Monday, June 18, 2012

Dream Fields

Check out this new book and DVD that was created by the Migrant Leaders Club of Mount Vernon, Washington! 

To Order the book on Amazon kindle or paperback go to: <http://dreamfieldsbook.wordpress.com/>  

It is full of poems and stories by middle and high school migrant students who want to educate others about what it’s like to walk in their shoes. Janice Blackmore and 15 students presented at our Volunteer Advocacy Training a couple weeks ago, and did an amazing job! 
They invite you to walk with them, 
hearing their stories about living as children of migrant farmworkers in Skagit Valley

Friday, June 1, 2012

beginning of my 5th summer....

June 1st: Completing FOUR YEARS at Tierra Nueva!
After quitting my case manager job and subletting my apartment to a friend, I moved up to Tierra Nueva in the summer of 2008.  Three months, was my plan.  I’ll do a full-time internship at Tierra Nueva for my MSW, and then move back down to Seattle.  Well, plans changed and I moved into a house with other girls come end of summer, in Mt. Vernon.  Now, 4 years later, I’m starting my fifth summer at Tierra Nueva. 

I'm so grateful to be here at Tierra Nueva.  I have learned so much these past years it's hard to pull into words.  I have grown in my understanding of God's unqiue and powerful involvement in this world.  I feel immensely more connected to God, experiencing what it truly means to be the branch connected to the vine of Jesus.  I can't live without Him, let alone try to minister to others, and have any positive impact without Him.  I feel increasingly rooted in grounded in who I am as God's beloved, participating with him in the work He is doing to bring His Kingdom here on earth. En la Tierra como en el Cielo.  On Earth as it is in Heaven.  I am grateful for my community here at Tierra Nueva, together learning how to seek a Tierra Nueva. 

day-in & day-out happenings:
 
       •  going to the Snow Goose Produce for their massive ice cream cones with our new interns and the Sanchez kids
       •  organizing a meeting with Mt. Vernon Law Enforcement, Juvenile Detention Center, CPS, and other service providers to address CSEC (commercially sexually exploited children & youth) in our community
       •   running into 3 people this week who are caught in the clutches of drug addiction, yet speak of hopes for treatment
       • receiving fearful phone calls from an undocumented father of 5 who is nervous about his immigration status

  planning a baby shower for a 16-year-old girl who is due in the beginning of July, worried about how she is going to pick strawberries this summer
  talking with a recently single mother of 4 with the youngest 4 months old, finding out she is unexpectedly pregnant
 hearing that the U-Visa part of VAWA (Violence Against Women Act) is potentially going to be gutted in the Act’s renewal, eliminating benefits for undocumented immigrant victims of crime.  
 writing letters with Evaristo & Alicia, helping them articulate the 'extreme hardship' that it will be if Evaristo is deported
    •  taking care of a Triqui friend’s 3 year-old daughter so she could take a class at Pregnancy Choices

 Im also continuing to enjoy being a women’s jail chaplain, co-leading Bible Studies, doing one-on-ones and just recently began corresponding via a new email system with one of the former Skagit County Jail inmates who is in Purdy.  It was fun to go into jail a couple Sundays ago, and have a woman tell me that she hasn’t had cravings for drugs since we prayed for her 3 weeks ago!  ‘The obsession is gone!’ she tells me with new light in her eyes.  'This thing works!'  
Praise the LORD! 

Elena and Araceli

Our Summer Hand-Made Sale!
Brenda enjoying an afternoon nap