A Hand Up

There are these 2 homeless men that wander around my Waterloo neighborhood picking up cans and bottles from the recycling bins and pulling things from the garbage that they may be able to sell. Every time they walk by when I am outside, they stop and say hi, calling me ma'am, saying thank you and God bless you. Honestly, these are the friendliest neighbors I've got.

Today I pull into the driveway and there they are, looking in my recycling bins while their shopping carts hang out on the street. We exchange pleasantries and they go to leave until it hits me, "Melissa, you have got to do more".

Now we have a home, food and a nice car, because of those choices we don't have many other resources but I do have a heart, a big one. So I asked the guys if they wanted to come back into my backyard to help me clean up the post-winter mess. Without any payment negotiations, they were heading back towards the gate with huge smiles on their faces. My kids and husband watched out the window as I hung out with David and James, cleaning up the trash, raking and sorting out broken toys from usable ones.

We talked about God, about homelessness, about our wonderful city and about my children. The entire time, my new friends had smiles on their faces and a spring in their steps. Towards the end of our clean up time, I asked them to wait outside while I went in for a few minutes. I packed up a bag full of apples, yogurt, 2 new toothbrushes and toothpaste, some bars of soap and a few sandwiches. Then I gave them each a $10 Tim Hortons card.

There was a hug and some tears, then David and James grabbed their carts off the front lawn and headed off down the street. While I don't feel like I did enough to change their lives, giving away a few things I had around the house is going to make a small difference and I gained two new friends in the process.

I wonder if James and David know just how big of an impact they made on my life today?

WPA Cake Auction 2011

Well, it's been a busy week in my world of cake. This morning we held a Cake and Dessert Auction at WPA to raise funds for our "Heart of a Teacher" outreach in April. With this outreach project, we are inviting local teachers from Waterloo Region to come to our place, have desserts, receive a free book, movie and fill a goodie bag full of those items teachers love to use in their class but usually have to pay for from their own pocket.

^^^Valentines Cakes made by ME!^^^

Without further ado, here are some pictures of this mornings auction...

We were blessed with so many donations:

Cupcakes from Yvonne Zensner at The Cake Box

Cake from Bonnie P

Cake and a gift certificate from Bev Kesselring of Latasia

Cake from Kathy, this one was just itching to go to a party house!

Picking up the winnings!

Excited? Scared? Wondering how he was going to hide his lemon bars from the family?

and my monkeys... wondering why the heck I was making them sit nicely when they could have been eating cake!

In the end, our WPA family was very generous, helping us to surpass our fundraising goal.

Now we have a very real and tangible way of showing the teachers in Waterloo Region how much they mean to us.

Thank you to everyone who participated.

Where Does Talent Come From?

I just finished a phone interview with Clara Kay, an editor at Cake Month magazine.

CLARA: "Is there anyone you want to thank for giving you the great cake decorating skills you have?"

ME: "God".

CLARA: "Anyone else? Teachers? Former Chefs? The Cake Boss?"

ME: "Clara, I have had many great teachers and role models over the years who have helped shape me into the baker and decorator I am today, however, the One who gave me the talent and the opportunity to practice my craft, through church and volunteer activities, who gave me the funds I needed to buy the ingredients I needed to make desserts for neighbors and friends and random people on the street, was God. I credit all my talent to Him, because He is the one who gave it to me."

CLARA: "Ok then, thank you Chef."

What do you want to bet that when this interview comes out it will say "I have had many great teachers and role models over the years who have helped shape me into the baker and decorator I am today", and nothing else? Why does it scare people when I credit what I can do to God?

Trust me, I'm not that great when I'm all on my own... I became great when I learned that what I had, I got from God and that if I used what talent I had for Him, I would only get better.