WANTED AND NEEDED: VOLUNTEERS/DONATIONS FOR WOODY'S HOUSE OF HOPE

Most people believe that there is usually good that will come about with tragedy.  Two weeks ago, Ray and I were stunned and saddened to hear of the death of a wonderful lady in the Coronado expat community.  Kimberly, along with her husband, Mike, were one of the first couples we met when we moved here last August.  Kimberly, as I wrote before, organized Girls Night Out for expat women to meet and mingle from the Coronado and surrounding areas.  Skye Wikjord lived in Kimberly's condominium building in Coronado and was the coordinator for last weeks GNO event.   Through emails about GNO, Skye wrote about the "JLMChristianFoundation, Kimberly having a room named after her", even to have "a house named after her", and she wrote about the Missionary, Marie Claire.  Through our curiosity and clicking on the links included in the GNO emails, Thea and I became more aware and interested in this foundation.  We only just met Skye within the last two weeks, and this is how we learned about Woody's House of Hope.   (MC is the Founder of the foundation, and Skye is the President.  They have been friends for over a year.)

 Sitting on the mountain side of the InterAmerican Highway in Penonome, Panama is an inconspicuous house called Woody's House of Hope.   Many expats in the Coronado area know that Woody and his wife, Monique, once owned Woody's Bar in Farallón, Panama.  Woody and Monique would bus children to his restaurant from the local orphanages and treat them to meals and a day at the beach.  Marie Claire Beauvil, a Missionary in Panama since 2009, and also a full time teacher at Five Star Academy, met Woody and Monique through the orphanage.  Within the past two years, she found a house to rent with the hopes of housing twenty young women that grew up in the mountains and lived in the orphanages for schooling.  The Panamanian government controls and subsidizes these orphanages (there are many orphanages here educating children that live in the mountains when school is not in session), but once the girls graduate at the age of seventeen, they then move out and either move back to their homes in the mountains or live on their own trying to support themselves barring the chance to further their education.   MC created Woody's House of Hope so that once this education is complete at the orphanage, they would then move into House of Hope and attend the nearby college.  She named the charity, and the house after Woody.    This she has she done all the while maintaining the JLMChristianFoundation in the US as well as in Panama.

http://jlmchristianfoundation.org/panama.html  This foundation is 100% volunteer based.

Jesus Loves Me (JLM) Christian foundation is dedicated to strong Christian character and excellence education by providing a caring community where students are educated to think biblically, serve effectively and lead Christ-centered lives.  

Keeping this post about Woody's House of Hope (and the short version!), Thea and I took a drive to Woody's House of Hope last Saturday.  We wanted to meet this wonderful women we had heard so much about from Skye Wikjord and hear about the foundation from MC herself. She gave us a tour of the home, gave us her story and we talked for four hours (imagine that).  We also met two of the girls currently residing full time in the house.  It was then that Thea and I decided we wanted to take part in adopting a room.  MC and Skye are in need of volunteers. The house is a fifty minute drive from the entrance to Coronado.  Whether it is one person or several persons getting together and adopting a room in the house, the responsibility lies in getting that room ready for these young women to move in and live in for the next five years.  There is also a list of items that the house along with these girls are in need of as of today.  MC just completed, yesterday, the biggest task of obtaining the 501c3 exempt so that she may receive any amount of a donation from contributors.  Two girls are moving into the house this Saturday with their room being completed by another "adopter".

The purpose of this post is to help spread the word about this amazing foundation and to encourage others to give time (not necessarily money, but that works too!) helping MC  with this cause for at risk young women.

Below are before pictures of the room Thea and I adopted.  I am also listing the items that are in need today.  There is a large donation box in Picasso restaurant and donations are collected Wednesdays during Happy Hour.  The box can be found in the hallway next to the woman's bathroom.
***PLEASE go right to the box and drop off anything from the list (please do not stop the staff to ask them about the box as it is labeled clearly)

Monetary donations can be made through the website.  School starts in March, so school supplies are needed.  And please donate gently used clothes that you would want your daughter to wear to school.  

The back part of the room that we have adopted.

The wardrobe area.

SUPPLIES NEEDED:

Marble notebook 

Notebook divided with subjects

Pencils

Pens

Permanent markers

Colored pencils

Makers

Line papers

Erasers 

Sharpeners 

Printing paper

Tall kitchen size trash can

Trash bags for this trash can

Large Garden/Yard size black trash bags

Rubbermaid style totes and bins—large 

Clear bins for storing incidentals

Feminine pads 

Toilet paper

Paper towels

Ant control/Pest control items

Shower caddy 

Paper towel holder

Non-perishable food

Towel bars for back of doors (for bedrooms)

Laundry detergent

Bathroom cleaning supplies

Kitchen bin storage containers

ARE YOU LEAVING AREA?  ARE YOU GOING ON EXTENDED VACATION?  Care to donate your food that will go to waste?  

It is our hope, though, that more people will read this post, check out the website, talk to all of the volunteers, and then want to drive to the house to check it out like Thea and I did last Saturday.  And then adopt a room, or adopt a girl (this is to come!). The sky's the limit in what can get accomplished as word gets out, and with my voice, I hope to spread the word a little each day...here in this thing I call retirement.

Find House of Hope on facebook and like it!  JLM House of Hope Panama
Email to volunteer or go to website for more information:  jlmchristianfoundation.org OR houseofhopepanama@gmail.com