Fundraising for Street Children in Ghana

The last few weeks have been filled with preparing for a fundraiser I've wanted to have to raise money for Chance for Children, the organization I work with in Ghana. The organization supports street children by providing many different programs to them and one of the ways they raise money for their program is by selling handicrafts that the children make or are learning to make. This includes batik fabric, beaded necklaces, recycled paper greeting cards, and more. I had the opportunity to host a sale at our local farmers market last weekend which was great and meant a lot of exposure to the community. Much of the preparation for this consisted of my overly ambitious goal of sewing finished products from the 48 yards of batik fabric that Alan brought back with him that had been created by the organization for sale. I figured I could raise more money by selling products like placemats, napkins, aprons, and hair ties than with just the plan fabric. But of course I came out with this overly ambitious idea before I had a real solid feeling for the amount of time a baby requires! I remained determined though and every time Eli was napping I'd run upstairs in our attic where I set up a little sewing room and I'd sew like mad not knowing if I'd get an hour or 10 minutes.



We got the word out through friends and our community here about the sale and soon enough I had a little article about the sale and NGO in 2 local publications!





The sale was a great success and we sold almost everything! Tons of people came after reading the articles and many were very excited about the work of the organization and were more than willing to purchase the crafts. I managed to raise over $1000 which felt amazing and pretty much sold out of everything! It really made me realize how living in a small community where the networks are strong and well-established can really pay off at times like this. Let's just say this kind of thing would not have happened in NYC!

Now, with the help of a local attorney who specializes in social media law, we've taken the fundraising a step further and have created a way for people to donate to CFC online! She'll be using CFC and this experience of going online to fundraise, in a workshop she's holding for local non-profit and business leaders on June 30th. This is a new experience for me and I am learning as much as I can about how to use social media to publicize a cause and spread the word about how to donate. Check out our Chipin page!