When we went to the Dominican Republic with World Vision this past spring, Hannah and Matthew were just giddy over the prospect of getting to see goats.   I was a little mystified. However, they were both giggling like school girls seeing these wonderous creatures (this link will take you to Matthew’s account).

It is amazing what a simple goat can do to help families living in poverty. They help provide sustainability for many years for these families.  Can an iPod do that? Probably not and I know all the toys and stuffed animals I recycled this weekend will not do that!

This holiday season when you are going through your gift checklist, considering giving a goat through World Vision.  You may never be able to personally see what affect your goat has but we saw it in the Dominican Republic and it was AMAZING!

Here’s what World Vision says about giving a goat:

Give a goat. Goats nourish hungry children and families with healthy milk, cheese, and yogurt. Goats also give a much-needed income boost by providing offspring and extra dairy products for sale at the market.

A healthy dairy goat can give up to 16 cups of milk a day. Goat milk is easier to digest than cow’s milk and is an excellent source of calcium, protein, and other essential nutrients that growing children need. Goats are practical animals — flourishing in harsh climates while producing valuable manure to fertilize crops and vegetable gardens.

Teopista, an AIDS orphan and World Vision-sponsored child in Uganda, is proud of her first gift ever — two donated goats that will help provide her with a brighter future. “I was very happy when I got the goats,” says the 10-year-old. “They will be of use to us. We will get money from them. I thank World Vision for thinking about me, too.”

Her aunt Restetuta feels the same way. “When the goats give birth again, we will sell off some of the younger [goats],” says Restetuta. “We will use the money to buy Teopista a school uniform, books, and beddings. We can also buy food with some of the money. I thank World Vision so much for all the help they have given us … we know that those goats will be of benefit to us in future.”

Also, please consider sponsoring a child today for just $35/month.

I will also be sharing what Andrea and I have up our sleeves to help the people we met in the Dominican Republic. I’ll be sharing our plans soon!

Read the stories from the Dominican Republic from Andrea, Amanda, Jill, Jessica, and Matthew.

Please consider sponsoring a child for just $35/month. There are so many children who are in need. It will transform you as much as it will transform the child.

Photo via: Mommy Snacks

These mother have the same dreams as all mothers.

They want their children to be safe, secure, and happy. They dream their children will go to college.

They want more for their children.

Just like us. Just like me.

Except she lives in a house like this.

Yet dream of a house like this.

Most of us in the United States have bigger homes for our cars.

Consider sponsoring a child today for just $35/month.

Today, we had a party at the ADP (Area Development Project) we were visiting. Some of the people on our trip were meeting with their sponsored children as well. As we were listening to the students play beautiful music I noticed this little girl with a paint brush painting apples. I didn’t think much of it at the time. I thought maybe she was finishing up a school assignment.

That’s not what she was doing.

She was painting this for her sponsor.

Patiently waiting to meet with her sponsor.

Unfortunately, none of us were her sponsor. She is one of the girls who was sponsored by a reader on Jessica’s blog.

Jill and I gave her a big hug and reassured her that we would make sure her sponsor received it.

She has been sponsored for just a month or so and is so excited about her sponsor! Excited to make her sponsor a gift. We brought gifts but never would have anticipated gifts in return.

You will receive a bigger gift when you sponsor. The gift of hope. The gift of faith. The gift of love.

Consider sponsoring a child today for just $35/month.

I was talking to Andrea about meeting my sponsored child and she was all like “Girl, you need to post about that.” There was just so much to post about. It is hard to fill it all in.

I have almost all of our digital photos backed up to my iPhone. I started showing Angela the photos of my family. I wanted to show Angela my children. She was very amused by several of the pictures. She was especially interested….

in the ones of my group being silly

girls in their white First Communion Dresses

Sofia sucking her fingers

and making silly faces, wearing underwear on their head, and many more!

After I initially met Angela, our sponsored child, we ate lunch. She sat on the other side of the room with her mother. After lunch, she came back over to sit beside me. At this point, Alejandro was somewhere else and I had left my handy dandy English-Spanish Dictionary book on the bus.  I wasn’t quite sure how to communicate.

That’s when my iPhone came in quite handy yet again.

I decided to see if she would love the same game Sofia loves! Of course, she loved Dress Chica on my iPhone. Kids are kids!

We ended our visit by giving Angela and her mother a Hope, Faith, Amore necklace made and donated by Lisa Leonard.

Please consider sponsoring a child for just $35/month. There are so many children who are in need.

Hannah, my 11 year old daughter, wanted to share her thoughts and experience from today’s events during the Dominican Republic Trip with World Vision.

Today we went to see the river slums, a small school, a music and art school, and a bakery.  We met a woman at the slums named Maria.  She has four children; two of which were sponsored.  Maria and her family live off a small store she has started.  Maria dreams of moving out of the slums into a safe, stable home to protect her children.  Shortly after meeting Maria we went to another family’s home.  The mother of the family was a teacher.  The World Vision program helped her get her teaching degree.  She has three children and one grandchild.

After that we went back and had lunch and saw the school.  At that school I saw children coloring, drawing, and writing.  T, Jake, and I passed out candy to all the school children and the children around in our area.  After that we went to the art and music school.  At that school there was flutes, pianos, singing, theater, dancing, guitars, and some others.  Then we went to the bakery.  At the bakery there was a baking class going on.  They told us their favorite thing to bake was cakes.  They also made us delicious cookies.

So far my time in the Dominican Republic has been very heart-breaking, emotional, educational, and extremely interesting!

~Hannah (:
If you feel moved, please consider sponsoring a child for just $35/month.

Photos used courtesy of Andrea, Amanda, and Jessica.

If you’ve been following along with my World Vision Story, you know that I have sponsored a child for a long time. Today was a very special day. We were able to give Angela, one of our sponsored children, a real hug!

First, I want to tell you about a few things about our first official day in the Dominican Republic. It is amazing the work that World Vision is doing here. They provide so much more than just a sponsorship to one child. They help the entire community lifting it up entirely to help bring everyone up.

The goal of World Vision is to empower the people in the community to help them become self-sustaining.  You can see the work in this organic vegetable garden as evidence the programs are working.

A group of 30 or so men and women, who have children or grandchildren who are sponsored through World Vision, pooled their land together to create this vegetable garden. They are very hard working people and were very excited to share their goodies with us – which were fabulous! Yes, I decided to roll the dice a bit and go ahead and eat the fresh vegetables!

Even though, the living conditions are harsh, we saw hope in this vegetable garden and in the goat farm.

Hannah was bizarrely excited to find out we were visiting a goat farm.

I was more distracted by this little cutie, Romey, who is just three years old. He was just accepted into the World Vision program and is looking for a sponsor. He was going to use a peso given to him to buy a lollipop.

After we visited the goat farm, it was off to see Angela, our sponsored child. Once we got past our language barrier because hablo poco espanol, we were able to connect thanks to our translator Alejandro. Angela was very quiet but her mother says she is not usually quiet.  She is in first grade now and her favorite colors are pink and blue. She has two older brothers and one older sister, which reminds me a bit of my family.

I feel very privileged to be able to meet my sponsored child!

It’s amazing that it only takes $35/month to help Angela and her family. Just $35 to make a difference!

If your heart is open, please consider sponsoring a child. There are so many beautiful children and families who need your support.