig, www.inspiration-lane.com (swirly frame altered using sparkle action from Atomic Cupcake)

Let’s see… my camera repair (which i thought would be covered under warranty) will actually cost half what I paid for the thing a year ago so I decided to just deal with a camera whose flash isn’t working for the time being. I guess I’ll just use my mom’s P&S or dad’s SLR for now. I had hoped my next electronics purchase would be a new WACOM tablet (so I don’t need to keep my brother’s held hostage) but I guess that will have to wait. At least I got my 500GB external hard drive before I got the camera news. It’s so nice to have the freedom of hard drive space. Esp. since, gasp, my laptop only has a 60GB hard drive. Don’t ask how i’ve pulled that off but now there is no need to clean out the hard drive anymore. Just transfer to the external!!!

Work has been challenging. We were recently sold and just today I finally got some solid information about our benefits package. Now, I at least know how much it will cost per paycheck. However, I still don’t know what doc visit copays or deductible will be. Trying not to freak out about it… but when you get sick or hurt yourself as much as I do, you want to know these things. I also have to figure out what to do with my 401K… eh, I’ll leave that for another day.

I am still working on typing up my Guatemala journal entries and hope to finally post them soon. In case you still haven’t seen my pictures, check them out here.

Speaking of Guatemala, I’m finally doing some digiscrapping and am testing it out with pictures from my trip last month. Here are a couple of my layouts:

As you can see, I’m not really the gawdy throw-a-ton-of-shatty-embellishments-on-a-layout kind of girl. Personally, I think some people go way overboard in their digiscrapping. But I also think that the photos from this trip deserve the opportunity to stand out and speak for themselves.

Let’s see… what else?

Oh, I need to find time to upgrade the blog to the new version of wordpress and FINALLY finish customizing this theme, widgets and linky love in the sidebar.

But I guess that’s it for this post anyways… next up: CHA and COOK!

Click here to see 300+ photos in my flickr set.

I’ll be typing up my journals in the next week or two. stay tuned!

Here’s a couple photos to tide y’all over until I get through the 1000+ my dad and I took last week!

I can’t believe it’s almost here. When I went last July, I promised them I would be coming back this year. I can’t wait to see the friends and fellow brothers/sisters in Christ I met last year… and to form new friendships and bonds that will extend beyond my time here on earth.

I have quite a few things to do in the next week (as team leader, I have to make sure everyone else gets their crap together).

I’m also sort of freaked out because last night when my team was packing up all our supplies/donations for the ministry, everyone basically said that once we get in the car to head to the airport next saturday, they will just do whatever I tell them to do. That’s a HUGE responsibility and I just pray I’m ready to be in charge of 2 13-year-olds, a 17-year-old, and 8 people who are 33-70 years old (including my dad!)