Feed My Starving Children

Confession.

I am not good at service projects. In fact, I struggle to have a servant's heart in the sense that is accepted and typically expected by society. I love to do things for people, but I sincerely struggle to hop on the service project bandwagon with a joyful and willing heart.

So a few weeks ago, when one of the guys in our Sunday School class told us about an opportunity to serve with Feed My Starving Children, Ryan signed up with glee, and I signed up because I didn't want to look like a jerk.

And in the weeks that passed between signing up, and this past Saturday when we participated, Ryan was so excited to be part of this day and I was so wondering why I was so broken that I was so not excited.

If you're not familiar with this organization {and I wasn't either until this past weekend} - the basic synopsis is that communities raise money to put together these little "manna packs" - that contain rice, soy, vitamins, and vegetables. Communities can come together to host a mobile pack, where people assemble and pack boxes of these little manna packs, which are then distributed to areas of the world where children are starving to death.

{Seriously, go to the website and read the much more detailed explanation of all these aspects...it's quite a well-oiled machine.}

So this past Saturday morning, Ryan and I headed to the church in town, where the mobile pack was being held, so we could do our part in serving!

One thing that really threw me off my game was that we'd been told before we went that you weren't allowed to wear jewelry - including wedding rings. I don't take off my wedding ring ever, unless I'm applying hand lotion or hair gel, and the maximum acceptable time for me to have it off is about 2 minutes flat. So while I refused to leave it at home, I made sure I was covered in case they made me take it off: I applied a Sharpie tattoo under my ring:

In the end, I was permitted to keep my ring on, as long as I wore a glove on that hand, but I did get in trouble for having my earring studs in my second ear piercing. :(

There were five shifts happening throughout the day at our site, and Ryan and I were part of the first shift, along with our Sunday School class. After receiving our hairnets {even Ryan had to wear a hair net - isn't that so funny???}, we went into a big room with all the other volunteers and listened to the directions for the day.

After that chat, we were ushered into the gym where the actual packing took place. A very nice lady gave us a demonstration of all the jobs available that day. One thing I really liked about their setup was that there was a minimum number of people required to serve at each station, but they did have quite a bit of flexibility built in for a handful more than the minimum to be at a station. That allowed families serving together to be able to serve together and not be broken up. This scared-of-serving-in-unfamiliar-places girl was beyond grateful.

I didn't count the number of stations set up that day, but Ryan and I guessed there might have been ten, and at each station, there were people scooping out the ingredients, measuring the weight of the bags, sealing the bags, packing the boxes, taping and labeling the boxes, carrying them out to the trailer, and replenishing the supplies at each table.

Ryan's job was to hold the bag under the funnel while the ingredient-scoopers filled it, and then he weighed the bag and gave it to me. I was a team with my friend, Marie, and we were bag-sealers. Our table was FULL of competitive people, and we were {NOT gonna lie} - a machine about cranking out the work.

Ryan with our friends, Nate and Jenna. {Nate and Ryan were in PT school together and now we all get to be in Sunday School class together!}

Marie and me - sealer team extraordinaire!

And here we are with our friend, Laura, who had the same job as Ryan.

Our shift lasted an hour and a half, and in that time, the whole big group of us {not just our table} packed something to the tune of 28,000 meals.

Each bag holds six meals' worth of food. There are 36 of these bags in one box. Just FYI.

And here is our entire entourage from Sunday School.

We learned at church yesterday that over the course of the five shifts in the entire day, our county packed 116,640 meals. {The goal was 100,000, but they had enough food and boxes to make the final count, so they just kept going until they ran out.} 753 people volunteered through the day, and the amount of meals we made will feed 319 kids every day for a year.

Even for a girl who struggles to have a servant's heart, that is pretty cool and something I'm honored to have been part of.

They also told us at church that there is a church up in northern Indiana {where our organizers actually went to observe and learn} who packed food for five straight days this year {Tuesday-Saturday} and ended up filling 11,139 boxes for a total of TWO MILLION, 406,024 meals. That will feed 6591 kids every day for a year.

I can't even wrap my mind around that.

Ryan and I are still learning, as we make our way in this life, the organizations we want to get behind and support, and I think we were in instant agreement that this is one of them. After observing their work and learning more about them, they are the real deal. They use their funds wisely and make a huge impact, one meal at a time.

Wedding ring debacle aside, I'm thankful I did this project, and I would happily serve again if they bring it back to our community. HAPPILY.

{Funny side note: after we were done, one of the ladies in our class came up to me and said "Hey you have been nominated...the University radio station is here and they need to interview someone. We think you're the logical choice." LOL!!! So even on my day off the air...I was on the air...}