Clean water...

For the past few weeks our boys have been learning just how lucky they are to have fresh, clean water to drink and use on a daily basis. They've discovered that only 30% of Haitians have access to safe drinking water and adequate sanitation, a child dies every 7 seconds from a water-related illness, and 2.5 billion people have inadequate or nonexistent access to proper sanitation. Our church is participating in a Clean Water campaign and they have asked the kids to get involved by collecting donations to send to Healing Haiti and World Vision. They equipped the kids with a water bottle and asked that they try to fill the bottle with money to help the people in Africa and Haiti get the clean water they need.

To help the kids grasp what it might be like to have a limited water supply we are doing a little experiment today. Since many families in developing countries have to travel to retrieve water, the kids and I went on a walk up the road carrying a one gallon jug of water. Now for the rest of the day we will only use the water in this jug for drinking, brushing teeth, washing dishes, etc... The goal is to show the kids how nice we have it here in the U.S. to have access to clean water whenever we need it.

Last weekend the boys put their heads together and came up with the idea to go around to the neighbors to ask for donations in exchange for a yard raking. Luckily, we have some very generous neighbors who rewarded their efforts not only with donations but they also brought the boys a plate of homemade cookies at the end of the day.

Today's lunch includes a ham/cheese water drop sandwich, blueberries/grapes, cucumbers, no bake chocolate bites: