Amazing News

WE HAVE SOLD THE RUG......Isn't that exciting news! We are going to have a tea on Monday afternoon to turn the rug over to its rightful owner now. All of us are over the moon but at the same time a little sad. I will be back to let you know how our tea went and any little details that I can divulge.

This is our Labour Day weekend, so have a good one.

Pat had a Little Lamb, well many little lambs......

In mid August, Laura Bozsormeny had her rug hooking summer class at St. Lawrence College in Brockville and this class was, for some, the end of many courses taken and they now have a Fibre Arts Certificate. Pat, who was in the class, made a number of the little "lamb" brooches seen above which she sold to her class and the proceeds from the sale of the "little lambs" went to the Women of the Congo. Pat is a wonderfully artistic women and a beautiful rug hooker. She is just another example of the women one meets when you do rug hooking....it is the bonus along with doing something that you love to do. Many thanks to Pat, to those who bought the brooches and also to those who purchased our flowers as well. Congratulations to all the ladies who received their Fibre Arts Certificate. We now have "sister" number 17.

Kingsdale Chateau

Hi there,

I have been remiss in doing our postings, so much going on and more to come. Margaret, one of our more experienced rug hookers, set up a day for us at the retirement residence where she calls home and we had such a successful day. Again, with the sale of many flower brooches, we were able to sponsor "sister" number 16. Thank you to Margaret and all of her friends for making our day such a success. The residence where she lives is just beautiful, we were treated to lunch and a tour of the residence as well.

Almonte Textile Museum

Last week our rug took a little road trip. There are at least three of us who are having separation anxiety because we have left it at the Mississippi Valley Textile Museum in Almonte. If anyone has the time, take a road trip up there yourselves and check it out. The town of Almonte is very quaint and the textile museum itself is a learning experience both about the history of the family business of the Rosamond Woolen Company and also just to see all the different period equipment used for making wool from sheep. The website is www.textilemuseum.mississippimills.com.

Sponsorship "Blooms"

This is not the greatest photo but just wanted to share this with you. Rhonda wanted something for us to show, when we were "on the road" with the rug, an illustration of how many women we had sponsored to date. It takes the sale of about 26 flowers for us to sponsor one women. We have sponsored 13 women so..... we put our heads together and came up with the piece above. It is an acacia tree (like an umbrella), we put 26 flowers on the tree and as one flower is sold we take one flower off of the tree. Our goal was 20 women and when one women is sponsored we add another women to the piece beside a green bucket (like the one in the rug) under the tree. When a women is sponsored, we put the flowers back on the tree and then do the process all over again. Thank you to Joan for her artistic talents. Thank you to all the ladies at the picnic our rug hooking guild branch had yesterday which totalled almost 90 women and do you know that the sun shone even though the weather forecasts said rain!!!!

Zainab Salbi, Founder of Women for Women International

We have been writing so much about our relationship with Women for Women International and I am sure there are many who would like to know more about this organization and about the woman who started this organization.

Obviously you can go on the internet to find out so much about it, but also Zainab Salbi has written a book called "Between Two Worlds - Escape from Tyranny - Growing Up in the Shadow of Saddam Hussein. It might give you further insight into this incredibly courageous woman and her reasons for starting the organization.

Also there is a blog that you can look up as well http://havefundogood.blogspot.com/2009/05/interview-with-zainab-salbi-founder-of.html. There is an interview with Zainab Salbi that might be of interest to you as well.

Number 12

This past weekend two of our members, Pat and Betty, had a nursing reunion of their graduating class and others from Kingston General Hospital. I won't mention the year, we will just keep it shrouded in secrecy!!! They had approximately three days of catching up with everyone, talking, eating and probably a couple of glasses of wine in there somewhere but.......again because of their generosity, we have been able to sponsor another woman....!!! I will also mention that for Christmas instead of exchanging presents, Pat and her brother give to a charity so she asked her brother, on her behalf, to donate to our Congo Project.

Thank you to Pat and Betty and the ladies of their graduating class for sponsoring "sister No. 12". We have been matched up with one so far - it takes time to do this, there is a process to make sure that the right match is made so as soon as we are able, we will discreetly give some details of our "sisters" and how they are doing. And if they will provide us with a photo I will add that as well.

Did we Say 6, 7 & 8?

At the end of May, many of us ventured to Kitchener to participate in the Ontario Hooking and Craft Guild (OHCG) Annual. This is a time for many to connect with friends from various parts of the province, to see the absolutely incredible rugs that people do and also to do a little "retail therapy". Ontario is a big province and not all of us are close to rug hooking distributors. I have still not figured out if I am inspired or intimated by what I see people do. I do have to mention that one of our members, Christine Gibson, won first prize for Fine Cut of her Monkey, her teacher being Jon Ciemiewicz. Congratulations to Chrisine. I will post a photo as soon as I can get one.

Needless to say, we took our beautiful Congo Rug with us and for those of you who are faithful readers of this blog, you will note that I said in a previous post that we were up to number 5 and as a result of our going to the annual we would be looking at sponsoring number 6, 7 & 8. Well we did but........also number 9, 10 & 11! We were over the moon as a result of the generosity of spirit that the women of the OHCG displayed and the support that we received for the Women of the Congo. The OHCG has been so supportive and have always given us some time to talk about the project and also to give us space so that we can display the rug and sell our flowers. Rhonda did a fine job again this year along with Vanna #1, Nancy and Vanna # 2, Pen. Rhonda took the time to explain how the rug was finished according to our visit with Julie Hughes who is a conservist with the Museum of Civilization in Ottawa. Marjorie Francis, who does absolutely beautiful quilting, oversaw the backing along with Sheila, Kim, and others in record time and did a superb job. I think Julie Huges would be proud. Hopefully we will be able to meet with her and let her see that we listened and listened well and her time was not in vain.

In her outgoing speech, the President of the Guild for the past two years, Jay Allison, pointed out that as a group it is not only the rug hooking that inspires us but it is the women that we meet along the way, the friendships formed, the generosity of time and spirit that so many of the women display and we can't forget to mention that many have struggles of their own that they have to manage on a daily basis but somehow they always seem to come through in a time of need. I think that it was definitely a result of how well we did for the Women of the Congo. A special thank you to someone, and I won't mention the name, who opened her heart and sponsored one woman with her generosity....!!

I will post the Monkey and also a piece that Marjorie quilted as soon as I can get a photo.

Spring Thing and Sponsorship No. 4

This past weekend our guild was invited to participate in Open Doors Ontario at the "Spring Thing" at Springfield House in Escott. Open Doors Ontario is province wide and basically it is to get people interested in the "goings on" in their respective communities and for us in this part of the world, we were able to display in two historical buildings in the area.

Springfield House is now the Escott Library having been restored and it is a wonderfully, charming old building that once served as a resting place for those travelling between Montreal and Toronto in the the late 1800's.

We set up the Congo rug, as well as many other rugs belonging to the members of our very prolific guild, and over the course of two days there was always someone there to demonstrate how we rug hook. It was great!!

We had our flowers on sale and as a result of that we have been able to sponsor 4th woman and are very, very close to our Number 5 sponsorship. We are off to our Annual Ontario Rug Hooking Guild meeting in Kitchener so we are all very busy making flowers so that we can possibly sponsor number 5, 6 and seven!! I will be back to tell you how it all went. It usually is a great time and Rhonda will be talking about the rug again this year filling everyone in on our progress.

Thanks to all that so generously donated to the cause this past weekend.

P.S. You will note in the photo our little furry friend is wearing her "Women Matters" brooch. All of the women who have participated have opted to wear a turquoise flower with our Women Matters ribbon attached.

Sponsorship No. 3

Here is proof, on Friday, May 8th, we mailed out our third sponsorship money order. How appropriate that we were able to do this so close to Mother's Day.....hopefully we can give a Mom some hope for her and her children's future.

Thank you to the Evangelical Lutheran Women of Good Shepherd in Brockville that helped us to make this possible so quickly...thank you, thank you!

Women for Women in Brockville

The Evangelical Lutheran Women of Good Shepherd, Brockville, ON welcomed us to an evening of great food and an opportunity to display and talk about the Congo Project. Rhonda gave the ladies a brief history of what we are doing, why we are doing it and gave a brief synopsis of what is happening and why in the Congo.

Once again we took our flowers to sell and we would like to thank the ladies for their gracious donations for the cause. Some bought flowers while others just gave money and because of their generosity we were able to sponsor another woman through Women For Women International.

In the closing remarks for the evening, on woman reminded us to pray for these women in the Congo one cannot deny the power of prayer.

Thank you Sheila, for inviting us to this wonderful evening sharing with women for women. God Bless

Thank You For Your Kind Words

We would like to thank Mary Ann from Nashville, TN for taking the time to write a lovely note of encouragement to us via Rug Hooking Magazine. It is always nice for us to hear these words and we do appreciate people getting in touch with us. It brings us closer to you and also to the women for whom we are doing this.

Thank you.

Thank You

Today was a big day for us......not the greatest photo but we have been able to send out sponsorship for two women in the DRC through Women for Women International. As you might remember, when Anderson Cooper did his segment on 60 Minutes back in January 2008 about the Victims of War-Raping of Women in the Congo, we were inspired to initiate our Congo Project with every intention of helping the women to become rehabilitated, educated and assisted with getting their life back so they could become self supporting for themselves and their families. Women for Women International sponsors women on a yearly basis to do just that. The rug is finished and we are still in the process of marketing it but in the meantime, Rhonda came up with the brilliant suggestion to make proddy brooches to sell at the same time and to bring awareness about the Project and, most importantly, about the women in the Congo. Thank you to everyone who have taken the time from their very busy lives to make flowers and to those of you who have assisted the project and purchased flowers - thank you, thank you. The ladies who attended the Olde Forge Hook In, to the ladies of the Olde Forge Rug Hooking group and also to the Red Hat ladies of the Gananoque area- your combined contributions have paved the way for the sponsorship through the brooches. There will be two women who will be eternally grateful for your support!!!

We will try to keep everyone informed as much as we can about the outcome of the initial sponsorships.

Thank you again from everyone at Women Matters.

Happy Easter

Happy Easter to everyone. The sun is shining in our part of the world which is great and some of us have real flowers popping up in our gardens although they might be a little chilly. We did have some snow recently. The sale of our flower brooches is going so well we can now sponsor a couple of women in the Congo so we will be doing that in the not too distant future. We have a few upcoming events where we will be showing the rug and also to sell more of our "bouquet" of flowers. Thanks to everyone who have supported our cause and we will keep you posted as news comes available especially when we have connected with our "sisters" in the DRC.

Our latest bouquet

We have been very busy making flowers for our "bouquet". I had mentioned before that we had invaded Rhonda's home and had a day long gathering with "Gene Shepard" via his book and CD and we have been producing and having fun with these flowers which we are hoping to sell. Our goal is to make as many as we can and again, the proceeds will go to the Women of the Congo. I will keep you posted on our progress and hopefully some great news in the future. If you see any that you like, let us know and we can keep it aside for you. All it takes is $15.00!!!

The Rug Went on the Road

We took a little road trip just recently to visit with the ladies at the Beaconsfield Rug Hooking group in Beaconsfield, Quebec. We had such a warm welcome and you can see here two of the rug hookers who purchased flowers from our bouquet of flowers. Denise, the president of the group, came to Canada from Brussels, Belgium about six years ago and has now settled quite well into life in Canada. Thank you ladies for such a warm reception and we hope to see you again sometime soon. You too can visit with them online at www.beaconsfieldrughookers.com.

A Red Hat Challenge

Here is one of the beautiful women that we get to spend our time with every Monday. What a blessing!! Eleanor is a proud Nova Scotian who now makes the Thousand Islands her home. A retired nurse (there are many in our group) and anyone of us would want to have her looking after us in a time of need. Warm, witty, and to paraphrase her, a dear soul!! She has only been hooking for about 5 years although she remembers her Mother & Grandmother doing it when she was a young girl. Eleanor has extended a challenge to the rest of us.....we get together 30 red and purple flowers and Eleanor is going to present them to her Red Hatters group and I bet that all 30 will disappear. Let's go girls.

The Start of our Bouquet

Just wanted to let you get a peek at the start of our "proddy flower brooches" that we hope to sell with the proceeds going to our Congo project. What do you think? Anyone interested in buying some let us know - we will be taking them on the road with us to various hook-ins, they are a "must have" for every women's fashion complement.

A Day of Learning - Proddy Flower Brooches

Don't you just love our model.....we were at Rhonda's home on Tuesday and we all participated in a day of doing Proddy Flower brooches. We had Gene Shepherd on the TV for our lessons and with all the wealth of rug hooking knowledge in our group, neophytes like me just "prodded" along. We had such a great day and once we have perfected the technique we are hoping to take our brooches on the road with us so that we can sell them for our Congo Project. There is never a shortage of laughter, sharing and food when we get together like this. As soon as we get a few together I will post a "bouquet" for all to see.

AC 360 Blog

I was having a little trouble sleeping the other night so I went up and turned on the TV and was watching Anderson Cooper 360. Ben Affleck was on sharing his experiences when he went to the DRC and is speaking out about what is going on. Now I am really awake so I went to my computer and knowing that they have a blog and that people can leave comments for all to see, I thought OK here I go, what do I have to lose. I just did a little blurp about our concerns about the women of the Congo and put in our blog address. All this at 3am in the morning.....but we are on there. Check out AC 360 blog. We have to be diligent about taking any possible advantage to get our project out there so that we can realize our dream of helping some of those unfortunate women in the Congo. When you listen to some of their stories, we too have to gain strength from these women and how they carry on despite what is happening to them and those around them.

Happy Valentine's Day to Lavender Wool

Yesterday Women Matters received a wonderful gesture from the ladies at Lavender Wool. I just had to share this with everyone. What a wonderful idea and thank you so much. Women Matters were supposed to meet last Tuesday for a day of hooking brooches but we came up against Mother Nature and you know when that happens sometimes we just don't win. As it turned out the freezing rain they were forecasting never happened but we had decided to cancel. We are together again on Monday and Tuesday of this coming week. Our generous donation of "valentines" wool will probably be used for our garden of flower brooches that we hope to churn out to raise money and awareness of the Women of the Congo.

By the way, did anyone see Ben Affleck on Anderson Cooper last night? It would appear that he has also decided to speak out about the atrocities happening in the Eastern Congo.

Happy Valentine's Day to all that read this, to the ladies at Lavender Wool and to the Women of the Congo....you are in our hearts.

Mimi Kashira's Letter to President Obama

I had mentioned in a previous about Mimi Kashira, a congolese woman, who came to speak to us at one of our meetings. Well I am including a letter that Mimi wrote to CBC (Canada Broadcasting) for Inaugauration Day. I guess the CBC was asking for these letters to be sent to President Obama - not sure if they actually were delivered but they were on the CBC Website. Here is a copy of her letter:

Dear President Obama, Congratulations. You are such an inspiration for billions around the world.
As you take the office tomorrow, I wish you success and strength from God to overcome all the challenges ahead.
However, when you see your two beautiful and precious daughters, please think of what parents like yourself have to endure every day in the Eastern Congo when they see they precious daughters being raped and their hopes evaporated.
Rape in the Congo has been another form of terrorism that needs to be dealt with. Women in the Congo have been crying out for help, please reach out to them by doing what you can to stop this ongoing forgotten war and rape against young girls and women. May justice be done and all the criminals put to justice. Please do not be indifferent to the suffering and cries of Congolese women like your predecessor.

May God bless you, your family and all America.

Thank you Mr. President.

Mimi Kashira,
Kingston, Ontario

Let us hope that President Obama did in fact get this letter. Mimi is in the process of raising funds for a school for Orphans in Goma. Mimi held a fundraiser recently in Kingston where she sang as well as many Queen's University students from different parts of the world. On March 8th Mimi is going to be speaking and showing the film "Blue Helmets - Peace & Dishonour" done by Montreal filmmaker/journalist, Raymonde Provencher.

Let's Hear it for Dr. Mukwege

DR Congo doctor is 'top African'

Denis Mukwege hopes his award will highlight Congolese women's plight

A doctor from the Democratic Republic of Congo who treats women raped by combatants in the war-torn country has been named "African of the Year".

Dr. Denis Mukwege - An Unsung Hero

On November 28th, Kim, Rhonda and myself went to Toronto to attend a symposium that was presented by SAFER and the Stephen Lewis Foundation. The symposium, Ending Sexual Violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, was an evening spent with Stephen Lewis, Eve Ensler (The Vagina Monologues) and a true hero in every sense of the word, Dr. Denis Mukwege, founder and Director of the Panzi Hospital in Bukavu, DRC. It was a sold out evening and without a real sponsor, the ticket sales paid for us to have the privilege to hear from these distinguished speakers. Dr. Mukwege was interviewed on the 60 Minutes segment that brought the plight of the women in the Congo to our attention hence the rug.

Dr. Mukwege specializes in obstetric and gynecological consequences of sexual violence. You could have heard a pin drop when Dr. Mukwege was speaking albeit through the aid of an interpreter. He is a strong presence with a soft, gentle, reassuring voice that has tried to help some 15,000 women and girls since 1999. He said the youngest was three and the oldest 82.....how does he do it day after day after day!!!!??? Dr Mukwege has a team helping him screen all the victims that come to him for help since as he said, "if I heard all the stories I would not be able to do my job as a surgeon". They have one psychologist on staff and there is a definite need for more. Dr. Mukwege does this even though his life, along with his family, has been threatened - now this is what true heros are made of.

The Panzi Hospital is always looking for funds. SAFER (Social Aid for the Elimination of Rape), a Canadian Organization, has been instrumental in sending some $40,000 worth of crucial medical supplies to the Panzi Hospital.

Eve Ensler spoke very eloquently about her involvement with the Panzi Hospital and her time spent at the Panzi Hospital. In affiliation with the Stephen Lewis Foundation, her organization V-Day is in the process of adding a facility that will house women for a period of approximately six months so that they can be rehabilitated, educated and comforted so that they can become self sufficient members of their communities. All very impressive involvement. We did manage to speak to Eve Ensler to pitch our idea about the rug and she was very encouraged by what we were doing!!!

Eleanor Buttrey was kind enough to buy our tickets for the function and some unsuspecting couple gave us a free parking ticket, divine intervention. Thanks to Eleanor, to those good samaritans in the parking lot and also to the gentlemen who gave up his table at Second Cup so that we could have a table for three of us and the rug!!

It was a quiet 3-1/2 hour ride home after hearing all that we did, but more adamant about what has to be done to help these victims of such atrocities. They need our help.

Mimi Kashira

One of the women of our rug hooking guild introduced an angel to us. Mimi Kashira lived in the Congo, became a widow at the tender age of 22 with two boys to feed, nurture and love in a part of the world that is just stricken with so many obstacles that it has to be an enormous task to parent under those conditions. Mimi has now devoted much of her spare time trying to help out women in the Congo. At the onset of talking to us Mimi explains that she is very privileged compared to other women of the Congo. When her husband became a victim of the Rwandan genocide, her family took Mimi and her two boys under their wing and encouraged Mimi to finish her education which she did. Mimi became a lawyer, fled her homeland and after a separation of almost two years she was able to get her two sons over here so that they too could have a better life. Mimi told us firsthand how women in the Congo are treated and it just validated our desire to help even more. Mimi has a smile that lights up a room - after we showed her the rug and what our intentions were when we finished the rug and were able to sell it, all Mimi could say was "thank you"!! You knew that that "thank you" came from a deep rooted place in her soul. I don't think anyone wasn't touched by her presence and the story that she had to tell.

Mimi has set up the MiMi Kashira Foundation which is assisting women in the Congo to have a better chance at life. We are so lucky to have what we have and they need us to help them get just a very small piece of the pie.

Thank you to Joy for introducing Mimi to us and thank you to Mimi for not just walking away from a terrible situation. She truly is an angel.

Bill Gray

Along the way during our process of hooking the rug, we had a couple of people come to speak with us inspiring and encouraging the project and for what it represents. Nancy introduced us to Bill Gray someone that she has had the privilege to call her "friend" In 1968 Bill Gray volunteered for an organization called Operation Crossroads Africa. As an impressionable 21 year old university student, Bill spent the summers building wells and latrines in Liberia. The experience left a lasting impression on Bill and now volunteering has become a lifelong passion for Bill, as well as being a husband, father, business man and now a Rotarian. Bill took time out of his busy schedule and presented us with a slide show explaining his years of helping out in different parts of the world and how it has helped him to grow to the person he is today. If the thought ever comes in to your mind "can I do that?", the answer is always, "of course I can". It was just what we needed to validate that we were on the right track. Sheila hooked a wonderful thank you card for Bill, the image being "Luck", the little girl born to Lucienne after her many months in capitivity. We had a beautiful potluck luncheon afterward so our hearts and our tummies were full after that inspiring day spent with Bill Gray.

Brainstorming

Last week Nancy had all of us to her home for a brainstorming session after a bit of a hiatus during the Christmas rush and holiday period. As I have mentioned prior to this post, we are all novices at the next phase of our project which is marketing the sale of the rug so that we can get the money to send to the women in the Congo. Rhonda did a wonderful presentation to keep us all motivated and different ideas were discussed and we all committed to doing our share. One thing that did surface was that we are going to have a day of hooking brooches for sale at functions or wherever to add to our funds.....again Rhonda has invited us to her studio and we are all going to learn something new so it is a win/win situation. The day was also the day of Barack Obama's inauguration so we had the other eye on the TV watching as the day unfolded. Nancy put on a wonderful spread for us so it was truly an inspirational day. Thank you to Nancy and Rhonda.......

Lavender Wool

We had the most wonderful article in the Rug Hooking Magazine January/February issue (February being Black History month) and as a result of this we have had a few emails sent to us supporting our endeavours. One in particular came from Bridget Sperl, who along with her three sisters, have a small rug hooking business and they have kindly put a link called "Making A Difference" on their website. Thank you so much to www.lavenderwool.com for your support and for helping us in this way. Needless to say, we need all the help we can get. Again, Women helping Women!!!! Let us try to support them as well.

Rug Hooking Magazine

We have the most amazing spread in the Rug Hooking Magazine. Rhonda Kellett put together a great article with photos taken by Julius Brokloff...please let us know what you think. The article was put in the January/February issue, February being Black History month. We have beaten the deadline of January 13, 2009.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year to everyone. We have been very busy finishing the rug and we are so happy to say that it is finished, appraised and anxiously waiting a new home. This is a new year and we are going to pick up the momentum again since we are now into the hard part of the process. Sorry to have been away so long but I promise to do better from now on.