A walk in their shoes

A walk in their shoes... I end this CAS experience with the most meaningful experience i've had in this CAS journey. At the beginning of February, a couple of friends and I took the challenge of the Lady Bug foundation walk. This was an extreamly meaningful experience for we were able to finnaly get a sense of what its like to be homeless. As we walked through the streets of winnipeg i realised how unfortunate it is to be out in the cold with barely anything to keep you warm. I usually dont wear socks and this day was no exception. I wont lie, by the end of the walk i felt that feet were frozen! I almost started complaining but then i realised how idiotic of me to complain when this was the purpose of the walk. This has defenetly been a life changing moment for me for it has encouraged me to keep doing what i do. This experience also lead to us meeting Hannah Taylor, the founder of the Ladybug Foundation. Overall, it was nice to see that there are a lot of people that want to make a differnce in the community.

As a final thought: Its time to take action, dont ever underestimate the differences you can make, it can be a lot more than you think. Be the change!

Esperanza for Free The Children

This past year, i helped initiate another hat sale at our school to help raise money for Free The Children. Initially, the idea came as a result of theWe Day event that came to Winnipeg a couple of months ago. Unfortunetly i did not take part of this even. This event insipered young people like us to came a difference in our community. As a result my friends and I took the initiative to knitt more hats so that we could raise money for this cause. When i first started knitting with my parents, my parents got into the habit of also making scarfs. Through this, i wanted to develop even further my knitting skills by helping them to make a few sets of scarfs and hats. This is one of the reasons why this new hat sale was unique from the first one we had for the Japan earthquake. Overall, the hat sale was a succes, we helped raise $700 towards Free The Children.
This just goes to show the development of our skills and how we continue our desires to make a difference.

Homeless does not mean Hopeless

Its been a long way since we first started knitting these hats. Its been a fufilling experience to be able to make a difference in our community. This in particular has inpacted my life greatly for helping my community had never crossed my mind before i entered the IB program. Overall we made 220 hats that were donated to Siloam Mission which were distributed over new years eve. Unfortunetly, we never got to see the faces of the recepients; however we have the satisfation that 220 of Winnipegs homeless were going to be warm in this past winter. In the last 2 months i saw two homeless people with our hats. I cannot begin to express how happy i was to see the impact that a simple hat can do in a persons life. I honestly do not regret spending countless hours knitting to bring hope to those who desperatly need it. As a result, this experience has deffenetly chaged the way i feel about homeless people and hopefully i can continue to keep this group and cause going for years to come.

http://watch.ctv.ca/news/#clip587572

The above link will direct you to CTV National with a small report made of the Esperanza project as well as the delivery of our hats.

CTC Camp

CTC Camp

Summer 2011.

This summer i was given the opportunity to spend most of my summer volunteering at Calvary Temple Camp. This was a very enjoyable experience for me for it allowed me to interact not only with staff members but with campers as well. Through this experience, i tried to get as much involved as possible. In light of a my decent amount of skills with crafts, i was given the opportunity to be in charge of arts and crafts. Also, i tried getting involved with being a councellor for the boys week. Overall, being at CTC Camp made me realise how productive my summer was as oppossed to sitting at home doing absolutely nothing!

FTJ

Helping out with FTJ Theatre Jeunesse has been an amazing experience for me. Through my high school years, i have been involved with what we know as FTJ which is our school's French theatre group. Each year we perfom a different play in hope of winning first place at the FTJ competetion. In the past two years, our group has been able to being awarded with several acting as well as lights and sound effects awards. In light of our small group, we have come build up a strong relationship with one another seing that it is a French speaking experience. FTJ 2011 in particular had an important inpact within my CAS experience. Through practices, we had several incidents that nearly threatened our chances of even performing at all that year. We struggled with actors deciding to drop their rolls as well as the lack of time we got to practice our play. Thankfully, even with last minute changes to our cast crew, we were able to pull it off. It was defently a big challange; however through this we learned that commitement and perceverance can lead to succes!