This has been an amazing journey. The yardsale was a complete success! I personally did not have too much stuff in my house to sale so my husband and I were worried we would not be able to raise a lot of money for the Alfaro family. Amazingly enough the week before the yardsale neighbors kept dropping stuff off. Everyday we would come home and find stuff in our porch and the donations just kept coming and coming until the point when we could barely fit the stuff in our garage. We sold $600 at the yardsale plus over $100 the Christiansen family donated for their yardsale. My mom also asked for donations in New York from friends.
One night, after having the yardsale, I checked my e-mail to see if Sonia (my point of contact in Honduras) had been able to get a "real" estimate of how much it was going to cost to build the Alfaro's a house. Keep in mind that she had been trying to get one for the past month but because the Alfaro's live in the mountains it is very hard to find a "handyman" who would go out there and do and estimate. So that night I received an e-mail from her telling me it would cost $3,000. This includes materials and labor. I thought I was going to have a heart attack!!! I thought for sure I did not have that amount. I knew I had more then $1,000, which had been my original goal, but $3,000 no way. So after reading her e-mail that night about 11p I decided to count all the cash from the yardsale plus checks plus the deposits from the paypal account plus donations my mother had gathered in New York. I must have counted that cash (a lot of coins and dollar bills) over and over and over!!!! I couldn't believe it!! I knew I was miscounting. I knew I was counting an mount twice because there is no way we could have raised $3,067!!!! I just wanted to cry. I was soooo thankful to my Heavenly Father for this. I could not believe it. And because I still wasn't convinced that miracles could happen, I went to the Bank first thing in the morning to deposit all the cash and checks to see if this was real. I was so nervous standing in front to the Bank Teller, waiting for her to count all the money and give me the total. And sure enough it was a miracle!
I handed the money to my mother and she flew to Honduras July 1st (she had been planning to spend the summer in Honduras since last year). I called her the day after she was able to go meet the family. She could not find the words to express how horrible are the conditions they live in. She said that the real thing is nothing compared to the pictures posted in this blog. My mom said that the family is extremely humble and could not stop thanking her for this donation. She also mentioned that the kids have such sweet spirits. Apparently, it has become quite a famous story in the little town of "San Jose de Colinas", everyone is amazed that people from the United States is helping this family. Sonia told me that the Mayor of the town is not charging for the City to run a water supply to the house (they had no running water before). A whole bunch of high school kids helped taking all the supplies to the location. (There is only one elementary, middle and high school in this town). Ladies from the area kept bringing drinks and food to the people who are helping in the project. The story is going to be on the local T.V. news. What was originally a project for one family has become a community project. To me, this is really important because when you live in such a poor town in which people are too poor to help others within their community, the fact that this event has made them realize that if a lot of people come together and unite, amazing things can happen. I lived in this town for 2 years, so I really pray that this will be the start of many great things to come.
My mother found out that this family belongs to a local Christian Church. She was talking to a neighbor of the family who also goes to their church and mentioned to my mother that the entire Church had recently been having prayers for this family because their living conditions were so horrible. He said they had been praying so hard for a miracle to happen.
THANK YOU FOR MAKING THIS MIRACLE A REALITY FOR THE ALFARO FAMILY.
YOU made it happen!!!
Also, just to let you know, my mother has been involved in the entire process to make sure every penny is going to the family.
