Fundraising Idea's for your Mission Trip

I will be going to Haiti with my church in June 2016. One of the first concerns many people have when led to go on a short term or long term mission trip is cost. I know that if I am meant to go on this trip, God will provide the way. I absolutely have faith in this, but we are not meant to just sit back and do nothing. So here are some fundraising ideas I have come up with.

1. Chocolate Bars 

https://fundraising.worldsfinestchocolate.com

2. Papa Johns Pizza Cards

Contact your local Papa Johns. Ours offers us 2$ cards that we sell for 5$ making a profit of 3$.

3. Chili's Give Back Night

10% of proceeds that night

http://www.qdi.com/Chilis/CHGiveBackApp.pdf

4. Buttermilk Sky

They pick a new charity each month and select a pie. Through out the month a percentage of the pie sales go to that charity/organization.

https://www.buttermilkskypie.com/pie-it-forward

5. Chickfila

http://www.chick-fil-a.com/Kids/Local

6. Golf Tournament

7. Bake Sale

8. Rummage Sale

If your church has a large parking lot or facility you can host a HUGE yard sale by selling booths for 25$ to families to sell their stuff. Would be good to have a bake sale at this time.

9. Spring Fashion Show and Vendor Expo

Sell booth space to vendors, have a fashion show, vendor exhibitions, and or speaker/entertainment on stage.

10. Christmas ornaments

11. Chili cook-off

12. Parents night out

Host a parents night out at your church. Have games and snacks.

13. New Years Eve Party/ Valentines Dance

We have used this for fundraisers before. Sell tickets or ask for donations. Have food donated to offset costs. It's always a lot of fun.

14. Movie Night/ Drive In

Have a movie night or drive in. Sell popcorn, candy, and snacks.

15. Cookbook

I have family who cherish their church's cookbooks. They are a wonderful way to preserve history as well. My mom has one with my Mamaws recipes and other family who have since passed. 

16. Car wash

17. Bake Sale

18. T-Shirts

You will want to order shirts for your trip anyways. 

19. Pancake Breakfast

Several restaurants will host a pancake breakfast fundraiser. Applebee's is the one I see the most.

http://flapjackfunds.com 

20. Bingo night

Who doesn't like Bingo? Sell Bingo cards and offer Prizes.

Have a fundraiser idea that I didn't cover? Let me know www.facebook.com/thissinglemomneedsgrace

Good luck on your fundraiser! I hope the above idea's and links helps you. Remember not to worry, just have faith that God will provide.

What am I Thankful for?

In November Facebook becomes inundated with people telling us what they are thankful for, every single day. I've tried this before and I am just not good at posting every day. I would fall off before the halfway mark and would sometimes post a whole weeks worth of thankfulness in a day because life gets busy and I forget. It's not that I'm not thankful, do people judge those who don't post everyday? Does it make me less thankful? Of course not. It's just hard for some people. Especially those with ADD like me. It becomes boring and monotonous. I really enjoy the artistic expression of thanks. Last year Elijah glued leaves telling what he was thankful for to a thankful tree I had printed off of Pinterest. We will probably do something similar to that this year. So I decided that I would post all 30 things I'm thankful for at once. Of course I am thankful every single day for all these things, but in case you're interested here are my 30 things I'm thankful for. In no particular order.

1. My Salvation: I gave my life to Christ at Camp Galilee in Lafollette when I was eight years old.

2. Church Family: I have gone to Dante Baptist for 11 years. It's much more than a church to me. It's my extended family. 

3. My Son: I tell my son all the time that it's him and I against the world. He is the reason I wake up in the morning and God placed him in my life for a reason.

4. Parents

5. Aunt and Uncle who had a major part of raising me and helping me to raise my son.

6. My niece Eralynn. I never thought I would love anyone as much as I love my son. 

7. All of my Nieces and Nephew.

8. My Sister because she teaches me patience.

9. My Brother because he teaches me forgiveness.

10. My Cats because they ease my stress...sometimes. (I'm looking at you Ginsberg who eats all my cords)

11. Books: I love to read.

12. Technology: for helping me to express myself.

13. Modern Medicine: for keeping my son alive.

14. Missionaries: They are selfless and have such faith in God. I admire them.

15. AC: I am extremely hot natured and can not imagine life without air conditioning. I am so spoiled with it.

16. My sight: I see the Lord in nature. I am a very visual person with a love for art. When I look out at the mountains, the ocean, the sunset, a beautiful fall day; I see God in it. It speaks volumes to me. 

17. Prayer: Prayer saved my son. He was severely ill in Children's and was on a lot of prayer lists. I absolutely attribute prayer to his survival. My car has ran on prayer. I have had so many prayers answered and for the ones that were answered no, I am also thankful.

18. VBS: I love VBS. Every year I go VBS crazy. I love to decorate and teach the kids. It's one of the most favorite events we have at church. It's won a lot of souls to Christ.

19. Forgiveness: I've done some really horrible things, some things against my brothers and sisters in Christ. I've slapped God in the face with my disobedience and evilness. He took all of that from me and cast those sins as far as the east is to the west. 

20. All of my Aunts and Uncles.

21. My Grand Parents: I was born into a bible believing family thanks to both sets of Grandparents. I was born Methodist and Southern Baptist.

22. Homeschool: I am very thankful to be able to Homeschool my son. Some countries prohibit this and even some states make it very hard to homeschool. I am so thankful to live in a state where I am able to homeschool freely.

23. Music: I love to sing, just ask my son. He begs me to stop singing.

24. Dance: I am especially thankful for Rejoice because I am able to dance for God. I may not be very good at it but when I dance it's just me and God in that room. I pray continuously that others will be able to see him through me. 

25. Football: it's my favorite sport and brings me happiness. I started playing football when I was 2. My Dad taught me how to throw and it's something that we share together.

26. Stan Lee: He's the man. I love The Avengers, and everything Marvel.

27. Comedy: If I am having a bad day, all you have to do is sit me in front of America's Funniest Home Videos, Madea, Duck Dynasty, etc.

28. The Food in my house.

29. My home: it's a humble abode, but I feel safe here and my neighbors are awesome.

30. FINALLY......I am thankful for being a Single Mom of a child who is on the spectrum and has food allergies. I doubt myself a lot, but I have taken care of this very high maintenance child, on my own, for over seven years. It's an accomplishment and I've learned so much through every hardship I've had. That's something I could have done without all of the things I am so very thankful for.

Shew.....that was hard! I am sure I have missed some things. It is harder than it seems. Especially when you are typing on the fly. Leave me a comment and tell me what you're thankful for. If you haven't already like my Facebook page www.facebook.com/Thissinglemomneedsgrace 

Jonah no more

I remember going to a conference in Gatlinburg with my Youth Group called Winterfest in the 90's and feeling the call to become a missionary. I've always felt that call and yet I pulled a Jonah and ignored it. Things happened that pulled me away from ministering to others.

Even now that I am an adult I still feel that calling. I serve where I can am I am active in my church, but that hasn't quelled that pull to become a missionary. I keep telling myself it is impossible. I wouldn't know where to start. I'm so flawed and I have a child with life threatening food allergies and autism. 

I am so excited that I have an opportunity to go on a mission trip with my church to Haiti. We will be leaving in June and will travel to Saint Marc. I have been searching for opportunities to serve in Haiti. I've looked at Medical Missions an several other excellent options. One night I happened to find YWAM. One of my Facebook friends did a discipleship training school in Australia through YWAM and I followed her blog and her experiences so I knew they were a great organization. 

I texted my friend from church about it and she said that they had been looking into going with their kids. So it all fell together. 

MY PERSONAL CONNECTION TO HAITI

I was very blessed when I was younger to go on several cruises in the Caribbean with my Dad. One of my favorite destinations was Labadee, Haiti. It was the most beautiful place I had ever scene. I can only imagine that Heaven will look like that.

                        Labadee is a private island in Haiti owned by Royal Carribean.

 This place was my Heaven on Earth, I didn't know the desperation of the people just over the hills. 

I remember eating all this food and looking up and seeing children watch us from the rocks. It was hard to eat after that. Before we left my new found Nirvana, we had an opportunity to go to the market. If you have never been to a market in the Caribbean it can be very intimidating and when you are a child as I was it was scary. People are very aggressively trying to get you to purchase their wares. 

                                                            The Market in Labadee Haiti 

I was drawn to this one guy who was sitting on the ground with these beautiful hand made dolls all around him. His words still haunt me. He said "I will give you these dolls if you bring me some hot dogs". I bought two dolls from him but I did not bring him food because we were told not to by Royal Caribbean. To this day I wish I had took him food. That moment stayed with me. The children and the man. I pray that RC gave them the leftover food. 

My dolls looked like voodoo dolls and they are now locked in a trunk somewhere because they terrified me to have them in my room. I want to go back to Haiti and help the people the way I felt I needed to that day. A short term mission trip is what I need to get some insight into over seas missions and to learn more about what they do and how I can help. If God leads me I will go. I know he will prepare a way for me. I am so excited to be sharing this experience with my church family. I know we will be blessed for going and I pray that God will use us as his living vessels to bless others. We are the hands and feet of Jesus. Maybe those of us who feel like we are not welcome, lonely, out of place are made to feel that way so we move. God doesn't want the Jonahs of the world to be comfortable. I don't know...just a thought.