We're Up To 950 TOYS!

Hi Everyone,

Can you believe it?

When I first heard that I was supposed to bring about 1000 small stuffed animals and small. toys for the poor kids in Ecuador, I panicked. How was I ever going to do that? It seemed impossible.

Then I thought -- well, I've got to at least TRY. It wouldn't be fair if I didn't even give myself a chance. So I sent out an email blast to a bunch of people... and the word seemed to magically travel out to lots of people. The Pioneer Press wrote a lovely article about us, which I'll attempt to include at the bottom of this note. Soon -- donations started appearing from all over -- people calling (even strangers)... and before we knew it, our garage started filling up with bags and boxes, both small donations and large. Today, I just finished counting 950 TOYS! And I haven't even finished. A man at my hair salon "coincidentally" happened to have a large garbage-sized bag of beanie babies which were supposed to go to another cause, but the cause didn't need any more toys. So -- we'll have even more...

We're supposed to count everything, because 2000 (yes, that's right! TWO THOUSAND) kids will be treated in one week -- with five dentists working full steam ahead, along with two doctors, a nurse and assorted volunteers. I was told that since the kids are really scared -- you can imagine that they've never seen a shot -- and they're about to get teeth pulled out -- the kids do a lot of screaming. Then, those kids waiting in line also start screaming. We "floater" volunteers are also responsible for keeping kids distracted while they wait in line. Some people donated puppets, so I'm going to use those in line with the kids. I also bought two books with suggested activities for elementary kids.

I'm so very grateful for everyone's support and help. I was feeling pretty scared last week, especially in light of the primitive conditions we're going to face. Still, after our meeting last Sunday with Zully Alvaredo, the director of Causes For Change, I felt more reassured. I met about 17 other volunteers and we learned about many things. Besides the village I mentioned earlier, where the Shuar Indian tribe will be waiting, we're also going to another village where many children have birth defects. This village (Taora ?), was sprayed with defoliants for their banana and sugar cane plantations. But the defoliants have lots of toxins. Some of the kids are microcephalic, which means they have little heads. I was told they don't have much of a brain.
I can't even imagine it.

It will feel especially good to be able to bring these many gifts on behalf of the Americans. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

I doubt I'll have access to any computer in Ecuador. Our hotel is primitive, and the villages have no electricity. I just bought three flashlights for each of us. Joel will need people to hold flashlights over each child's mouth, so he can see what tooth he is supposed to pull.

I'll write manually in a journal, and will write to share more news.

All the best to you,
Lynn