Last week I upgraded the background of the Sweet Hope website.  Consequently, the stuff that made the website cool stopped working.  It gave me the opportunity to change up the site a little bit.  I liked the black and grey, but thought that brightening things up a bit would be cheery.  Granted, I went with white and grey, but hey… it’s better than black.  Now if I could get a better photo of the Mirnoe children I would be a happy camper… I might just have to ask Galina to help me out with that.

There is a new feature on the site this year.  REVIEWS.  Click on the Reviews tab at the top and leave a comment.  Your comments are like our advertising.  Sweet Hope does not pay for any advertising so word of mouth is crucial for us.  Letting new customers know how delicious the candy is helps us sell more candy.  If we go with our usual 20% increase in sales our goal for 2010 is $4680.  So we need lots of “word of mouth” (and volunteers).

One other thing we are dealing with this season is a lack of a refrigerator.  We were offered a older used refrigerator from my aunt and uncle, but my paranoia set in and I began worrying if it might break in the middle of the season like my other one did at Valentine’s day.  Therefore, we are asking for donations from our gracious Sweet Hope customers to help buy a new refrigerator.  Trust me it will come from the scratch and dent section of the Sears Outlet Store.  At this point we have no refrigerator (that can accommodate the quantity of chocolate we produce) so without the new fridge there will be no Sweet Hope sales.  If you can help (even just a little bit) we would be eternally grateful.  The cost of a new fridge is roughly $450-$500.  At the moment we have $140.  If you would like to donate (even a little bit) please do so at http://www.sweethopefoundation.org/products-page/.

Guess what I’m doing while it is 90 degrees outside.  I’m sitting by the “pool” and working on Sweet Hope.  But isn’t it August, you ask.  Why yes, yes it is.  That would be why it is 90 degrees and I’m not wearing pants.

It takes 4 months to put Sweet Hope candy sales together.  For the most part the groundwork is laid and I just repeat everything I did last year.  However, I use August to look back and figure out how I can make things more efficient.  I have the timeline finished.  I would suggest marking November 8th on your calender.  The week of September 20th should also be noted.  That is if you want to have a say in what we make this year.

The only thing I’m currently stuck on is packaging.  I want to be economical in my packaging choices so I purchase the recycled material brown kraft boxes.  They aren’t the prettiest boxes in the world,  but they’ll do.  I do have the option of changing the ribbon colors.  In years past I’ve gone with red.  It is the holidays and that seems rather festive.  I have branding for the website and the cards and pretty much everything else.  It is just that the product doesn’t match.

The candy sales are just a fundraiser portion of the whole organization.  Granted, it is how we got our start, but in the long run we don’t want it to be the only thing we do.

Here is where I need your opinion, oh 8 people who still read my blog.  Should I change the packaging?  The box options are brown kraft or gloss white.  The ribbon colors can be found here.  I use 5/8″ ribbon so I’m limited to those colors.  I’ve also considered not tying bows, but rather having labels printed with the bee to seal the boxes.

Give me your honest opinion.  You’ve given them as gifts.  I need your experience.

The area around the nursery I work in has a fairly large Russian population.  They mostly keep to themselves and somehow convince the Walgreens in the area to put up an “Apteka” sign.  Every so often we get a stray shopper in the store and every so seldom I get up the courage to at least say thank you in Russian.  That is often met with shock and further shyness.  Today was a little different.

A woman came into the store today who, when she opened her mouth, was clearly Russian.  She wasn’t like most of the Russians that frequent our establishment.  She spoke remarkable English and asked questions.  She didn’t dismiss me as this young thing that didn’t know anything.  At the end of our conversation I had to ask where she was from.  She said, “Russia.”  Well duh I knew that (I totally did not say that to her).  I asked where in Russia and she said St. Petersburg.  I told her that my son was from Russia and of course that sparked the normal conversation asking if I had married a Russian.  I told her my son was from Khabarovsk and that we adopted him.  My statement stopped this very large lady in her tracks.  She said that her father was from Khabarovsk and he was an orphan as a child.  Me telling her that we adopted this little boy from her father’s home town nearly brought her to tears.

She asked to see photos, mentioned that Oleg looked like us and when she asked his name and I told him she coyly said, “ahlezhek.”  She told me to be firm with him and not baby him too much.  She said give him a very good education while he is young and he will turn into a good man.  I have heard that from nearly every Russian woman I have encountered and I follow that advice to the tee.

I told her briefly about our work with Sweet Hope and she asked when I was in the nursery.  She wanted to come back and talk to me about it and somehow wanted to help.  Then she gave me a giant hug.

There are days that the thought of Sweet Hope makes me very tired.  It is usually about the second week of chocolate making that I stop and think, what the hell am I doing.  Then there are times like today that I remember why.  I remember that my experience in Russia and becoming a Russian (Swedish/Irish) American family is so worth it.  I thank God everyday for giving me the opportunity to create this beautiful project.  It may not be moving at the pace that I would like, but it is moving forward.  That is all I can ask for.  And as for hugs from giant Russian ladies… bring it on.

A few weeks ago I was contacted by a woman who lives in Moscow offering assistance with any translation services Sweet Hope might need.  Now I get quite a few requests from people asking for money and the like, but I’ve rarely been offered assistance.  At first I was skeptical, but upon further investigation I realized that this is 1) an actual person willing to help and 2) she was volunteering.  We like volunteers around these parts.

It just so happens that this translator contacted me right after we received the newspaper article from Galina.  I had done my rough translation of the article, but I still wanted to know exactly what it said.  I offered this to Samantha for translation along with the hand written thank you not from the Mirnoe Director.  This morning I received an email from Samantha with the translation of the thank you note.

Respectfully Lisa and Derek -

The staff and pupils of Mirnensky Social Shelter for children and young adults
thank you and your American friends for rendering your help.  We invite you
to be our guest.

Director Vorobtsova

Galina had expressed that she and the Slavyanka women would like me to com visit, but she hadn’t said anything about Natalia mentioning it.  She had only told me that she wanted to take me out to Mirnoe orphanage to see it.  It is so sweet to see that the have invited us to come.  I wish I could.  I have bags of hats, gloves and shoes in my garage (oh please please won’t you donate more) that I would like to hand deliver.  However, at the moment all of my extra cash is being used for an upcoming trip to China.  It is nice to know that we’re welcome.

As you know I received the packet of papers that told us what Galina and the director of Mirnoe Children’s Home purchased.  Oh wait, I didn’t tell you that part.  That’s right, I put it in the monthly Sweet Hope newsletter and posted something on Facebook.  You should totally subscribe (here*).  Included in that were thanks from the Slavyanka women’s society and from the orphanage and all of the receipts from the purchases.  We also received photos.  Technically I’m not supposed to post photos of the children, but I’m going to break the rules a little.

Anyway, the orphanage purchased warm clothing, shoes, medical equipment (including a new stethoscope for the doctor and nebulizers), a vacuum cleaner, candy and a digital camera.  In addition, the Slavyanka women purchased a small photo album for each of the children in the house so they can keep photos of birthdays, holidays and their friends.  Even more, Slavyanka has taken patronage of the orphanage and is appealing to the people of the territory for support.  They will work to make repairs on the building and ensure these children are looked after.

All of this is thanks to you and your generous support.  You provided a light to the world of children who would have otherwise been forgotten.

Tuesday afternoon I received a card in the mail from Galina with the newspaper article about the work that is being done in Mirnoe.  I know a man at our church who used to work for the US embassy in Moscow and speaks and reads Russian.  He served as our translator for the last packet of papers we received and I had planned on asking him again if he would translate this article.  However, you know me and my “gotta have it right now.”  I thought surely the internets would have something that could translate this for me.  Ahh teh googles knows (most) all.

I found an OCR (optical character recognition) program that reads cyrillic.  Only it doesn’t translate it.  I had to use a separate site for that.  The other challenge was the article was long so I had to break it into bits so that I could find the line breaks and what not.  That way the translator could read most of the text.

Now we all know that an online translator doesn’t work that well, but it works well enough to get the gist of what an article is trying to say.  An hour later I had the article.

The reporter interviewed Galina and she talks about how traditionally she helps us arrange a “sweet” Christmas for the children, but this year plans abruptly changed.  She mentions how she talked with the regional official and wanted to find children who desperately needed the help.  The governor said that Mirnoe would be happy to accept your help.

The part that I love is the article says:

You are not confused, the New Year has already passed.  It turns out that it is not important what day it is, but the occasion can always be found.

The article goes on to talk about the conversations between me and Galina about my confusion over where Mirnoe was and the trouble we had in getting the money there.  Since the New Year holiday had passed Slavyanka “disposed” of the money differently.  The purchased a vacuum cleaner, supplies for a medical cabinet, clothing and shoes.

The article concludes – We had the opportunity to remove these children from our memory, but the women of Slavyanka [and you] have given them a place to preserve their memories.  They will help them with building repairs.  We shall help.

This article is a reminder of the generous work all of our Sweet Hope patrons have provided.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

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*in the box on the sidebar