Haiti

A lot of emotions have been twirling around in my brain since news of the 7.0 earthquake in Port-au-Prince. Deep, utter despair when news broke. Anxiety not knowing the status of our girls at House of Hope. Relief when I heard all the girls were safe. Fear after hearing a security wall caved and one of the support beams of the building were damaged.

Devastation is widespread. It's all over the news; pictures and video footage show people trapped under tons of concrete or being hauled away to trash dumpsters.

However, every day I thank God for keeping so many people I know safe. All the girls are fine. The orphanage director and his family, though their house was destroyed, are alive. Most of the staff and nannies, though all of their homes were destroyed, are accounted for. The school that began construction last year is unharmed. For now, the orphanage has food and water. The US has made a strong commitment, as have many other countries, to do whatever they can to aid the Haitian people.

So while it is inevitable that the news will slowly stop coverage of Haiti's capital, and many people will eventually forget about the devastation, I will keep Haiti in my thoughts and prayers.

It's a bird! It's a.... plane?

This isn't the first time I've blogged about knitting. Anyone who knows me knows I like to knit. And I like to think that my knitting skills have evolved in the two years I've been an active "knitter".

My most recently project was to be a gift for my nephew Caden. He (well, his dad, anyway) has a thing for airplanes. And I found the cutest pattern for a knitted toy airplane. I did some variation on the color, but overall, I followed the pattern to a T. As you can see, my version did not turn out quite as cute as the pattern.

Contrary to popular belief, those are propellers on the front, not a mustache.

Needless to say, this one will not become a gift. Most likely, Kevin will use it as chew toy. He'd probably rip off those propellers faster than you can say "747". But that's ok. I just need to start thinking of it as my first knitted dog toy. On the other hand, there are organizations that accept donations of hand-knitted hats for newborns. I wonder if there is an organization similar that accepts donations of hand-knitted other things, like airplanes with mustaches. Either way, it was a learning experience, right?