All Because of a 6 Year Old

I could not wait to tell you this story.  My mind is just whirling from our day.

How do I even begin to tell how this story of how sweet the heart of a child can be?  

When we went to Bali in April of this year, we saw the poverty that existed in Indonesia.  Nothing can prepare you for the fierce reality of it until you experience it yourself.  No amount of cameras or tv shows can prepare you.  No description is graphic enough to move you the way standing right in the midst of Indonesia does.

And so that was how this story began.  I told Raelee about the children that had no toys.  And she thought long and hard about it and approached her mommy and they decided a lemonade stand might make a bit of money for toys for the children.  And she told her friends, and mommy told her friends... and so on and so on.  She had sweets donated to the cause, made signs to advertise and got prepared.  Raelee and 2 friends went about taking care of business.  They invited everyone they saw to come to their lemonade stand.  Friends came from 10 miles away to drink the lemonade.  And they earned nearly $80 US dollars!

They went to the dollar store and bought toys.  They bought lots of girl toys and mommy and Ms Jenny had to convince them to buy boy toys, too.  So they bought boy toys.  

And they had a lot of toys  :-)

Do you know how many toys $80 buys at the dollar store?  80!!  

There was also a little girl named Amanda in Washington who made some finger necklaces to share in the cause.  She had a bit of help from her sister Nicole and brother Nathan, but she was the main person making her colorful necklaces.  She shipped them halfway across America to put in the pile of goodies to be taken to Indonesia.

After the sale, the girls packaged everything up and gave it to 'granny and papa' to take back to Singapore - never imagining that Raelee would soon be here.  They were just super excited that someone was taking those children toys! 

Granny and papa brought an entire suitcase full of toys back to Singapore with the intention of handing the toys out soon.  Before that happened though, they got a call that Raelee and her mommy were coming to Singapore for a visit.  Granny had a friend named Leone that knew some people in Indonesia and soon plans were made to take the toys to an orphanage to give to the children.  Raelee and mommy came over to Singapore, and rested a bit.  Then they dug out the suitcase, loaded all of the loot in bags and took a ferry to Indonesia, a bus to Nongsupra and then a van to the Restu Ilahi orphanage.

What happened next was the most amazing 2 hours of my life.  Raelee was introduced to the children in grand fashion.  Their caretaker told the children the story about how a 6 year old, with the help of two friends, raised money to buy them gifts.  He told of how she flew to Indonesia from AMERICA to bring them the gifts.  And he let her introduce herself and finally give her gifts to the children. 

What.  A.  Feeling. 

They taught Raelee how to play a game of Mancala:

Please go back to the picture above.  Look at the man's feet.  Do you see the red curly thing there?  That is a jump rope made out of rubber bands the children use to jump 'rope' at school!  I am so glad Raelee brought them a new jump rope!

Steph played ball with them:

I honestly think the children had no idea how to play it.  When she finally took the balls out of the package, you could see a light bulb go off in their eyes.

And they taught her how to jump rope with the rubber band rope!

This young lady took her gifts and put them in the house so no one else could get them.

Raelee had made some new friends.  Even though they could not speak English, and she could not speak Indonesian, they communicated.  Smiles are the same in all languages, and children are the same in all nations. They play, they see no color and they laugh.

Soon, all too soon, it was time to say goodbye.  It was with sadness that we left, but with a feeling of doing something wonderful.  The children were smiling from ear to ear - toys in hand.

The children were very well cared for.  Their home was clean, spotless even, and they were all happy and beautiful.    However, there were no toys present, except the ones that were given to them today.  It was obvious, painfully obvious, they had probably never received a toy in their life.  They had no idea how to play with them, but Raelee took time to show them and mommy took time to help.  

Granny stood back in awe of her little grand daughter.  

And how do you replace the pride shown in this little face?

All because of a 6 year old, these children now have toys in their lives.  

And all because of a 6 year old, I will always cherish this day. 

And because of this 6 year old, my life will never be the same again.

Thank you Raelee, and thank you friends of Raelee.

And thank you Leone for finding our little friends.

Too Tired :-)

We are tired - a happy tired, but we are beat.  We all are falling over from exhaustion, so I am not going to post tonight.  I will try tomorrow, but I think it will be the day after tomorrow.  We are going to Indonesia tomorrow with Leone to an orphanage to give the toys the girls bought to the children.  Please bear with me for a couple of days.  I will be back.  


But for now, I will be resting  :-)

Smokin' Luge Runs

I forgot to say that we all went down the luge; papa and Raelee in one cart, mommy in another, and granny in the last one.


Someone thinks they 'smoked' the others twice, but there are no pictures for proof, so you will have to guess who won?


It might have been papa and Raelee.  But don't tell them I told you.

Sentosa Island

Saturday we took Raelee to see the pink dolphins at Sentosa.  We looked and looked for them but we couldn't find them.

We found the mosaic water feature:

He is there Troy, do you see him?

But we didn't find the pink dolphins  :-(

We found the Tiger Sky Tower:

And we saw all of Singapore from it, but we didn't find the pink dolphins  :-(


Raelee found a yellow snake:

And even let it KISS her:

But we didn't find the pink dolphins  :-(


We found Bugsingham Palace:

And lots of butterflies:

And we found BIG bugs:

And we were very glad they were stuck in a glass frame and not climbing on us - the might have CRUSHED us they were so big!

We found birds there too:

But we didn't find pink dolphins  :-(


We even found a dragon:

But it wasn't with the pink dolphins  :-(


And we found Oscar:

Who was not with the pink dolphins  :-(


Finally we found the pink dolphins - far, far away where we could not see them:

They had just been moved to their new home and are not performing yet  :-(

So we decided we just have to read about them:

Then we went to Song of the Sea:

We were sad the pink dolphins were not performing, but maybe they will be before we leave.  Until then, we had a great time looking for those guys and gals.  Don't go to Sentosa before asking if the pink dolphins are performing - you will look for them all day!  Oh, and they have moved, they are by the aquarium now  :-)


Yesterday, Raelee proclaimed a day of rest... so we rested and it was good.


We are off to Jurong Bird Park today  :-)  

Tata for now  :-)  

Off to the Science Center with Raelee

I thought about not posting this.  To most, it is just pictures of a kid wandering through a fun place.  To those that love Raelee, it is more than that.  It is looking at the sheer enjoyment, contentment and happiness in her facial expressions.  So I decided her daddy, her grandma, her aunts, her uncles and her friends needed to see her.

Please bear with me on this blog  :-)

We started off the day doing exactly what most parents would never do - we let her play in the water park at the Science Center before doing anything else.  The school children were there with the teachers (who also joined in the water fun) and they were all having a wonderful time. I couldn't believe how many children there were in this one maze.  There was no way to keep up with just ours - but thankfully there was one way in and one way out.  We didn't loose her and she had a great time burning off energy.

After drying off and using a blow dryer (they provide them at the Science Center, like at a hotel) we played with some of the exhibits.  She had so much fun just doing what she wanted to do.  

Pssst!  We didn't tell her she was learning  :-)

We found out we knew our animal sounds  :-)

She did lots of projects:

And danced with herself:

And thought mommy had lost her... body:

We learned what 3 million 500 watts of electricity sounded (and looked) like:

And so did the kids holding up the florescent bulbs no wires attached!

Today was a Raelee day.  We learned one more thing:  we MUST go back  :-)  

We did not even begin to see it all.

The end of day 3 and another day in paradise.  

I still have to pinch myself to see if I am really here.  

I am.  It hurts when I do that  :-)

And now our girls are here too.  

What a wonderful life...

I am so lucky.

Is anyone out there?