Where Are The Longitudinal Study Kids, Now?
So it’s early May 2019, and we’ll be meeting with our Longitudinal Study kids for the last time this academic year on the 15th of this month.
Next year, two of our kids will graduate. This just floors me. We started in 2012 with students from the 3rd, 4th and 5th grades. I’ve had the great joy of birthing a whole new family, of witnessing their journeys, of acknowledging the teeny tiny little voices that are now deep and strong. These children, well, young adults – they have my heart.
A Special Thanks To A Special Volunteer
I have a very dear friend, and sister in life who has added such an important component to our study meetings. I have been lucky enough to know and love my Janelle for 23 some years now. Janelle has been the color in my day, the keeper of my life moments, the center page of much of my world.
Janelle has always had a great desire to better the lives of little ones who struggle with hunger. She has expressed this to me for years.
When one of the teachers came to me from Emerson, crying over the fact that one of her returning students looked so gaunt and weary. She had discovered that this young man had not been eating regularly over the summer. She then checked through the school to find that his siblings were just as gaunt and weary.
Blessings In A Bag
Many of you reading our blogs are aware of the birth of Blessings in a Bag. By the next day, FLOC had found a nutritionist in order to formulate a healthy weekend meal, and within the next week, that young man had his book bag filled with the first Blessings in a Bag. We feed 160 children over each and every weekend – kids who have no resource to depend on.
What you don’t know is that my friend, my sister Janelle is the queen of this program. She goes out every month and shops for over 160 children, comes into our Study meetings, and helps our study students assemble food for these children who would not be eating but for these efforts. We have fed well over 1,200 children at this point.
Janelle’s favorite song is Fly Like an Eagle. It’s what gets her through the more difficult struggles in life.
“Feed the babies who don’t have enough to eat,
Shoe the children with no shoes on their feet,
House the people livin’ on the street”
– Steve Miller Band. Fly Like an Eagle. Capitol, 1976. Single.
Oh my dear Janelle, you are Flying Like an Eagle, and I am beyond words proud of who you are. Thank you for taking such good care of so many.
FLOC, our board, our children are simply blessed by the woman that is Janelle Stamper.