Pick Me! is a Success

“Pick Me!”
We had an exciting day today at Adron Doran University Center with our “Pick Me!” display. Linda Barker and I had to beat the rain to set up the 10 posters that illustrate our Blessing Hands story. The sorority sisters of Chi Omega were fantastic help. They knew people by name and got a lot of people to stop at our table during the lunch hour. Chrissy Miller was there the first shift with her bright smile and willing spirit. Danielle Caudill and Caryn Hendy, the service chairs for the sorority, had all the girl’s times scheduled and helped at the table themselves. I will speak about our kids at their meeting next Monday.

We all enjoyed talking about the kids and seeing people respond to their needs. I think the visiting scholars enjoyed their hours the most. Penny Ye and Hongyu Mai, English teachers from Guangxi University, knew how to pronounce the kids names.

The “Giving Tree” swayed a little under all the cards, but it held up. We signed up over 30 people to our newsletter and about the same number as pen pals. Four primary students got sponsors, and two lovely girls from different sororities said they would ask their sorority about supporting a college student at $500 a year. You sure couldn’t go to school at Morehead State University for $250 tuition a semester.

Several people asked if we would be there again so they could sign up later when they had money. We have five more days that folks can drop by and pick a student from our “Giving Tree”. We recruited some prospective volunteers too. Thanks also goes to Abby Oney, who filled in at the last moment for a person who was too sick to fulfill her scheduled time.

We have a new Google Checkout button on our blog at http://blessinghands.blogspot.com/. Google is giving nonprofits free service for the year. No service charge will come out of your donation if you use Google Checkout during 2008. Pay pal is also available if you prefer it.

You can pick a student to support too. The students who don’t have sponsors are pictured at the addresses below. You can e-mail me the name of the child that you select at Blessinghands@gmail.com, and I will sign you up as their sponsor. You can then write to them if you like.

Yangshuo High School Students without sponsors: http://picasaweb.google.com/blessinghands/YangshuoHighSchoolStudentsWithoutSponsors


Middle School Students without Sponsors: http://picasaweb.google.com/blessinghands/LowerMiddleSchoolStudentsWithoutSponsors


Primary Students without sponsors: http://picasaweb.google.com/blessinghands/PimaryStudentsWithoutSponsorsSpring2008



I cannot resist showing some of them here.

Mo Chunfeng - $80 High School one semester


HuangYuli - $25 middle school one semester








Wu Jingwang Primary - $10 a semester

Liao Fuzhan College Student - $250 a semester Major- Computer Science

"Pick Me!" Sponsor Poster

Since our internet friends cannot come to the exhibit in Morehead, we are sending out reports to them about the events. This is the content of the sponsor poster.

Sponsors

We match sponsors with our students, hoping to open a window on the world for both of them. Some sponsors e-mail or visit their sponsored students. Chen’s sponsor supports her in high school and even sent her a special gift, a Louisville, Kentucky baseball team shirt.

Li’s sponsor pays $80 a semester for his tuition in high school and sent him Chinese New Year gifts. His grandfather came an hour with him on a bus to meet us at the school.

Anita Wherry visited her two students.

What a dream come true to finally meet my special students, May and Lily. They enthusiastically greeted me by name. We exchanged gifts, but their thank you letters written in English are my greatest treasure. I left that day determined to be a better pen pal and financial supporter.–Anita Wherry

Mo’s sponsor sent her a new backpack and prays for her every day. Mo is in the blue trimmed jacket. The standing girl is still without a special sponsor.

Nina Ottinger got to visit with her two sponsored students while she was in Yangshuo, China.

Mo Bao, an orphan, is one of 7 students supported by churches.Here he is holding his new school clothes.
Your church can support a child too.

Pick a student to sponsor.
Hang is in Middle School. Her support is $25 a semester.

Cheng is a primary child and needs $20 a year.

Li is in high school. She gets no government help because she is over 15 years old. She needs $80 a semester.

Feng is studying to be a women and children's doctor in college. She needs $250 a semester.

Dogwood "Giving Tree"

Today I went in pursuit of a dogwood tree to use for our "Giving Tree" next week when we will have a table and display about our kids at Adron Doran University Center in Morehead. I've had my eye on a wild one that is growing on the mountain in my backyard. A friend suggested that I spare the live tree and go in search of a donated dogwood tree. I had already thought of that and looked at one at Wal -mart, but the limbs were not big enough to hold all the blooming faces of children that we plan to put on our "Giving Tree".



However, I decided to check out Lowes just in case a good tree might be found. There was a good selection of small dogwood trees just right to carry in my car. So I ventured an "Ask" and was met by a smiling manager. Embarrassingly I only had a brochure in Chinese and forgot about my name card in my wallet. He seemed to believe me, however, and offered a tree for $5. I was glad for the savings of both money and my backyard tree. I took it right home to try out the cards with student's pictures.


The tree groaned with the load, but once I strengthened it with a wooden rod, the children bloomed wonderfully. For good measure I added a few silk pink dogwood flowers, since the tree was not naturally in bloom. Our "Giving Tree is now ready for sponsors to "Pick" a student to support.

ADUC has decided to only allow the exhibit on the days that our table will be displayed rather than leaving the posters up continually for two weeks as originally planned, so don't come looking for the display except Monday - Wednesday.


The "Pick Me!" theme has been a lot of fun to illustrate. Each artist has shown their own special style while using similar colors and themes. I want to thank Linda Brewer, Meg Glancy, Carolyn Boyd, and Nancy Sartor for the posters that they have created. Come see them Monday - Wednesday next week and the 2nd week of April at ADUC. I also thank Dorothy Juran and Abby Lou for helping with the cards to go on the tree. The four visiting Chinese scholars from Guangxi University have volunteered to woman the table the 10 o'clock hour this next week. They can answer many questions about China.

Already two promises of $250 college scholarships have come in from the newsletter announcement. I sent the invitation to our students in China was well. Even though I knew they could not come, I wanted to let them know what was happening and motivate them to translate the English. Their eager response to be involved has made me realize that I need to share this event on the Internet as well as in Morehead. Sponsors can respond there as well. So here begins our first Internet "Giving Tree."


One friend suggested that they enjoyed a conversational blog more than my fancy professional newsletter. So I am considering wedding the two and putting my blog postings about the " Pick Me!" exhibit on line during the two weeks that the display will be in Morehead. You might be getting more mail from me for these coming two weeks as I share the kids' pictures and needs and allow you distant friends to "pick "one too.

We are featuring primary ($10 a semester), middle school ($25 a semestser), high school ($80 a semester), and college students ($250 a semestser). We are also encouraging people to sign up to be pen pals and receive our newsletter. There is a donate button if you want to "Pick" a student now.


When the two weeks are over, I plan to take the display on the road. Two churches have already scheduled us. If your group would like to have the display and "Giving Tree" and do your own "picking," we have about 300 students that presently don't have sponsors. These are real kids that you can write and interact with. What a difference it will make in their lives and yours.


Springtime Blessings,

Betty Cutts

James is a Blessing Hand During Spring Break

How are you now. I am James. I hope you everything well. Now in Chengdu City the weather is very warm. A lot of flowers come out in spring.

Also during the winter holiday I went to Wen Chuang City to be a volunteer. It is a great experience for me. Though it I learn so many things I cannot learn form books.When help others, the feeling is so good and your heart become simple happy.

James

I wasn't able to see one of our college scholarship students in China, because he was teaching poor students in a remote area of China during his Chinese New Year holiday. I encourages me when I see one of our students putting into practice what Blessing Hands stands for. We ask our scholarship students to do a few hours of volunteer work each semester. James has gone beyond that to spend several weeks helping others.

I read recently that a scientific study had been published that showed that pleasure centers in the brain are more active when giving then getting. I guess it has finally been proven scientifically that it is better to give than to receive. Lets hope that the children he taught learned to be blessing hands also.

Pick Me!

Blessing Hands is planning a display at Adrian Doran University Center at Morehead State University the first two weeks in April. We plan to display foam board posters showing our students and pictures from our activities. The university wants to encourage diversity on campus and let their students volunteer with local nonprofits.

We plan a exhibit to showcase our students from college to primary levels. A "Giving Tree" will display student pictures in the center of dogwood blooms with the theme "Pick Me!" We hope folks will pick students from the tree to sponsor or write. Chi Omega Sorority will be sitting at a Blessing Hands information table on the second floor near the cafeteria from Monday through Wednesday (10-2 p.m.) starting March 31st.

Several local artists are volunteering to do foam board displays that will be placed on easels on the first and second floors. If you want to join the fun, we have a place for you, or just come on by and see pictures of Qinzhou and Yangshuo, China's wonderful students.

Water Projects

We asked to see schools this trip that needed pure drinking water. Our first school was Dali Primary School where one of my favorite teachers from summer camp teaches. Harry, as we named him, brought his little daughter with him everyday to summer English camp and wanted to learn English so much. She was quiet as a mouse.

His school only has water for a few hours a day before the hand dug wells go dry. I say wells because there are two of them. The bucket is for when the electric pump doesn't work.

The water is pumped to a holding tank until faucets are turned on. The bright red characters warn not to drink the water. I fear they drink it anyway. We have some proposals under consideration that will allow schools to have filtered and boiled water from deep drilled wells. Perhaps you would like to drill a well for a school. Just think of the difference that would make in the children's health and the outlook of the whole school.

The first school we hope to help has a well that is contaminated by an uphill school toilet and the cultivation of nearby fields with pesticides and other chemicals. We hope to raise money for this project to begin this spring.

You might be interested to see how they flush the rural toilets with a water drip system that fills a bucket that finally tips to pour through the concrete out house. Eastern squat toilets are strange to us, but they are much more sanitary than sitting.





Boiled water is precious. At Puyi Primary School each child had their own cup stored on the wall with the boiled water container nearby. Bottled water is expensive, but they always offer it to us when we visit the schools, especially in the summer.

A Vist to He Jinhua's Home

While I was in Yangshuo recently a teacher arranged for me to visit the home of one of our students, He Jinhua. She has been a Blessing Hands student since the fall of 2005 when we first began supporting the students of Anding Primary School. One of the teachers who attended our summer English camp taught there and submitted a list of students in the school who could not afford their tuitions.

In the summer 2006, our summer group held an eyeglass clinic, and He Jinhua was there for her well child physcial and eyeglass exam. The group also visited her school and found it badly in need of repairs and needing a water system. Nina Ottinger of Founding Family Charitable Foundation was with us that trip and took it as her foundation's project to repair the school and help them finish the water system. The winter of 2007, Nina and I returned to the school to see the repairs and greet the students.

I always noticed Jinhua because she had such distinctive eyes, so I was delighted to be invited to her home. Her father was home for Chinese New Year, but his boss had refused to pay him for cutting wood. Many migrant workers are cheated this way. Jinhua lives with her elderly grandmother, since her mother left when she was very small. Her uncle went out of the village to work ten years ago and has never been heard from again.

Jinhua has now graduated to lower middle school at Gaotian National School. A national school is usually for minorities, and there are many Zhaung people in her area. It took us a long time to get to her home from her school. That is why she probably is a boarding student. Her home was the first house by the ancient village gate, so her family has lived there a long time I was told.

We were invited to sit on small stools by a wood fire, the only heat in the home. They had electricity that supplied light from bulbs when evening came. Neighbors came by to visit, and Mr. He invited us to stay for supper and spend the New Year holiday with them.

Jinhua, whose name means golden flower, was delighted to have us visiting. She eagerly showed me their kitchen and her bedroom. She had decorated her bedroom with lovely folded paper birds and streamers. A light bulb hung from the ceiling along with a yellow curled fish. Mosquito netting and bars on the window protected her bed. Just she and her grandmother live in the big old house.

The lean to kitchen has a wooden cutting board and fire pit. Food is bought fresh each day so there is no need for cold storage. They sit on low stools while cooking. In a nearby window was all they needed to start the day including tooth brushes and paste, incense sticks, and other unknown creams or medicines.

We felt very warm and welcomed in their home, although we could not spare the time to stay for a meal or overnight. They understood that I had relatives at home waiting for me too.

We are announcing a new newsletter that has more functions. People who confirm their interest in our newsletter can choose from different languages for their news. If people are not interested, they can easily unsubscribe. We want all our supporters to receive our news voluntarily. By putting the newsletter in both English, simplified Chinese, and traditional Chinese, we are attempting to reach more people who might want to hear about our kids. We plan a new web page that will allow people to sign up for our newsletter. We will also use Google Earth to allow sponsors to see where the schools are located. Senior students at Morehead State University are working on assembling a database that will make access to information easier from our website. We will be able to show pictures of students who need college scholarships and Middle School tuitions. This will give a new way to help our students with their educational expenses.

Blessing Hands January Newsletter

Good News: It was in the news lately that the Chinese government is planning to help the children in the first nine grades with more school expenses such as textbooks and other expenses. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2008-01/07/content_6376070.htm. Poor boarding students in these grades will also have some subsidy increases. This is good news for our lower middle school students who were really pressed to pay for textbooks and room and board. We have been giving them $25 a semester in help for these expenses. As the government steps up to give more aid, we can step back and begin looking at other ways to help our students or increase support for higher middle school students who don’t receive any help from the government.

Bad News: I know that children are suffering in China both in the city and rural areas. The article below tells of the problems of the rural poor. Migrant worker’s children are especially having problems.

“The World Bank’s estimate of the number of poor people in China was tripled to 300 million from 100 million last month, after a new survey of prices altered the picture of what a dollar can buy"

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/world/asia/13china.html?ex=1200891600&en=

28299bd0a3c1a97b&ei=5070&emc=eta1

Trip to China: Carolyn Franzini from Sister Cities and I will be leaving for China on the 17^th of January. Carolyn will stay two weeks extra to study Chinese, but I will return on the 31^st. While we are there I will be exploring the new subsidy changes and developing a proposal for future Blessing Hands assistance to our children. We may change some of our support based on new developments, and I will need to make a report to the Blessing Hands Board and donors on our possible future goals.

Visiting with Students: We will be visiting in Nanning, the capital of Guangxi Province, with seven of our Blessing Hands scholarship students who attend various colleges there and renewing friendships with former visiting scholars who have come to Morehead State University.

In Qinzhou we have timed our trip to attend the gathering of the students as they receive their spring tuitions. I always enjoy meeting the students and matching personalities with pictures. We will have used books to give away that have generously been sent by a donor to arrive in time for the gathering. Anna Liu is trying to get them all T-shirts with the Blessing Hands logo.

In Yangshuo we will be visiting Sister Schools and Blessing Hands children in their homes and schools. We will also have a gathering there and hope to meet most of the college scholarship students from that area who will come home for Chinese New Year. Mrs. Wei has three days of touring the schools and viewing student needs arranged for us.

Water Purification: We hope to survey the Yangshuo rural schools for water needs while we are in Yangshuo this time. We have set aside a day to do that. I know that many schools do not have any water source and others have inadequate water. Sometimes there is a simple fix for these problems such as using pottery pots to filter the water. Other schools might need a well dug or pipes to bring water to the school. During a stop in Hong Kong we will be meeting with a man who often assists with water purification projects in China and is interested in the poor.

Scholarship Interviews: We will also be interviewing senior students for next year’s college scholarships. We don’t plan to go to China this coming summer because of the Olympics, so this trip will be the only opportunity to interview students in person.

New Look to the Blog: I was so busy this fall that I made very few blog entries. Lately I have been catching up and the blog has a new format. I encourage you to check it out. http://blessinghands.blogspot.com. It even has rotating pictures.

Website and Database Development: MSU students will be helping us again this spring with our web presence. I will be taking a borrowed GPS device with me to China in an effort to locate the schools more accurately on a Google Earth overlay. While the web build is going on, the home page is located at http://blessinghands.us.

Pen pals and sponsors: A new friend has sent Blessing Hands a pen pal matching program he developed that should make it easier to match pen pals. While I am in China, I will be emphasizing the importance of pen pals and encouraging students to have e-mail addresses. I attended a Chinese Christian conference after Christmas and found many new friends interested in Chinese children. Thanks to all of you new pen pals and sponsors who are writing to our students. During the conference, I always seemed to be sitting down by people I must have been ordained to meet.

Sponsors and donors needed: We sure do appreciate all of our donors, but we need more. Feel free to pass this newsletter on to people with soft hearts. Consider reaching deeper into your own pockets as I have done into mine. Checks should be made to Blessing Hands and mailed to 106 Timber Lane, Morehead, KY 40251, or you can donate by credit card with a button on our blog mentioned above. Support for a higher middle school student is now $80 a semester because of the drop in the value of the dollar against the yuan. The students need your help.

Donate with the button on this page or make checks to Blessing Hands, 106 Timber Lane, Morehead, KY. 40351

http://blessinghands.blogspot.com/ or blessinghands@gmail.com or http://www.blessinghands.us

Anna Tells How Blessed It is to Give

Anna is one of the first students who received our scholarships in 2006. She is in her second year of college now.

Dear Betty,

I forgot to tell you a significant thing in my last mail. That is, about a week ago, one of my roommates found an appalling article when she surfed the internet. The writer uses many pictures to present the extremely hardness lives of some children in the poor family. They even have not enough clothes worn in so cold winter. She was so moved and told our whole room members. The next day we picked up our clothes which we seldom wear and collected them together. We even asked our professors to help us. Finally we posted those clothes according to the address gave in that article. When we finished this all, so blessedness we are!

Although our ability is not strong enough to do more, we did what we can do. Helping others really makes one feel contented. I am so happy that I can do something for them. Then, I spent some time to think of my own life. Apparently, I am not the most unfortunate one, I have a beatific family and all of us are healthy. So, I should not complain all the time but ought to endeavor for myself, for my family, also, for others! This is my honorable duty! I will try. All along.

Anna

James Does Volunteer Work During his Holiday

James, one of our college scholarship students, wrote recently to tell me he could not meet me in Yangshuo while I was there on the 28th of January. He is volunteering as a teacher in a minority village near his college. I am delighted that he is being a Blessing Hand to others. Just as he has received he is now giving. His slightly edited letter is below.

Dear Betty

How are you now. Last week I went to Wenchuan City and Longxi Xiang Town, some villages, to inspect the primary school. They are Qiang nation people, an old nation in China history.

When the school lesson is over, I will go there to be a volunteer teacher to teach them something about law with 50 students from all over China. Some of them from North of China University and some of them from West of China University.

I think it is important to help the children in the poor district. They cannot have enough food to eat. Also their civilization is different from ours. Their clothing is beautiful which is made by themselves.

I will go on the day 2008/01/25 and come back Chengdu on the day on 2008/02/02.
Best wishes for you.

Yours,

James

2008/01/10

Youfen Sends Thanks,

Youfen from Qinzhou No. 1 Middle School has sent Blessing Hands a lovely hand beaded thank you. She must have worked hours on it, since it is very large. She also sent 13 necklaces and bracelets that she had beaded. We feel her warm thanks for sure. She is in the third year of high school as we count grades in the USA.

In her letter she says:

I don't have any money to buy gift to your and I don't think buy gift is a good idea to thanks, so I decide to make some things to your. I know this things is worthless things, but it stand for my thankgivng heart. It's meaningful. I hope you can like it.

Newsletter for December

Blessing Hands - December Newsletter

COOPERATION WITH MSU: Morehead State University encourages their students to get practical experience through their initiatives to help local nonprofits. A senior student, Brandi Adams, did our 990 tax report under the supervision of her teacher, Ms. Deborah Madden. Three campus social clubs helped us advertise our two Pizza Hut nights that gathered enough to support two senior students for a semester. Two MSU Chinese graduate students, Dorothy Juran and Abby Lou, designed the new logo featured here.

Senior students, Jessica Garrish, Bill Crain, Miranda Cox, and I are working on a new web page and database that will allow all our information to be retrieved from the internet in both public and private ways. We have edited all our student’s pictures past and present and coded them by schools. It is such a big job that the project will be extended to next semester. Jessica is also working on a Google Earth overlay that will feature our Blessing Hands students and hopefully attract new donors and sponsors.

SPONSORS NEEDED: Forty-eight of our students have active sponsors. We also really appreciate those that are supporting our seven male college scholarship students. Some pay extra for their student’s room and board or actually visit their students. Nina Ottinger from Founding Family Charitable Foundation just returned from China where she visited her sponsored children in Yangshuo and checked on the Blessing Hands students who received FFCF eyeglasses in Qinzhou. Her traveling companion, Anita Wherry, was delighted to meet her own two students.

What a dream come true to finally meet my special students, May and Lily. They enthusiastically greeted me by name. We exchanged gifts, but their thank you letters written in English are my greatest treasure. I left that day determined to be a better pen pal and financial supporter. –Anita Wherry

About four hundred of our students need sponsors not only to support them financially but to feed their soul with friendships through e-mail or letters. We support them through program funds but how much better it would be if each had caring sponsors. Please consider sponsoring one of our students. Unfortunately the dropping of the dollar against the yuan has forced the board to raise the support for high school students to $80 a semester. The middle school support will remain $25 while primary children still get $10 a semester. Their tuition is paid by the government now, so what we give them goes for room and board or school supplies and books.

VOLUNTEER REPORTS: Our college students are sending in reports about their volunteer service. We have encouraged them to be Blessing Hands by creating a Zhu Fu Zhi Shou online Google Group for them to exchange ideas and report their volunteer service. Feng Min is volunteering in an AIDS service project at her medical school. Guilian, Daolin, Katie, Hong Joy, and Cherry helped older citizens, while Bamboo and Chong volunteered with children. I wish I could include all of Chong’s delightful description of her tutoring experience with a primary migrant boy displaced in the city.

Being with him reminded me of my primary school years, when I was naive. We had a very happy time in the morning. I treated him as my little brother. His academic performance is not very good. Every Saturday I will go to his primary school during this semester and learn together with him and answer academic questions he encounters. This semester I will be his volunteer tutor. - Chong

Several of our college students have sent pictures to illustrate their volunteer service

Make checks to Blessing Hands. Mail to 106 Timber Lane, Morehead, KY. 40351

Tel- 606-784-4785.

blessinghands@gmail.com or http://blessing-hands.org or http://picasaweb.google.com/blessinghands

Chong Begins her Volunteer Service

Blessing Hands asks our college scholarship students to voluntarily perform some service project of three hours each semester and report it to encourage projects by other students. We want them to have the joy of giving and receiving blessings as a Blessing Hands representative.

Chong, who is studying to be a teacher, has volunteered to tutor a migrant worker's child more than three hours this semester. You can see from her letter below that she really enjoyed her service. I have taken out complete names for privacy and edited her letter, but the thoughts are completely hers.

Last Saturday, on October 20, I attended our school's holiday activities. The purpose of the activities is to help migrant workers and their children's learning. Migrant workers are farmers working in cities. As a result of hardships, they rarely have time to guide their children to learn; however, due to poor economic conditions, families cannot afford any tutors that teachers request. We need to help them as volunteer tutors.

We leave Guangxi University at 8:30 a.m. to start to a primary school. We will help their students. It is a small school without as much as a football field. It has a teaching building of three floors. Each floor has six classrooms, a dormitory, and two playgrounds. In this small area, they formed a school.

I was trying to help a third-year small boy. He is a scrawny little dark child who looks a bit mischievous, but he is very clever. He is called Pei. In talking to him, I understood that he is one-year-older than his smaller brother, but his learning is in the same classes. His parents are doing small businesses and are often not at home.

He keeps three rabbits and two small turtles. Every weekend for fun, he often takes the small rabbits and small turtles for sunbathing. He and I spoke of rearing the small rabbits and small turtles, discussing what they eat and what not to feed them. In particular with rabbits, we cannot give them too much water or overfed them vegetables. Otherwise they will die. His small turtles only eats lean meat and nothing else. The first time I heard of a turtle eating meat, I found it very strange.

He was very expressive and talkative. He reminded me of my primary years, when I had a naïve, romantic look. We had a very happy morning. I adopted him as my little brother for the morning. His academic performance is not very good. Every Saturday this semester I will go to his primary school and learn together with him, answering the questions he encounters some learning difficulties with. This semester I will become his volunteer tutor.

Chong

October Newsletter

College Scholarships: We now have twenty-three Blessing Hands college students studying everything from nuclear engineering to tourism. We have scholarships for thirteen female students and seven male scholarships. I am pasting in a thank you letter from one. The three scholarship students from last year have returned to their colleges also.

I'm very happy that I have got the college acceptance letter. I wait for it so long. With your help and love, my dream will come true. I promise that I will learn harder than before. I think you believe me.

I am too happy to express my mind. You are very kind for giving me a chance to go to college, how can I thank for your kindness? When I become a teacher, I will give my big love to all the students. Is that a good way?

Our supported college students have to maintain good grades and reapply in the spring for the next year. We encourage them to do a three hour service project each semester that they self-report to their Blessing Hands forum group or by e-mail to us. One of our college students, Cen Wanman (Doris), has recently won an English speaking contest and advanced to compete in the provincial contest. You can see her picture here.

Friendship Art Show: The open house for the Friendship Art show sponsored by Sister Cities of Morehead and Blessing Hands went very well. You can see that show online at http://blessing-hands.org/1-100%20paintings/index.html , and the pictures of the reception are located at http://picasaweb.google.com/blessinghands/FriendshipArtShowReception .

The paintings are for sale with the proceeds going to poor students in Yangshuo. Three college students from China served Chinese tea to our guests. We showed the Chinese news reel that was made of the Friendship Art Event in Yangshuo last summer. About 55 paintings are on display, and the winner, determined by a people’s choice award, will represent Yangshuo at the International Sister Cities Young Artist’s Showcase in 2008. A Chinese delegation from Yangshuo visited Morehead recently and really enjoyed our Friendship Art show.

Sister School Matches: Seven Sister Schools have now been matched with the help of the W. Paul and Lucille Caudill Little Friendship Grant. Sister Cities of Morehead, and Blessing Hands. The first batch of pen pal letters has gone out to their pen pals in China. Sister School boxes containing fine art items are being prepared for exchange between the Sister Schools. Marvin Moore, Rowan County Superintendent of Schools, greeted the Yangshuo Delegation at a luncheon at McBrayer Elementary School. Mr. Zhou, the Director of Education in Yangshuo County, toured three area Sister Schools along with Mr. Zhou from Yangshuo City Government and Mr. Wu, the former chairman of the People’s Political Consultative Conference in Yangshuo’s area. They got many new ideas from viewing our schools from elementary to college level.

Qinzhou Ingathering: Qinzhou has just finished their fall gathering of students to receive their tuition. I’ve been getting thank you notes all week. I am including one here for your pleasure.

Hello!
I am a blessinghand-student. My name is Suhui. I am from Guangxi Qinzhou Zhaixu Middle School of China. This is the first time that I write e-mail. So I am very excited.
I am very happy, because I got the money from Blessinghand. Blessinghand gives me a big help! Thank you very much, Betty! And could you make friend with me? I am expect to received your write!

Pen Pals: You can tell from this letter that the students are eager to write pen pals. If any of you would like to write one of our students by e-mail, please let us know. We have been matching them with youth groups, schools, sororities, and clubs. Nancy Sartor from Morehead would like to write to a Chinese adult. Her e-mail is pecantal@hotmail.com. She is especially enjoys quilting and needlework.

Morehead State University Student Helpers: Our Blessing Hands intern, Megan Mraz, is speaking in area schools about her experiences in Yangshuo last summer. She is available to speak to your group, if you are near Morehead. We also have two volunteers from the Students for Free Enterprise Club working on our IRS 990 form and making suggestions about our bookkeeping. Three Morehead State University computer students have taken their senior projects with Blessing Hands. They are working on creating a data base program that will help us keep up with information, improving our website, and creating a Google Earth overlay that will show all the locations of our students and schools. Our local university has a policy of encouraging practical experiences for their students with area nonprofits.

Pizza Hut Promotion: On Tuesday November 6 and 13th, Pizza Hut in Morehead will be giving a donation to Blessing Hands for every meal bought with a coupon bearing our name. Come eat with a purpose. Coupons will be given out on campus, or you can get them from Betty Cutts.

Taiwan Program: Blessing Hands has funded a trial program in Taichung, Taiwan for one year. Emily Hsu, a graduate of Asbury Seminary, is the director there. We are starting with nine children that need support for school supplies and one child that cannot afford tuition for school. Emily works with a local Taiwanese church network called the Family Church.