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Marco DiGiulio helps deliver wheelchairs

During this holiday season many of us who are more fortunate give to charities to help out those who are in need. Over 150 million children, teens and adults worldwide are in need of a wheelchair but cannot afford one. Our own Chief Winemaking Overlord, Marco DiGiulio, was in Belize this past weekend to help Gordon Holmes of Wine for Wheels deliver wheelchairs to the people who desperately need them. Because of the generosity of wine lovers like you, someone now has mobility and freedom. Thank you.

If you’d like to sponsor an event to benefit the Wheelchair Foundation Mission check out www.wineforwheels.org.

SOURCE: Carpe Vino

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Clyde Beal: Group of local painters support Wheelchair Foundation among many other charities

If you’ve ever had the occasion to visit HIMG on Route 60 East, you’d have to admit, it would be nearly impossible to not become attached to at least one of the beautiful watercolor paintings there. Resembling a starving artist sale, the paintings adorn the long corridors leading to various offices. With all there shapes, sizes, colors, and subject matter, they seem to provide just the right effect for those visitors shuffling to and from their scheduled appointments. If your Christmas list places you in the market for that one special painting, it’s probably hanging around at HIMG.

praise_painters

“The Praise Painters” get together on a typical Monday. 

Those paintings are all the work of a group who simply call themselves “The Praise Painters.” While the actual wall paintings at HIMG are not for sale, individual copies can be purchased by contacting Patty Dickey, who is the community resource coordinator at HIMG. Dickey said the pictures are quite popular and sales are good. “If you’re shopping for a painting as a Christmas gift, remember that it takes about a week for copies to be made,” said Dickey. Revenue from the art work sales goes into the Mountain State Wellness Fund which supports multiple non profit charities.

“Our Praise Painter group paints every Monday,” said Sunny Hammers, a retired Cabell County teacher who taught art classes for thirty years. “Our credo comes from an old Billy Joel song which goes something like: ‘It’s a pretty good crowd for a Monday, and they all come in with a smile. Cause you know it’s here that they want to be. To forget about life for a while.'”

They really don’t forget about life for a while. But come Monday mornings, they do adhere to the words of that song pretty close. They have been getting together like this for seven years now. Their number has grown from three ladies who love to paint, to over three dozen accomplished artists. They get together for the shear camaraderie that develops every time they meet. In fact, they have grown to the point that there is simply no more room for expansion.

While they do come together to paint, they are far more than the sum total of the finished art work they produce. As their paintings begin coming to life, life is being shared in its purest form.

“We’re more like family than anything else,” said Janet Vital. “We socialize, we exchange ideas, we laugh and grow together. We support each other, and all the while, we feel good about what we are about.”

Monday’s group is a diversity of skilled ladies who believe their name says it all. “We developed the name Praise Painters because we feel this is God’s work,” said Barbara Bozzay. They gather at Christ The King Lutheran Church on Route 60 East. They bring their water colors, their brushes, and their love of painting, and they share the morning. Their number is so great that the group is divided into two sessions, Thursday evenings and Monday mornings.

Most would consider the art accomplishments of this all volunteer group to be more than adequate to make a better community. However, the group feels they are capable of doing more — much more. In addition to spending hours to complete each painting, they support a number of other charitable agencies.

The group donates paintings to Faith In Action each year to help defray operating expenses. Paintings, along with paint supplies, are made into baskets that are auctioned off.

Rose Thornburg, Director of Faith in Action, says that the donated art work from The Praise Painters group is always well received.

“Their work is most professional and their donated items always do quite well when our auction begins. We need more groups like them.”

As a group, they donate three hundred dollars annually to the National Wheelchair Foundation for the purchase of two wheelchairs.

Another member of the group, Sue Hatcher, is director of an organization called Girls Place. “We meet once a week at Bates Presbyterian Church on East Pea Ridge. We invite girls between the 7th and 12th grades who need school help. We develop their self esteem, offer socialization with group crafts, and do community service projects as a group.”

Well, there you have it. A story about a group of mostly retired individuals who got together to fill the hours in their day, and ended up making their community a better place to live.

SOURCE: Herald-Dispatch

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International Wheelchair Foundation donates 35 wheelchairs to San Pedro

The International Wheelchair Foundation handed over wheelchairs to 35 people in San Pedro Town on Wednesday afternoon. The donation was made in a special ceremony at the San Pedro Town Central Park. Since 2006, The International Wheelchair Foundation has been visiting Belize and this year 206 wheelchairs will be distributed countrywide.

One of the volunteers of the International Wheelchair Foundation is Glenn Perry, who is a member of Sueño Del Mar. According to Perry, the international organization had donated over 800,000 wheelchairs in 140 countries. “Wheelchairs to us are the essence of goodness,” stated Perry. He added that, “it gives hope, it gives mobility and does not only change and individual and the family but also the community.”

The wheelchairs were assembled by the volunteers. Following the brief ceremony the wheelchairs were handed over to the residents and their families. The wheelchairs came in four different sizes and are originally made in China. Factory cost by wholesale is about US $150 but in Belize the same type of wheelchair is estimated at about $1000. The 50 volunteers are all from North Carolina in the USA. As part of their visit on the island, the San Pedro Lions hosted them to lunch just before the handing over ceremony.

SOURCE: San Pedro Sun

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Wheelchair Foundation Donates

Those of us who can move about on our own power will never know the hardships that the wheel-chair bound have to endure every day. Apart from their state of immobility, access to public facilities is rarely offered for these persons – and so they are left as outsiders. But there’s one level even more difficult than that – imagine needing a wheelchair and simply not being able to afford one. Well now, there’s a solution for at least that problem. I found out more today.

 

Jacqueline Godwin Reporting,120709d
Words cannot express the feeling of appreciation felt by the recipients of the wheel chairs. Whether they have been disabled from birth, an accident or illness many of these persons have been unable to interact with society because they have been unable to move on their own and so they remain mostly indoors, shut in and away from society.

Gill Santos, Daughter of Wheelchair Recipient
“Right now she cannot walk, she can’t stand up that long because then her foot. Now this will help her a lot because she can now go in the yard and just go around because she always keep in her room and can’t move much. This will help her go to church more and serve God now and rest. She will not feel pain anymore, like now, just to walk and so this will be a great help.”

Hermeneginda Cruz’s wheel chair is a gift from the International Wheel Chair Foundation in collaboration with Rotary International and the Rotary Club of Belize. According to the President of the Wheelchair Foundation David Behring the donations that accidentally started with his dad following an experience he had while on trip to Eastern Europe.

120710dDavid Behring, President – Wheel Chair Foundation
“And he was asked to take some medical supplies off to Bosnia and Eastern Europe and on that shipment they had wheelchairs and what he was really moved by was the fact that it was tangible and instantaneous; when they took the wheelchairs out, they took an elderly person who had been relegated to the back of the room and put that person in the wheel chair and that person moved his own self. My father said it just changed his whole opinion of wheelchairs and he said now this person has independence and the ability by themselves from point A to point B. That started ten years ago and we’ve done about 800,000. I think it is more than the rest of the world did combined in that short period.”

Jennifer Rivero, Recipient – Wheelchair
“Well first of all I want to thank my Heavenly Father and his son because without him we wouldn’t nothing. And I ask these blessings and everyone and I am very grateful for this wheelchair. It will help a lot of people in the country and so I ask blessings on those people who thought it up, who distributed it to the many who need it.”

Vinai Thummalapally, US Ambassador to Belize
“It goes to show that extraordinary things can be accomplished by ordinary people. I am stealing this line from my boss, whose life has been just this, extraordinary things can be accomplished by ordinary people and I truly believe in my heart that we are all ordinary doing extraordinary things in our own lives and once again without I would like to just thank everybody who have made this gift possible and the tremendous positive effect that this is going to have on so many lives.”

Ivan Cowo, Director of CARE Belize
“From the establishment of CARE Belize we have referred, we have referrals to the Wheelchair Foundation for the more than 100 persons who have come to CARE asking for assistance in getting a wheelchair. We have distributed, our organization in the south, Stann Creek and Toledo Districts, about 40 wheelchairs that we got from the Rotary.”

A total of two hundred and ten wheel chairs were received.

Maria Price, President – Rotary Club of Belize
“You know I feel very overwhelmed really that a group of Rotarians, because some of the them, and Wheelchair Foundation people who have a lot of things to do have taken the time out to fundraise quite a lot of money and to give to the community here and I know they do to other countries as well but for them to identify Belize this year is quite heart warming and very appreciative.

As Rotary clubs we always try to identify a community and we like to do through Rotary International, build relationships with other Rotary Clubs and they try to find out what the needs are, can they assist and we have so many Rotary Clubs all over the world. They all identify certain needs. We had the wheelchair need, we found a partner who also happens to be members of Rotary.”

Sharon Pollack, Executive Director – Helpage Belize
“And I am grateful for them because especially in the field which we are doing, the bed baths and that, we are always needing new wheelchairs and at the home too. They don’t last forever, they really don’t last forever so we always and we also try to keep some but we have a whole year.”

SOURCE: 7 Belize News

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