BeadforLife

Well, I'm only a week behind in posting about this one!!

Last week, the station hosted a BeadforLife "Christmas Shopping with a Purpose" open house. If you've never heard of BeadforLife, it's an organization that teaches women in Uganda to make beads, soaps and lip balm, and then they sell the products so the women can get out of poverty and take care of themselves and their families.

At the parties, 100% of the proceeds go right back to BeadforLife and according to their site, they operate their administrative expenses on 13% or less of what they receive. All the rest goes to eradicating poverty. This is the second year the station has hosted a party for them, but last year the party was the day before I left for our wedding, so I didn't get to go! I had a BLAST this year, working with all my buddies and meeting people who stopped by to say hi and to shop!

I thought I'd show you some pictures from our day. Last I heard, the stations party generated $18,000 in sales, and we'll soon find out how many online sales {party stayed open a week after the actual open house} also went toward it. That's pretty amazing!!!

The beads are actually made from paper. They are intricate and gorgeous - and there are all shades of every color.

They have necklaces, bracelets, and earrings in a variety of styles...

And they go with anything. I have five bracelets that I wear together as a collection, and I usually wear them at least three times a week. Worthwhile investment!

I love all their stuff, but the neutrals are my favorite. They're rich and stunning...

 Hadn't seen this style before. I love chunky bracelets, so these were fun!

 A treasure trove of the multi-colored strings....

 Hands down, my favorite bracelet style was this one. If I owned one of these in every color...

 Lynne's favorite lip balm...

 DARLING jewelry pouches. I managed to remember to only shop for GIFTS. Not for BEKAH.

 Soaps...

 Baskets...

 One of my most favorite pictures I took that day:

 For the party, they arranged all the jewelry by color and there was a table for each color family. Kind of like shopping at Charming Charlie's. :) This was the blue table.

We were open from 11-7 and had probably over 400 people come through in those hours. And as a little treat...we had some yummies from Fort Wayne Chocolate Fountain.

All in all - a very fun day and we loved being able to help the women of Uganda!