Festival of Hope

Well, we survived another year!

Even though it sounds like I am at my wits end, this honestly is the one of the highlights of my year! I love this weekend. While the weeks/months of prep are exhausting, the event itself is so exciting. I am always shocked and humbled when they want us to bring the hat booth back.

For those who haven't checked out my blog before, the Festival of Hope is put on my our local Rescue Mission as a thank you to the community and to bring more attention to what services the Rescue Mission does on a daily basis. Our local mission rocks. They have a on-site medical program, day care and many more services besides just being a shelter. They have the most loving people who work there. I love this organization more than I can say.

This festival is totally free. Local churches, organizations and loving people donate their time and supplies to this event so the people of the rescue mission can attend and not have to worry about trying to pay. This year was the biggest and best by far. When I started attending this event 4 years ago, attendance was closer to a few hundred people. This year, they estimated that attendance was 3,000-4,000 people. Amazing is all I can say.

A little background on our booth - we make hats out of grocery paper bags. We crush them up, pop them back out, roll the brim and then spray paint them. The people who attend the festival then get to decorate them however they would like. We have stickers, ribbon, foam pieces - basically anything you can stick on a hat can be used. Our first year we made 100 hats and ran out with about an hour left for the event. This year we made 500 and had a few left over.

Every year we are amazed at the response. People love these hats. We love seeing the tough guys who wouldn't be caught dead wearing something like this, take such pride in decorating the hat then wearing it for the rest of the day.

My favorite moment was on the way home. We had just loaded up the car with a bunch of girls who had come to help and Ky was in the front with me. Due to the street still being closed as they were cleaning up, we had to go out and around. We passed by a park where many homeless are known to stay. We were stopped at the light and I looked into the park and spotted him. This gentleman, who was obviously down on his luck with his possessions next to him, sitting on the edge of a plant bed holding a pink balloon and wearing one of our hats. I tapped Ky and told her to look in the park. She began to scan the crowd and I saw her eyes light up and began to tear. She had spotted him.

She looked at me and said, "He is why we do this mom. This is the reason. This makes it all worth it!"

With tears in my eyes and my throat unable to produce any sound, I shook my head in agreement. Like the first little girl I made a hat for 4 years ago whose face and smile has been burned into my heart and mind, this moment made me remember what all the hours of prep work had been for.

He is the reason. God made him. We need to love him and show him Christ through our respect, love and a hat made of paper and spray paint!