Have you ever just looked at the world around you and though – yuck.

However, we have a future to look towards, and prayers are the only thing that can get us through.  We must find some goodness in every day in order to get by, because the world is so full of ugliness.

I look to my children.  My beautiful children.  I feel so blessed to be able to be their mom.  Kids will be kids, they all have bad moments  (we all do) in which they need to learn from.  But overall, I’ve been blessed with some amazing kids.

Today I’m going to share a story about my eldest daughter.

At a young age, I could see a sensitivity to her; a gentle heart, an empathetic spirit.  A person of those qualities are precious, but can be broken so easily.  I should know, I’m one of them.   I’ve found it important to give her opportunities to let those traits develop, because there is a fine line between leader and a boss; a fine line between caring and giving, and being taken advantage of.

When she began middle school this year, I encouraged her to join every club she could.  Give a it a try, go to a few meetings, and she if it was a fit.  She’s loved everything that she’s been a part of.  Particularly, she’s found great friends and connections in the Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA) and the Sylvania Community Action Team, Junior (SCAT Jr).

The FCA meeting is before school – 7:15am – and for a non-morning person, she quickly gets up and ready to go.  She was so nervous for the first meeting, didn’t think she’d have any friends there.  She was right, she didn’t.  But that meeting, a devotional about being the hands and feet of God, stirred something in her.  She began to invite friends to come to the next weeks meeting, and a few did.

A few days later she attended the first meeting of Sylvania Community Action Team, Junior.  At that meeting, they discussed was that they, even as middle school children, could be an impact on their community.  Kids mentioned giving money to charity, participating in walks/runs.  But she came home, and shared with the family her heart – to make scarves and donate them to the local homeless shelter, Cherry Street Mission Ministries.

As parents we were proud of her, but I was so humbled by her heart, and her listening to the voice of God in her ear.   She told us she had a goal of 60 scarves, but maybe 100 if she could get some friends involve.  All before Thanksgiving, 2 months away.

Then came the task of getting to 60 scarves. She knew how to use a loom and finger weave, but looms can take a while, and finger weaving can only produce so much of a scarf (mostly the infinity variety).  So we had to learn some new techniques – arm knitting.  Honestly, I can’t tell you which of the various YouTube tutorials made the process easiest to learn (casting on is tricky if being taught the wrong way), but once I figured it out, we took off running.

Then came the expense of the yarn.  We made several scarves and sold them to purchase more yarn, some donated money for the cause, and some donated yarn.  We were so thankful for it.

Between Samantha, her sister and I, we made 60 scarves in about 4 weeks, 15 were donated by friends, and another 10 were made by friends of the girls at a knit-in that we hosted.  85 scarves in all were donated on November 8 to the Cherry Street Mission.

But the story doesn’t end there…

Samantha’s goal, her mission, has had an impact on many who have heard her story.   Thanks to friend and neighbor, the Sylvania Arts Commission (who donated a large amount of yarn) put a plea out to help Samantha reach and exceed 100 scarves before Thanksgiving.  Samantha’s story had been shared dozens of times in only 8 hours, and our community has stepped up to make her “small” goal into something bigger than we ever imagined!