Riverside Alternative Christmas Fair

One of the best holiday traditions in Riverside is the Alternative Christmas Fair:

12 noon to 4 p.m. Sunday, Dec. 7, at the First Christian Church, 4055 Jurupa Ave., Riverside.

This annual gift fest offers hand-crafted wooden ornaments and jewelry, soft alpaca sweaters, carved nativity sets, breads and baked goods, sweatshirts and honor cards from Heifer International, Christmas music, fair trade coffee and bean soup. Participants include 10,000 Villages, Heifer International, and many others. Come make your holiday shopping something that helps others!

More information is available at (951) 686-0646

Growing Home

Sometimes, it comes as a surprise to people to learn that we have projects in the United States. Our U.S. projects run the gamut from small goat farm projects in the Appalachians, to urban gardening in large cities, such as Chicago. Growing Home is one of the projects we have supported and helped to become a success in the Chicago area. From their website: "Growing Home provides job training for homeless and low-income individuals in Chicago through a social enterprise business based on organic agriculture. Our program provides experiential learning opportunities and employment in the horticulture field as well as a unique job readiness curriculum that helps reintroduces participants back into the workforce." Just think about that for a moment: Growing Home helps train homeless people and those who have been released from prison, who might otherwise be without hope, to learn job skills, to learn a trade, all by growing food under the L-train! This is amazing!

To me, this has always been one of the most inspirational projects I've encountered during my first year with Heifer. I invite you to learn more at www.growinghomeinc.org

Introducing New Educational Resources for Elementary Students!

From Pre-K to Gr.6 - there are books, videos, and games for every student!

Page McBrier, New York Times Best-Selling author of Beatrice’s Goat, drew from her personal experiences with Heifer project partners to write new books for these education kits; each book is set in a different Heifer project country. The new titles now available for purchase are The Chicken and the Worm and Winter in Songming.
The Chicken and Worm is a story of friendship, innovation and humor. Warm, colorful illustrations and straight-forward, often humorous dialog introduce young readers to the idea that even the smallest creatures can work together to care for the Earth.In Winter in Songming, a boy takes his first step into manhood while his village takes a step toward self-sufficiency. This book is a delightful portrait of a community’s pulling together to build a better future.

The books can be ordered by calling (800) 422-0474.

The new resources will help teachers learn more and speak more authoritatively about hunger and extreme poverty, which afflicts more than a billion people around the world. For more information about Heifer Global Education, visit www.heifereducation.org.