Extreme Room Makeover for Sick kids

From the Des Moines Register:

For six years, Nancy Berg of Waukee couldn't get the idea out of her head.

In 2002, she read about an Ohio-based nonprofit that redecorated bedrooms for sick kids. Since then, the mother of three kept revisiting the concept, believing a similar project was her purpose in life.

A tragic accident finally put her dream into action.

Berg initially contacted the Ohio group after reading about its work, but discovered starting a nonprofit is cumbersome. She needed a business plan and a foundation, and the Ohio nonprofit wanted a share of her proceeds.

Still, she held the idea.

"I'd bring it up every two or three months to somebody," said Berg, who works in public relations. She wanted to help, not only children with illnesses but also those who had been injured in an accident or who were dealing with disabilities.

"I just have a passion to do something better and do something for the community where I live, and I'm good at organizing and love decorating and painting," she said.

"Kids are my passion and going over the top for their bedrooms is my little pet project."

Finally, her friend, Amy Brown, decided to help. She said the words that kicked Berg into action: "Let's find a project."

Berg said she thought about a recent e-mail she'd received about a teacher who had been in a car accident. Berg realized she already knew the family who might benefit.

They decided to call their new organization Project Dream Space.

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Before April 11, 2007, the Julseth family of Earlham had plans to move to a different house, a home where each of the children could have a bedroom.

A car accident changed that.

Jacy, then 6, was in the hospital for nearly a month afterward, healing in a full-body cast. Robin, his mom, a Waukee elementary school teacher, was in the hospital for more than a month.

"Jacy lacerated his intestines, groin, liver, and broke his back and had multiple fractures," Robin said. "I had multiple fractures to my hip. I was trapped under the dashboard. ... I broke my ankle and heel. ... They had trouble getting my foot out. And I have tons of nerve damage."

Suddenly, the family had new plans to follow: a long schedule of surgeries.

They had a pile of hospital bills and Robin was confined to a wheelchair. A new house was nowhere on the agenda. Instead, she and her son were literally stuck in their old house. He wasn't allowed to go outside and her injuries kept her in the chair.

"Just getting outside and enjoying the sunlight was not something we could do," she said.

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Berg arranged to meet the Julseths in May.

"Amy and I walked through the door and Jacy said, 'Are you here to paint my room?' " Berg said.

Berg had hopes for an even bigger improvement. She had mentioned the project to a builder, D.J. Schad of Destination Homes. Their sons played on the same soccer team.

"I approached (Schad) and I said, 'I have three plans. Plan one is to build a bedroom.' And the builder said, 'Done,' " she said.

Berg's to-do list grew longer from there.

They repainted the house, resided the exterior, added landscaping, replaced the windows and turned the porch into an entryway and closet.

"Jacy loves science and space, so they gave him his own little laboratory with a sink and a fridge where he can do experiments," Robin said. Project Dream Space decorated the room with a picture of Einstein and his famous discovery, "E=mc."

His sister, Addison, received a room makeover, too. The team painted her room with a woodland princess scene.

While the accident disrupted life for months, Robin said the family has been blessed, not only with the makeover but also with support from friends and family who helped keep the household in order while Robin was recovering.

Living in the improved space has eased the stress of adjusting to the accident.

"It's wonderful," Robin said. "Because of the accident, it takes a couple of years to settle the insurance.

You have to wait until the surgeries are done until you get a settlement. So there would be no way we could move.... And (paying for) all my equipment, the wheelchair, ramps, bathroom shower chair.

"We were thinking, 'this is how it will be for two years, and it'll be tight.'"

Instead, their old home feels almost like a new one.

"It's wonderful," Robin said. "It was a load off our heads. It looks like a brand new house on the inside.

"We're at home now."

Which is more than Berg had hoped to achieve with her first project. She's now fundraising and seeking kids to help with Project Dream Space. She is also seeking people to form a board of directors for the organization and leadership team.

She hopes to eventually expand the organization to tackle projects throughout central Iowa.

"I want a stash of funds for the accidents and sudden situations that come up, so we're able to help a child immediately," she said. "I also want to have some funds on hand where we can help children that are new to a wheelchair or have a long-term illness."

Catholics exercise every Sunday

Whenever I've brought non-Catholics to Mass, I always hear the remark about all the standing, sitting, kneeling, and more standing. I try to explain the reasoning behind the different postures for prayer, but this report from ABCnews.com adds a new twist:

Scientists Say Just Standing Up May Be as Important as Exercise

Scientists have found intriguing evidence that one major reason so many people are overweight these days may be as close as the seat of their pants. Literally. According to the researchers, most of us sit too much.

In most cases, exercise alone, according to a team of scientists at the University of Missouri, isn't enough to take off those added pounds. The problem, they say, is that all the stuff we've heard the last few years about weight control left one key factor out of the equation. When we sit, the researchers found, the enzymes that are responsible for burning fat just shut down.

This goes way beyond the common sense assumption that people who sit too much are less active and thus less able to keep their weight under control. It turns out that sitting for hours at a time, as so many of us do in these days of ubiquitous computers and electronic games and 24-hour television, attacks the body in ways that have not been well understood.

The Need to Putter

"It was hard to believe at first," said Marc Hamilton, associate professor of biomedical sciences at the University of Missouri-Columbia and leader of the research team. He said the team didn't expect to find a strong signal when they began researching what happens to fat when we remain seated. But the effect, both in laboratory animals and humans, turned out to be huge.

The solution, Hamilton said, is to stand up and "putter."

The research was published this month in the peer-reviewed journal Diabetes, and it will be presented by Hamilton's post-doctoral researcher, Theodore Zderic, at the upcoming Second International Congress on Physical Activity and Public Health in Amsterdam.

Hamilton is not suggesting that anyone quit exercising. But he says his work shows that exercise alone won't get the job done. We have to pay more attention to what's happening when we aren't in the gym, because the body's ability to dispose of fat virtually shuts down, he says, at least if we're sitting down.

Hamilton recruited a few laboratory rats and pigs, as well as about a dozen human volunteers, including himself, to learn more about the physiological effect of sitting. The lab animals laid the foundation for the research in two different experiments. The animals were injected with a small amount of fat that contained a radioactive tracer so the researchers could determine what happened to the fat.

"What's the fate of that fat?" Hamilton asked during a telephone interview. "Is it burned up by the muscle?"

The radioactive tracer revealed that when the animals were sitting down, the fat did not remain in the blood vessels that pass through the muscles, where it could be burned. Instead, it was captured by the adipose tissue, a type of connective tissue where globules of fat are stored. That tissue is found around organs such as the kidneys, so it's not really where you want to see the fat end up.

The researchers also took a close look at a fat-splitting enzyme, called lipase, that is critical to the body's ability to break down fat.

After the animals remained seated for several hours, "the enzyme was suppressed down to 10 percent of normal," Hamilton said. "It's just virtually shut off."

The results from the animal studies were very convincing, he said, and human experiments were just as compelling. The researchers injected a small needle into the muscles of the human volunteers and extracted a small sample for biopsy. Once again, the enzyme was suppressed while the humans remained seated. That resulted in retention of fat, and it also resulted in lower HDL, the "good cholesterol," and an overall reduction in the metabolic rate.

You Need to Move Those Legs

The implications, Hamilton said, are clear. While much thought has been given to the good effects of regular exercise, scientists have not paid enough attention to what happens during the rest of the time when we may be fairly active but are probably sitting too much. That could help explain the rising tide of obesity, because people tend to sit more these days than they did a half century ago. Not to mention eating too much and getting precious little exercise.

Some might argue that playing video games, or even working at the computer, involves movement of the upper body, especially the hands and arms, so that's not really inactive. But Hamilton counters that arms don't weigh very much, and the big muscles in the human body which are so critical to burning fat are located in our legs and back.

"When we think about the postural muscles that are mostly in the legs and back, these are big, powerful muscles," he said. "We're talking probably 20 pounds of muscle in each leg. That's a lot of muscle that can be engaged in routine activities," including burning fat. But they can't do that without the enzyme that is suppressed while seated.

Much is still not known, including such fundamental issues as how long the effect lasts from getting up and moving around for a while, but Hamilton expects the answers to come fairly soon.

"There is going to be a flood of research on this in the next couple of years, and not just by us," he said. "This has raised the attention of a lot of great scientists around the world who have begun doing their own studies."

In the meantime, he suggests, we do the obvious. Take the time to get up and "putter" for a while. If his research turns out to be on the mark, it could save your life.

On February 18, 2008...

This Monday, February 18th, 2008 . . .

This Monday, February 18th, 2008 Wendy and I will embark on our journey to break a World Record. As the Muslims say, insha'allah. God-willing.

Tonight I read the story of Clarence and Mayme Vail who got married back during the Presidency of Calvin Coolidge and are still going strong. Mayme's advice on building a strong marriage? "You've got to have patience."

It's hard to imagine anyone looking back at our wedding year and saying in amazement, "You got married when George W. Bush was President?!?!?!" Though, I guess that can probably be said about a year from now too (perhaps with a different tone).

In any case, read about this very sweet story at The Catholic Spirit.

And, since this will probably be my last post as a bachelor, wish me luck. Say a prayer for us. I'll see you on the flipside . . . as a married man.

Rabbi Bachman says, "Get to church."

Bringing peace does not only involve donation of money to help end hunger and poverty. Nor does it only involve working on large-scale social issues. Sometimes it makes a world of difference to make a difference in just one soul.

I'm sure Rabbi Bachman has a lot of anecdotes from his life as a clergyman in New York City. This one is touching and I'm sure that Zeke will get around to visiting Church soon. Sometimes all it takes is a little reminder from a rabbi:

For the second time in a month, I couldn’t get the keys to work in our car. Apparently, some kind of computerized and magnetized process, encoded inside the keys to match a reading inside the ignition, was not working. It wasn’t in sync. The first time around, I had to pay the dealer around $95 to cut new keys and re-program the ignition, causing me more of a headache than anything else. Mainly it had to do with a security feature I wasn’t ever quite aware of until it broke down and made me realize I never would have requested it in the first place.

But the second time, I was even more annoyed. It had happened last week, just as I finished a visit with a family to plan a funeral. The day was bitter cold; the death, even worse. And I was sad and drained. To walk outside only to discover that the car didn’t work was somehow a fitting end to the day. Rather than take a cab, it seemed right to brace the unsympathetic winds and walk the distance, thinking of the weight of responsibility of the days ahead.

I had to borrow a car to head to the burial the next day, a minor inconvenience, and plotted all week long to get back to the car in order to arrange for it to be towed so I could get myself some new keys, yet again.

That moment finally came last night. Again, the cold was all around; rain clouds had begun to gather; and I was feeling generally annoyed. AAA arrived–keeping me posted with calls at five minute intervals (great customer service, I’ll add here) and then the driver pulled up. He was a young man, in a Yankees hat, and together he and I set to pushing my car out of the spot it was in so we could hook it up to the tow. “Stay low, brother, stay low,” he offered as we pushed car back and then out of its spot.

When we were finally read to roll, he said, “So you’re clergy–I noticed the sign in the window.”

“Yeah,” I said. “A rabbi.”

“A rabbi? Well alright. Doing the Lord’s work.”

And then the following fifteen minutes consisted of a streetside confession–less rabbi, more priest.

I learned about the Church he attends (when he’s not driving so much) the foods he eats (when he’s not thinking so much) and the women he chases (when he’s not praying so much). He seemed genuinely Lost in a Flood. And the wind was blowing, and the rain was getting ready to fall, and there was an urgency to his words–as if in saying them he was seeking a healing long overdue.

But he kept doubting his ability to overcome. He wouldn’t listen to my pleas for patience, for being kind to himself, for heading back to Church on Sunday no matter what. I held his hand as he reached out for me and said, “What’s your name?” (just as I remembered the famous Midrash about the Children of Israel being saved from Egypt because they remembered their Hebrew names.)

“Zeke,” he said.

“Like the Prophet Ezekiel, who dreamed of angels,” I replied. “Your name carries in its meaning the virtue of an angel. Did you know our rabbis teach us that God saved the Jewish people from Egypt because they remembered their Hebrew names?”

He stared back at me and I at him. But for the broken keys in one chariot, I never would have come face to face with Zeke in his Chariot, rigged up to tow cars on winter nights in Brooklyn.

I urged him to take Sunday off; get to church. “You have to rest, brother. It’s a commandment.”

“Saved just because of their names?” he said.

“Yeah,” I said.

“It’s powerful to know that, rabbi,” said Zeke. “I’ll be in touch.”

With whom, I suppose, depends upon where he ends up Sunday morning.

Bill Gates gives $300 million to help end poverty

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced that it would commit over $300 million towards efforts to help reduce hunger and poverty in Africa and South Asia.

Details from the LA Times:

The $306-million commitment over four years included $164.5 million to the Nairobi, Kenya-based Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa, for efforts to improve soils and help small farmers boost crop yields. The Rockefeller Foundation contributed an additional $15 million to the effort.

Smaller Gates Foundation grants will assist research on hardier rice strains, provide better irrigation methods to small farmers and help develop superior coffee beans for export.

Grants totaling $48 million, to Little Rock, Ark.-based Heifer International and CARE, in Atlanta, are meant to help dairy farmers and landless peasants in East Africa and Bangladesh improve milk quality and build access to markets.

"If we are serious about ending extreme hunger and poverty around the world, we must be serious about transforming agriculture for small farmers," Bill Gates, co-chairman of the foundation, said at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

I wish I knew more details about how the money gets to the individual farmers and how this will change agricultural practices for the better, but I'm glad to see them giving to where there is a need.

On MLK day, make peace

Found this on Beliefnet.com: Ten Ways to Bring Peace to the World.

http://www.beliefnet.com/gallery/10waystobringpeacetotheworld.html?pgIndex=0

Try them. Serve. Be the change.

$500 for every newborn. Yes, please.

Imagine having $500 in a College Savings Account from the moment you are born. Awesome!

The Christian Science Monitor recently reported that the Harold Alfond College Challenge will give $500 to families statewide to set up a college savings account:

Harold Alfond founded Dexter Shoe Co. in Maine in 1958 and shared millions of dollars to promote health and education in the state. After giving many scholarships to college-age students, "he wanted to help build aspirations for college at the front end of life," says Greg Powell, chairman of the board of the Harold Alfond Foundation. Mr. Alfond laid the groundwork for this legacy before he died in November.

How much will this cost the foundation?

The Harold Alfond Foundation expects to spend $7 million to $9 million a year, if everyone participates.

How much will the money be worth if the family continues to contribute to the account?

If a family adds $50 a month to the account and it grows at a rate of 8 percent, it would be worth $25,000 when the child turns 18, according to the Finance Authority of Maine, which administers the NextGen plans. Without additional deposits, the $500 could grow to $2,000. Tax-free withdrawals can be used for any accredited postsecondary schooling, including vocational training or occasional classes.

Other benefits?

Researchers also found in interviews that having a college savings plan encourages students to earn better grades and make more educational plans.

I think this is an awesome, very generous idea. Hats off.

"It's a great testimony to Mr. Alfond's generosity – I just wish he could have lived long enough to see the program itself started," says Scott Bullock, CEO of MaineGeneral Health.

Holy Simon Cowell in a tutu!

This is how much American Idol special last year raised for charity from the Associated Press... $129 million. Awesome! I love American Idol because of it's simple American Dream reality dumbness but I love more that they were able to do this and raise so much. I wonder if they'll be able to pull this off again:

The American public donated more than $54 million to ''Idol Gives Back,'' and corporate and matched funding brought it to $75 million, according to organizers. The money was being distributed roughly equally among the following projects in the United States and Africa.

AFRICA

Malaria No More. Will support bed net distribution, education, and monitoring to fight malaria in Liberia, Madagascar, Mali, Uganda, and Zambia.

http://www.malarianomore.org

Nothing But Nets. Will purchase and deliver long-lasting insecticide-treated bed nets to children and their mothers, provide education on malaria prevention, and train local community health workers to carry out the programs on their own.

http://www.NothingButNets.net

Save the Children. Will address major killers of children, including diarrhea and pneumonia. Serving approximately 400,000 children and more than 500,000 people in Ethiopia, Guinea, Mali, Mozambique, Sudan and Uganda.

http://www.savethechildren.org

Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Will provide support for its program focused on strengthening and expanding HIV prevention, treatment and care in South Africa's Western Cape Province.

http://www.jointheglobalfund.org

U.S. Fund for UNICEF. Will allow UNICEF to provide over 800,000 children with health care services. Additionally, nearly 500,000 students will receive an education along with school supplies.

http://www.unicefusa.org

UNITED STATES

Save The Children Federation. To expand programs in poor areas of Appalachia, the Southwest and the Gulf Coast, helping more than 11,000 children in 25 educational sites in four states.

http://www.savethechildren.org

Boys & Girls Clubs of America. Will help fund Power Hour, an after-school homework assistance program.

http://www.bgca.org

America's Second Harvest. Serves 9 million hungry children each year. Funds will be used to distribute 250 million servings of fresh fruits and vegetables and provide grants to support more than 200 community food banks.

http://www.secondharvest.org

Children's Health Fund. Will, among other projects, fund three new mobile medical units, including in New Orleans and have a special focus on the youngest victims of Hurricane Katrina.

http://www.childrenshealthfund.org

Shimon Peres: A Peaceful New Year

It's now 4:31am on the first day of 2008. I wish you all the best this year. May our strengths be made stronger and our weaknesses weaker. May our leaders answer the call for peace and may we be there to help.

Happy 2008!

I found this message for peace on Ynetnews.com:

Christian leaders attend reception at presidential residence

Aviram Zino

President Shimon Peres met Monday with the leaders of the Christian factions in Israel, in honor of the Christmas and the New Year celebrations.

"The Palestinians are not our enemy and neither is Islam," said Peres. "Terror, violence and the alliance between religious fanaticism and nuclear weapons are our – and the world's – enemies."

A merry Christmas and a happy new year (Photo: Reuters)

The religious leaders were Peres' guests for an official ceremony held at the presidential residence. "The human spirit declares science and religion to be noncontradictory, but one must separate between religion, faith and violence," added Peres.

"We all have one God, and enriched uranium wasn't one of his commandments," said the president.

Israel, promised Peres, would continue to ensure freedom of religion: "Israel will protect all its churches and will allow total freedom of religion.

"Let's make Israel the land from which a message of tolerance and love goes out to the world," added Peres. "I wish all of you a happy, peaceful, new year."