The Cercadillo Project

This weekend, Café y Coser, our sewing/crafts initiative, has had the privilege of selling our items at a women’s conference in Santo Domingo.  This conference, True Woman 15,  has drawn Latin American women from 22 different countries.

Necklaces, several styles of bracelets, headbands, bookmarks . . .

. . . rugs, tote bags, headbands, bookmarks . . .

. . . little bags with zippers, bags from recycled plastic, potholders. . . .

. . . little box bags lined with plastic, beaded anklets, small and large coin purses . . .

These are just a few of the items made by our Cercadillo women.

24 of the Café y Coser con Cristo Women

What fun it was for them to see their store this morning as they came to the conference!  They were quite proud of their work, and rightly so.  Our women enjoyed interacting with the shoppers and the shoppers also seemed to enjoy meeting our industrious women.

Four of our Cercadillo youth girls who went to the pre-conference for teens.

Tomorrow is another full day and we hope we won’t be bringing nearly as much back to my house and we left with on Thursday morning.    By the way, prepping the displays, getting all the products to the conference site, displaying the items beautifully and the overall selling could not be taking place without the help of volunteers.  Mary Schultz from Santo Domingo is always ready to lend a hand to our projects.  Rebekah Cline from St. Louis and Moriah Richett from New Hampshire flew in just to help with this conference.  So thankful for these ladies.

Opening are still available for anyone interested in coming tomorrow evening to take down the displays and move the leftovers back to my house.  🙂

Four!  Four!  Four!  Four!  As of around 1:15 today ALL of our hand pumps in Cercadillo are working again!

Because a picture is worth a thousand words . . .

Pump #1 – WORKING!

Pump #2 – WORKING!

Pump #3 – WORKING!

Pump #4 – WORKING!

 The first water from the well is usually rather muddy.  After a few buckets it usually clears up.  These kids couldn’t wait to start enjoying it.

What a relief to have all four pumps working again!  Pump one has needed repair for six months, pump two has needed repair for eight months, pump three has needed repair for one month, and pump four has needed repair for more than four years. When the final pump broke, the situation seemed hopeless. All the time that I was frustrated trying to find a solution, God was at work behind the scenes. He used Beth Jones, living in upstate New York, to connect us with the organisation H20 Technologies, here in the DR.  What a great day this has been, to see even pump number four working.

Thank you for the part you played, through your prayers and encouragement!