Community yard sale for Japanese relief

This Saturday, I worked for the big community yard sale to raise money for Japanese earthquake and tsunami victims. (Info HERE.)

100% of the sales at our table went to the Red Cross for Japan.

I think that we did very well.

Everyone had a good time, but I got a sunburn. (Apparently, SPF 70 still isn’t enough for me….)

I got sun-burnt, but it was worth it!

This is the thank-you card that we gave to each customer.

We customized all of the thank-you cards.

Japan-zone of the yard sale.

The last of the 'Hungry Tiger' t-shirts was sold!

This baby took a toy from our table. He wouldn't give it back, so his mom had to buy it from us.

For some reason, I'm popular with Japanese toddlers.

Stylish kids.

Libby-chan came to visit us.

K-chan with her baby Mocha

I got to baby-sit Mocha.

OH, HAIL!

I was sound asleep late last night, when I suddenly woke to the sound of many, many rocks(!) hitting the window.

Andrew was not in the room, and I heard the front door open and close.

“Vandalism?”, I thought. No way.

I called for Andrew and he came rushing into the room to show me what was in this hand.

Hail stones, the size of marbles!

I’m really grateful that I explained to my ESL students last week what a hailstorm is!

In 1998, there was a hailstorm here that caused widespread damage across the city.

Even now, when a thunderstorm rolls in during spring, I watch for the green-colored hail cloud. 

At least the hail last night wasn’t big enough to dent cars or break windows!

Now I don’t feel so helpless about the situation in Japan.

My poster

I’m fighting back for my Japan!

I was feeling really helpless that I couldn’t do anything to help (I talked about it here.), but that’s changing.

Yesterday, my friend ‘K’-chan happened to run into Andrew. She and another Japanese person on our campus are making -t-shirts to raise money for the Red Cross. They needed help setting up to receive payments online, and to possible make a website (not just Facebook).

Well, I’m an art person and I’m pretty savvy with online selling via eBay.

So… Now, I’m a part of this ‘Hungry Tiger’ project.

The beginning of the website.

I worked most of today on the website, then the poster. I was careful to teach the others about using this web-building software and to be careful of copyright laws.

Tonight, a student came in from our of town to shoot a promotional video. FOR FREE!

Actually, all of us are working completely for free. The company that is printing the shirts is doing so for only $0.30 each. So, the rest of the t-shirt price will go Japan. 

I feel really grateful, because now I’m actually doing something with my hands and my minds for the people in Tohoku.

Hopefully, tonight I can sleep with peace in my mind.

Vintage Camera series – My Kodak Hawkeye Brownie

This is a continuation of the post from last week about the vintage cameras I got recently.

The next camera I would like to introduce is the Kodak Hawkeye Brownie!

This camera debuted in May 1949. (I have the flash model, but no flash attachment.)

It’s a simple box camera from the Brownie camera series. The shutter was working when I received it, but there was MOLD(!) on the lens from the inside. So, I had to completely take it apart and clean it well.

Like my Duaflex II, I loaded this camera with modern 35mm film.

35mm film inside my Hawkeye Brownie

I loaded the film late in the afternoon/early evening. After taking some shoots of Anna Belle, I headed out to the woods near my house.

Anna didn’t like having this ‘thing’ pointed at her.

I love this picture. She’s glowing!

But the moment passed quickly. Now, she looks sad.

This picture really captures the feeling of these woods.

I was trying to take a long exposure, but I moved and made it blurry.

The sun was setting. Time to go home.

Anna Belle watching the sunset.

Poverty in Kentucky

In sure that if you’ve ever turned on a TV, you know that not everything in this countryside is wonderful.

The poverty here in Kentucky is rather crushing.

Driving outside of this city, five minutes in any direction and you will see it.

My father’s wife was born in ‘down in a holler’ and grew up in a one-room house in extreme poverty. They got water from a natural spring and didn’t have electricity or a flush toilet. She and her sister are rare people to escape that life. No one else in her family has done so.

Last year, ABC News and reporter Diane Sawyer took a deeper look into the poverty and addiction stricken side to Kentucky. It’s a side of America that many choose to overlook and ignore. Diane Sawyer’s reporting on America’s forgotten children is eye-opening.

“In the hills of Central Appalachia, up winding, mountain roads, is a place where children and families face unthinkable conditions, living without what most Americans take for granted. Isolated pockets in Central Appalachia have three times the national poverty rate, an epidemic of prescription drug abuse, the shortest life span in the nation, toothlessness, cancer and chronic depression.

But also in Appalachia young fighters and dreamers filled with hope struggle to survive: a high school football superstar who sleeps in his truck; a 12-year-old who wants nothing more than her own bed and a cupboard full of food; an 18-year-old who must decide whether or not to spend the rest of his life in the coal mines; and an 11-year-old determined to save her mother’s life.