It all comes back to volunteer work

Hey guys!
Do you remember when you were younger and just wanted someone to talk to other than your parents or your friends, sometimes they just didnt understand? Have you ever hoped for some attention from someone, felt left out or rejected? How about hungry, cold, lonely? There are thousands of children out there that do every single day.

There are 168 hours in a week. Could you spare 1 of those hours to enrich the life of a child?

I volunteer with Big Brothers Big Sisters and I can honestly say it is the most rewarding experience of my life. I have a little girl that I see weekly. We started our friendship with the in school mentoring program and when the school year was done we would have had to say goodbye as T was moving onto high school. (The in school mentoring program is for grade 8 and under.) So we were faced with a decision, go our separate ways with the small mark we left on each other or transition into an actual Big and Little mentor program. I love T dearly and love spending time with her and she loves spending time with me. So we took the plunge. Its a huge commitment, dont get me wrong. it most certainly is not for the weak of heart. But I figured if I could spare an hour of my week at the school to see her I could up my game and see her for a couple hours a week. We make it work. obviously some weeks are more hectic than others but I wouldnt change it for the world.

T loves a variety of things, crafts and making stuff mostly. She loves new experiences and seeing new things. Shes a quick learner and whenever we go somewhere that has some educational value (which i try to do often) she is always very interested in learning all about it. She asks alot of questions, sometimes I have the answers and sometimes we get to ask people that work there (wherever we are). The butterfly conservatory was so much fun. We had butterflies all around us, landing on us and eating near us. We got to learn about the different types of butterflies, their habitats and got to see one hatch from a caterpillar!

We went to Ripley's Believe it or Not! Which was awesome, there was so much to learn there and to see. It was a rainy day and we needed a change of scenery for once. Learning about all the world records, seeing different clothing and weapons from different eras and statistics from films was so much fun.

We go for walks and look at the wonders of the world we live in. We feed the ducks, we watch the falls, and we love to people watch. There are alot of tourists in this area and we love to watch everyone go about their business as they look at the falls. We take advantage of living so close by and dont really see the beauty that is so close by. The looks on wonder and amazement on other peoples faces is so much fun to watch and brings a sense of pride to us as well.





Have any of you volunteered? Maybe not with children or in this type of setting but for anything? I would love to hear about it. I have my name on a volunteer list for the 2015 Toronto Pan Am Games. I believe this would be an amazing opportunity and would bring pride to our area having such an event this close by. I want to hear from you and your ideas on volunteering, the Pan Am games, anything!