Two days left to shop & support N4A at the same time

Through August 31, 2011, Network for Africa supporters in the USA have a unique opportunity: when you order from Clever Container, 25% of your order total will be donated to N4A!

Want to know more about Clever Container?  Below, N4A supporter and Clever Container consultant Debbie Davis discusses some of the most popular items from their catalog.  Click here to download the catalog onto your computer.

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Clever Container has a lot of things to keep closets organized.  Two of our most popular are the Belt Hanger and Scarf Hanger (pg 34 in the catalog).  The scarf hanger can also be used to hold baseball caps.  The belt hanger is great if you are short on closet space because you can use it to hold 12 tank tops or camisoles by putting both straps on one hook.  

The Jewelry File (pg 34) is one of our bestsellers.  You can hang it anywhere and it has 48 pockets to hold earrings, necklaces, etc.  It keeps your jewelry organized and easily accessible.  You don't have to go rummaging through a jewelry box to find a matching earring because each pair is together in its own little pocket.  

The Handbag and Shoe Files (also on pg 34) can be used in a bunch of places in the home.  The shoe file can obviously be used in a closet to hold shoes, but it is also great for the garage or mudroom to have a place to put your shoes when you walk in the house.  The handbag file works great for kids’ clothes (to separate by day of the week...saves time in the morning when you are getting the kids ready for school because their clothes are ready to go).

The Card Cubby (pg 42) is another of my favorites.  It is like a mini-rolodex that you keep in your purse at all times to hold any gift cards or valuable coupons so that you have them with you when you need them.  This item will pay for itself because you will save money by having those coupons/gift cards with you.

The 3-Drawer Vanity (pg 20) is our #1 bestseller.  It is advertised as a bathroom organizer but it also works great in kids’ rooms for hair accessories, or in an office for office supplies.  The drawers are the perfect size for pens and other school supplies, and because it is clear, you know exactly where your office supplies are.  

The Bin Coffee (pg 15) is meant to hold coffee stuff, but also works for office supplies and the back section of it fits girls' headbands perfectly, so it would also be great for a kids room or bathroom to hold hair accessories.  

The Wraprack (pg 11) works in the kitchen to hold aluminum foil, Ziploc bags, etc, and also works on a bathroom cabinet door to hold straightening irons.  

A great solution for back-to-school clutter is the Document Boxes (pg 28).  It comes as a set of five.  One way to use them is to have one box per child and that child can put all of their school papers in their box.  This keeps the paper clutter to a minimum.  Throughout a year of school, kids end up with a lot of artwork, and they usually don't want to throw any of it away. The document boxes can be used to store the artwork after it comes off the fridge, and at the end of the year parents can go through the box of artwork with the kids and pick out their favorite pieces to keep.  The art won't be as special to the child after that much time and it would be easier to get rid of some of it.  They can also be used to store homework supplies so anything a child needs for their homework is in one spot.  

Lastly, the GripIt 3-Ring Binders (pg 24) are really cool.  They come in all different sizes to fit a purse, iPad case, sun-visor in the car.  The 3-ring binder Grip It is the special for the month of August ($15 when you buy $35).  They have rubber on the back of the little strips so they hold things very securely.

The current bestsellers are:

1. 3-Drawer Vanity pg 20

2. Car Pocket (Black/Grey) pg 36

3. Jewelry File pg 34

4. H2O Pouch pg 39

5. Shoe File pg 35

6. Magnetic Clips (Set of 3) pg 44

7. Mop & Broom Organizer pg 27

8. Scarf Hanger pg 34

9. Cart 2 Car pg 36

10. Document Boxes (Fashion Colors) pg 28

To order from Clever Container and get credit for Network for Africa, go to www.CleverContainer.com/Debbie. When you are checking out, there will be an option to Select Your Party; choose Women Helping Women: Network for Africa Fundraiser, then complete your order as usual.

Click here for further step-by-step instructions and more info on how your purchase will benefit N4A.

Thank you for having a look at Clever Container’s products and for supporting Network for Africa!

Women on the go: get organized while supporting N4A

Through August 31, 2011, Network for Africa supporters in the USA have a unique opportunity: when you order from Clever Container, 25% of your order total will be donated to N4A!

Want to know more about Clever Container? N4A director and work-from-home mom Christa Bennett shares some of her favorite Clever Container products….

(To view the links below, you may be asked to enter the Consultant ID and/or Consultant #. Enter “Debbie”.)

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Working from home means that in my office, there is always at least one pile of laundry that still hasn’t been put away from the weekend.  My work uniform is yoga leggings and a t-shirt.  The line between my family life and my work life isn’t always straight.

And I like this arrangement – but it also means I have to be careful to stay on top of keeping my work papers organized (I don’t want to lose a check from a donor in one of the aforementioned piles of laundry…).  However, I also need my papers to be easily accessible and transportable, as I sometimes work away from home, as well.

The Clever Container file tote is a perfect solution.  At 11½ x 14 x 6½, it is big enough to hold papers, folders, and even my laptop sleeve.  The tote has file rods embedded in the purse, to hold hanging file folders.  It’s great to take with me when I need to work away from home or to a meeting.  Most importantly, because it looks as pretty as a purse and has pockets for my keys, phone, & the miscellany we women always seem to be sticking in our purses, it cuts down on the number of bags I have to carry.  

Available in pink (always my pick!), jet black, and chocolate brown, $69.95.

Clever Container’s clipboard and file folders in outline bloom & French floral are practical yet chic accessories to the file tote.

Clipboard in outline bloom or French floral, $9.95 for set of 9 folders.

File folders in outline bloom or French floral, $9.95 for set of 9 folders.

To order from Clever Container and get credit for Network for Africa, go to www.CleverContainer.com/Debbie. When you are checking out, there will be an option to Select Your Party; choose Women Helping Women: Network for Africa Fundraiser, then complete your order as usual.

Click here for further step-by-step instructions and more info on how your purchase will benefit N4A.

Thank you for having a look at Clever Container’s products and for supporting Network for Africa!

Learn and Farm: The Peace Dividend in Africa

Slow Food & Network for Africa in Uganda

For most of her life it has been too dangerous for Anna to visit her family’s fields, just four miles from their home. During twenty-three years of war, Anna and her family were confined to a squalid refugee camp in Patongo, in Northern Uganda. Going to cultivate their land would have been to risk kidnap, rape and murder at the hands of the vicious Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) who lay in wait for civilians.

As parents were killed, agricultural skills were lost. Now that the LRA has moved elsewhere, a generation of survivors needs to learn from scratch how to grow their own food and rebuild their rural economy.

Network for Africa is working with partners in Patongo to create community vegetable gardens, as part of Slow Food International’s Thousand Gardens in Africa project.  The gardens will provide a source of local, sustainable food in the midst of food shortages & skyrocketing food prices in the country.  Additionally, they will recover & incorporate traditional farming techniques that were largely lost during the war. The community vegetable gardens will serve as a model, inspiring others to ‘learn and farm’.

Last week, representatives from our N4A partner organizations attended a Thousand Gardens in Africa workshop in Kampala, Uganda.  The workshop, which was sponsored by the Slow Food Foundation for Biodiversity, covered topics that will equip the community leaders to successfully implement the gardens, including:

• Agricultural management
• Education & economic management
• Group dynamics in community gardening

There were representatives from the Patongo Youth Centre, Patongo Counseling Community Outreach, Gwokke Keni, Paorinher Orphanage, and Ribbe Aye Teko.  We will keep you updated on the progress of the vegetable gardens in Patongo.

Slow Food & Network for Africa in Rwanda

Last month, Peace and Jean Paul – the Aspire Project’s CEO and project manager, respectively - met with Edie, the Ugandan Slow Food coordinator.  They discussed Slow Food’s initiatives and talked about the promotion of local, traditional food in Rwanda.  Peace and Jean Paul determined that Aspire will sponsor two demonstration gardens: the first at the Aspire compound in the Rwandan capital, Kigali, and the second in the more rural area of Rutunga, where Aspire is rolling-out a rural version of the successful Aspire project, tailored for the women and families of Rutunga.

Jean Paul also attended the Thousand Gardens workshop in Uganda this weekend.  His presence will mark the first time someone from Rwanda has attended the workshop, and Aspire is Slow Food’s only active partner organization in Rwanda.

When you order from Clever Container, N4A gets 25% of proceeds

Through August 31, 2011, Network for Africa supporters in the USA have a unique opportunity: when you order from Clever Container, 25% of your order total will be donated to N4A!

Want to know more about Clever Container? N4A director and work-from-home mom Christa Bennett shares some of her favorite Clever Container products….
(To view the links below, you may be asked to enter the Consultant ID and/or Consultant #. Enter “Debbie”.)

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In our family, there is a constant battle to keep our car looking less like an amusement park after-hours (think food wrappers and various sticky substances of unknown origin) and more like a respectable family’s transportation.

Clever Container to the rescue with a no-leak litterbag. My daughter can easily put her banana peel and empty juice box in the leak-proof bag, as opposed to dropping it beside her for us to discover, moldy, two weeks later. It can even hold yesterday’s half-empty coffee when I need to move it to make room for this morning’s cup of joe.
Available in pink (this girly mom’s favorite) or brown, $16.95.

A Clever Container car hook is another useful gadget to keep items in one place rather than getting lost or dirty on the car floor. Great for storing an extra change of clothes, backpacks, purses, and the like.
Set of two, $11.95.

To order from Clever Container and get credit for Network for Africa, go to www.CleverContainer.com/Debbie. When you are checking out, there will be an option to Select Your Party; choose Women Helping Women: Network for Africa Fundraiser, then complete your order as usual.



For further step-by-step instructions and more info on how your purchase will benefit N4A, go to our website.
Thank you for having a look at Clever Container’s products and for supporting Network for Africa!



Childcare for working mothers in Rwanda

While the women of Aspire, Network for Africa’s Rwandan partner organization, are hard-working and keen to learn, they are often distracted by their young children.  Without other care options, the mothers have no choice but to try to manage working while watching their children.  Of course, they often feel torn, as they know their children need attention and positive direction.  However, their families also desperately need the income their work provides – and the women need the new-found confidence and self-respect that their work gives them.

N4A is addressing this need for childcare for the families of Aspire.  We are currently fundraising to set up a multi-purpose nursery for the children of the Aspire women.  In addition to childcare facilities, the program will include age-appropriate education and fun activities for the children and daily breakfast and lunch.

We are excited about this opportunity that so perfectly fits N4A’s goals of equipping individuals with education and an understanding of their inherent worth and rights.

An important aspect of this approach is providing safe spaces for children to play and explore.  As N4A fundraises for the childcare program, we have already purchased playground equipment for the children.

Peace Ruzage, Aspire’s founder and CEO, emailed us this report when the swing arrived at the Aspire campus: “It is excitement and crying for who goes first!  I think the mothers are more excited than the kids.  Just wanted to make your day with these pictures.”

A merry-go-round has also been installed at Aspire.

We look forward to implementing the childcare program and seeing the children thrive as their mothers do, too.

You can donate here to support Network for Africa’s programs to provide education to women and children.  Thank you for your help.

Sudanese women offer stories of resilience

Novelist Rebecca Tinsley struggles with how to share Sudanese women's stories without spreading a sense of hopelessness. In the end she had their resilience to highlight, along with the transformational power of education.

(WOMENSENEWS)--Consider this dilemma – how do you accurately portray the lives of women in a place like Sudan without making their world seem so hopeless that most of us prefer to avert our eyes?

I faced this problem when writing my 2011 novel, "When the Stars Fall to Earth," about women and girls in Darfur who have survived their government's campaign of ethnic cleansing. I chose to write fiction so I could focus on individual stories rather than depressing statistics, and in the hopes of reaching a wider audience with these stories.

My intention was to show the resilience and resourcefulness of these African women who are facing enormous challenges. To bridge the cultural gap with female readers everywhere, I also wanted to show much we have in common, such as our discoveries of an inner strength we often don't realize we possess.

Women have such low status in Sudanese society that I could have filled a book with heartbreaking examples of discrimination. But there comes a point when even the most internationalist and sisterly reader wonders why millions of women in Sudan continue to submit to this treatment.

Many of us understand, on an intellectual level, that from the moment they are born many African girls are programmed to think they are worthless. Many of them are fed less than their brothers and they are kept home from school to work in the fields or assist their mothers with the chores.

In parts of Africa there is a 1-in-7 chance of dying in childbirth; the maternal mortality risk in a developed country like Ireland is one in 44,000. Traditional practices and village-level customs, such as forcing the widows of men who have died of AIDS to marry their brother-in-laws, often add to the spread of HIV and make a mockery of international conventions on the rights of women that may have been signed by the Sudanese government.

Discouraging Control

In Sudan traditional anti-female customs are reinforced by the local interpretation of Islam, while in other areas of Africa Christians who warn against birth control hinder women from taking control of their reproductive health.

The Sudanese government also plays a discouraging role. In 2008, for instance, in Khartoum state alone, 43,000 women and girls were charged with public indecency. The punishment for this is public flogging by a policeman or soldier who whips them, often with 100 lashes. Some of these floggings have popped up on YouTube.

The young woman's supposed crime is indecency, which often means wearing trousers. Local human rights groups say this standard is applied disproportionately to two groups: those who are ethnically black African, as opposed to Arab, and those who are on their way to or from college.

Despite this distressing backdrop, the women of Darfur display remarkable courage and determination against incredible odds to protect their children.

It never ceases to amaze me how women in a place like Sudan begin each day singing, laugh together as they walk to fetch water, find the time to braid each other's hair, care for old people with tenderness and listen to their stories. Despite a scarcity of water, and without our modern conveniences, they face the world in clean, well-maintained dresses, even when they only have two changes of clothes to their name.

Education Critical

If one theme emerges from my novel it is that educating women and girls is the key to a life free of negative traditional customs. Literacy is the best way to empower women, and we always underestimate both the need to educate women across the world and the immediate effect it has in improving lives. I have seen this for myself in the literacy project run by the charity I founded, Network for Africa, where Rwandan genocide survivors' lives are transformed when they can read and write.

The U.N. calculates that for every dollar you spend educating a girl you must spend $100 educating a boy to get the same positive effect. If we want smaller, healthier families and real economic development, our best investment is in female schooling.

For the female characters in "When the Stars Fall to Earth," and for the real women in Darfur and across Africa, the moment they access education is the point at which their lives change, their confidence grows and they take control of their future.

In refugee camps across the region, the women of Darfur are holding their families and societies together with slender arms. Their stories deserve to be told in a way that shows how much like us they are.

While we should certainly learn from the challenges they face and adapt any attempts to deliver development aid accordingly, we must not lose sight of their courageous female essence.

Buy a copy of When the Stars Fall to Earth: 100% of the author's profits are donated to Network for Africa, to help women and children who have survived genocide and war.

Article originally published at Womens eNews: http://www.womensenews.org/story/the-world/110730/sudanese-women-offer-stories-resilience?page=0,0.