Shine The Light on Hunger

Everyone else's yard sign is at ground level. You can't miss this one - in a raised pot - it's at eye level. And everyone is asking WHERE DID YOU GET THOSE TERRIFIC SIGNS PRINTED? The answer is - of course- our buddy Matt at Bravo Signs did a dozen of them for us, just for the cause. He is all about shining the light on hunger. He does great work and is fun to work with.

In all truth it's really fun to be in the spot light....

Anne here: late one afternoon last week, Jerry Wolford photographer with News Record, and Wes Beeson dropped by Toad Hall, and found us wrapped up with the big Lighted Christmas ball, a three foot diameter sphere loaded with 1,200 multi-colored mini lights. Jerry took tons of pictures while Jonathan roped Jerry and Wes into helping us into raising the big ball. Once aloft, Jonathan's next task was to Huck Finn our News-Record friends into helping him launch three more pull lines high up in an Oak tree along Ridgeway Drive. That done, we said goodbye, set about lifting a few more Lighted Christmas balls, and had no idea where Jerry's project was going.  We saw a photo on the front page of the paper but didn't go to the website to see the slide show because we were trying to get the house decorated and get closure on some other projects around the house.  

About mid-afternoon, friends Linda and Rod called to invite us over to watch the launching of a Christmas decoration Rod dreamed up (literally).  Fortified with peppermint mochas, Rod, Linda, Jonathan and I fastened seine line, parachute cord, and one pulley to Rod's beautiful star, a five foot high three dimensional, handmade, wrapped in 800 clear mini lights.  Once launched to its full 75 feet (you can see it from Cornwallis Drive and from other points in Irving Park), I called the boys to their reward: Jerry Wolford's multi-media interpretation of the Sunset Hills Lighted Christmas balls. Jerry nailed it, it's about the fellowship, community, and sharing the abundance of our pantries with others.

Come see the lights. Bring food. Bring friends and if our front door is open, stop in.

Food Bank Service Entrance

Jonathan here: We stuck the trailer (see right) in our yard with one wheel on the curb and the other on the lawn, tilted toward Ridgeway Drive. The forecast was for rain, so friend Phil brought over their Harris Teeter tailgate tent and together we popped it up and tied it down with tent stakes. About 5:00am rain set in, so hard it woke me up.  I got up and went outside to check the trailer. Water is the enemy of non-perishable food, especially boxed cereal, rice, and pasta.  The trailer was about half full, and fortunately everything in it was still dry. I found a polypropylene tarp, lashed it over the top and sides, and went back to bed. I was so cold my teeth were rattling. 

As in years past, the majority of LCB traffic enters Ridgeway at the north (Friendly Avenue) and drives south (toward Market Street).  Three fourths of cars turn east on Madison; the rest continue to Market.  This year, in an attempt to get folks to drive the length of Ridgeway, we thought if we parked the trailer on Ridgeway that might make things easier.  As it turned out, drivers seemed puzzled when the trailer wasn't in its usual place, between the sidewalk and Madison in front of Toad Hall.  Navigating to its new location seemed hard.  Some parked alongside Madison, as in years before, got out, and walked around the corner to the trailer across from Marlene's home. Others stopped on Marlene's side of the street and walked across Ridgeway to access the trailer. Not safe.  So friends Jim and Janet offered to meet us at home after work to move the trailer to safer (and more accessible) ground. We arrived home to find the trailer, neatly and safely parked right on the curve of the corner, in plain view, complete with Harris Teeter tailgating tent tied down with tent stakes, safe and sound.  Thanks Jim and Janet.

People kept coming Sunday and Monday nights, bringing gifts of non-perishable food.  By Tuesday morning the trailer was about half full and the forecast was for rain, so before noon I stopped by, transferred bags, boxes, cans and jars to my Suburban and drove over to Potter's house.

It's been a year since I had been to Potters house. A mid-day weekday visit is as busy as it gets.  Men and women, some going some coming, some new to street life, some tired, faces worn and eyes blank; I saw a high school aged kid with a backpack and a mixed race couple. The homeless rarely walk side by side, like my wife and I do; one walks in front, the other ten or so feet behind, like a wounded person on a litter or a deer being hauled back to camp.  Truth is, they're exhausted to the point they have nothing left to give each other; couples who've lost a child feel like this.

Antonio and two other men whose names I didn't get met me at the dock before I could ring the buzzer (see sign, right).  Antonio, I learned, played football for Grimsley and graduated in 2001.  Greensboro needs more men like these men, strong, focused, servant-leaders. 

All totaled, Friends of Lighted Christmas Balls, which includes Sunset Hills neighbors and friends who attended the 7th Annual Lighted Christmas Ball Workshop, had given an abundance of nourishing, life-sustaining non-perishable food to Potter's house. 

Our goal is 10,000 pounds this year.  Help make it so.  We've got a good start, but that's where you come in.  If your life has been blessed with abundance, consider making a grocery shop using this suggested shopping list, stopping by one of several food collection points in the neighborhood, or investing cash in 2nd Harvest Food Bank of Northwest North Carolina or Greensboro Urban Ministry.  Come enjoy the Lighted Christmas Balls.  Bring your friends, family, and co-workers, and bring a bag of non-perishable food.  And share your hope with those whose hope has run dry.  Here's a map, we'll have other collection points mapped out by this weekend.

You can't read the dial on the scales just above the big box on the right.  It reads 488 pounds. 

It's raining where we live, hard.  It's 37 degrees cold.  I just went outside to check the trailer, it's already starting refilling itself.  I can't believe folks brave cold and the wet and dark of night just to put a few cans of groceries in a wet trailer.  But then, my faith is pretty small.

Lilac Drive

We saw these 5 Lighted Christmas Balls with clear lights made.  Photo looks like an Ansel Adams.  Map: http://schmap.it/kuwkur

Llamas come to Sunset Hills, see Lighted Christmas Balls

Jonathan here: Mama Llama writes a blog titled Little Llamas. She's also a raving fan of the Lighted Christmas Balls. After a long day chasing her own little llamas around the house, here's how she likes to relax:

"I recommend making some hot cocoa...putting a Christmas CD on in the car...blasting the heat and rolling down the windows...and enjoy the Magic!
She authors the Little Llamas blog and you can read what will probably be the first of many blog posts and photographs right here.

I like her blasting on the heat and rolling down all the windows idea.  We did it a little differently when our kids were little.  We played a game that went like this: It's really, really cold and we're going down the road and one of us says to the other, "so, you think you can stand the pain?," and which ever of us accepted the challenge would unroll his window and stick his bare hand outside. Followed by the one who made the bet. Suffice to say that experiencing 30 degrees farenheit at 45 mph for 10 minutes and you can probably take getting your teeth drilled with no Novocain. 

Hey, Grace Community Church has about 40 Lighted Christmas Balls lit up, thanks to Allison, Clay, Gardner, Johnnie, Justin, and Scott.  Why don't you put all your friends in your car, head on over to 643 W. Lee Street, and challenge your passengers to a little friendly game of freeze your fingers off. 

More pics from Lighted Christmas Balls workshop #7

more pics from Sunday afternoon's workshop here. 

Kerrie Orrell has a dear friend who was just diagnosed with breast cancer.  So she and her daughter set out to make a bow, cover it with pink lights, and hang it from a tree in her friend's yard. 

(Ross Martin, background, wonders if making a lighted Christmas ball while using his cell phone improves reception.)

Coming the distance to make Lighted Christmas Balls

This is Jennifer and her husband.  I can't spell his name, but it's pronounced "chess-mir." Anyway, Jennifer lives in Tampa, hangs Lighted Christmas Balls in Tampa, and visits her parents in Greensboro where she grew up.  This is maybe her third year attending the workshop.  Chesmir (sp) gets the award for coming the farthest distance to make a Lighted Christmas ball.  He's from the Czek Republic.  There area where he's from is rich in Moravian faith, history, and tradition. 

If you can't be on time, be early

My friend Buck Campbell, pictured left, was the first participant to arrive for Sunday's Lighted Christmas Ball workshop. He made four, had enough lights for more, and was one of the last guests to leave. It wouldn't surprise me to drive out to his home on McKnight Mill Road and see a dozen or more Lighted Christmas Balls. The truth is, Buck is a kid at heart, and there's no point in telling you his age because you wouldn't believe me. Buck is a member of Summit Rotary and maybe the first Chartered Life Underwriter in North Carolina.