First-Ever AHIR Raffle

Last week, my pal African Kelli brought to my attention Jessica's blog, "Something Nice to Talk About." Jessica splits her time between the US and Brazil and is sponsoring a raffle to help the people of Cascalheira, a small village of about 70 homes. Take a look at the village and its residents here.

Jessica will be going back in July/August and is looking for a way to raise funds to help the village, so she decided to hold a raffle on her blog. I wanted to give her a hand so I am holding a raffle to help her out as well.

The picture above shows my homemade care package of what's up for grabs if you enter the raffle:

• Six blank greeting cards with photos of Rome that I've taken on my wanderings about the city
• One teeny-tiny bottle of our homemade limoncello, which came out REALLY good this year
• One CD compilation of some of my favorite Italian tunes

If you want a shot at winning, here are the instructions:

• Each raffle ticket costs $1 USD. I know that kind of limits who can participate, but maybe those of you outside of the States, US expats in particular, have a few extra dollars laying around from a trip you might have taken in the past. I also know that some of us (me) aren't too trustworthy of our local postal service, but I hope to hide a few of my dollars well enough so they don't get ripped off in transit (fingers crossed). If you think that sounds paranoid, you haven't ever received a box of four Godiva chocolates with just one missing.

• For each dollar you send, put your name and contact information on a slip of paper or index card. Each one counts as an entry. Also write AHIR so Jessica knows you are entering to win the prize shown here.

• Send your entry to: Jessica Torok, P.O. Box 249, Mill Neck, NY 11765 USA

Jessica will let me know who wins the prize, and I'll send it out as soon as she gives me the contact info.

Lots of other great projects going on around the blogosphere lately...there is definitely a spirit of giving and sharing in the air! I mentioned my pal Kelli before. Very proud to call this superwoman my friend, a former partner in crime from our college newspaper, and now simply one of my BFFs back home. She visits various third-world countries for work and had a call for care packages to bring to the kids she will be visiting this month in Africa...she received over one thousand four hundred responses and is working like Santa Claus to sort everything out, but what she can't take this time she'll take on a future trip.

There was also a fun and unexpected number of responses to my spontaneous "Sisterhood of the Traveling Book" idea. There are actually two copies of two different books up for traveling now, so I am getting that sorted out and will have an update soon.

Have a great Monday!