If you’re from West Virginia, you are probably among the minority of people who can name the woman who started Mother’s Day, Anna Jarvis, and her Mother, Anna Reeves Jarvis.  If you’re from Grafton, WV, as I am, you couldn’t escape Mother’s Day history if you wanted to. Grafton is home to the International Mother’s Day shrine and the site of the first Sunday service honoring Mothers.  It is the pride of a city that has seen much better days. And that history has always been a source of pride for me as well.

Today, my feeling of connection springs from a different source. Because what many don’t know is that the first Mother’s Day was organized by Anna Reeves Jarvis as a day to “raise awareness of poor health conditions” in her Appalachian community, “a cause she believed would be best advocated by Mothers. She called it ‘Mother’s Work Day.’” Anna was a Mother fighting for others.

So, today I say Happy Mother’s Day with a renewed sense of pride and in the spirit that Anna Reeves Jarvis originally intended.

HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY!

I’ve seen most of the photos numerous times. I imagine that I am a lot like most of you who follow what is happening with MFFO. I look at the photos trying to get a feel for a place that I have never visited. I look at the photos trying to get to know, on some level, girls I have never met, but who I’ve come to love. Last night, I was simply missing my wife.

But the photo below stopped me in my tracks. It helped me focus and helped me go to sleep. It captures a simple moment in time. Two girls are reading a book. As a result, it clearly illustrates our mission: helping orphaned girls become powerful women.

What can you see in this photo? Call me pollyanna, but I see hope. I see the cycle of poverty being broken. “Educated girls grow into educated women, who – research shows – have healthier babies and are more likely to educate their children.” It’s the girl effect.  Writing this now has me on the verge of tears.

This photo is what MFFO is about.

This is why we’re taking action in Kenya by creating a new home for 34 girls. We believe that part of the education process is teaching girls that they DESERVE to be treated with respect. Combine an education with a healthy sense of self-worth, and you’ve powerfully changed a life. And changing the life of a girl is important. Here are some facts provided by The Girl Effect.

1. When a girl in a developing country receives seven or more years of education, she marries four years later, and has 2.2 fewer children.
2. Educated girls grow into educated women, who – research shows – have healthier babies and are more likely to educate their children.
3. When girls and women earn income, they reinvest 90 percent of it into their families, as compared to only 30 to 40 percent for a man.
4. An extra year of primary school boosts girls’ future wages by 10 to 20 percent.
5. An extra year of secondary school boosts girls’ future wages by 15 to 25 percent.

At Mothers Fighting For Others, our mission is to help orphaned girls become powerful women. And there’s a lot of work to be done. If you’d like to help, please let us know.

This is amazing news. For the last two months, we have been unable to speak freely about the work we’ve been doing behind the scenes with our US partner, Stepwise, and our Kenyan NGO partners, Sisters Arise Project, to take over the guardianship of the 34 girls so we could move them into a more suitable home. Today, it is done.

We have been unable to speak openly about this until now. But you should know that the money you have donated in the past few weeks has already been put to work. We have secured a new temporary location for the girls and have paid for four months rent in advance.

I Leave For Kenya On Thursday

The timing of this news could not be better. Although we had some concern about how the volcanic activity in Iceland might affect this trip, that now appears to be mitigated. When I arrive in Kenya, my main focus will now be:

• preparing the new facility
• purchasing the needed supplies
• and moving the girls into the their new temporary home.

This signals a whole new chapter for these girls’ lives. And we could not be more thrilled. You will now begin to see more frequent updates about exactly what we’re doing and exactly why your funds are needed and where they are going.

Thank you all for your support. My heart is filled with joy right now!

In response to this need, many have come forward to donate their services to be auctioned to raise funds to help. Our first auction raised $2,413 and Denise Ulrich, from Duluth, GA, graciously made the winning bid.

Now, we have two more packages being offered, and both auctions end Saturday, April 17 at around 8 PM PST. We are reposting these auctions to end April 20, at 2PM PST.

Package 1 – Marketing Services – Total Value Over $2,800

Epic Marketing: Newsletter Design – $1000 & up

• Design of a two page newsletter.
• Includes design, copy and images, and printer ready PDF.
• Does not include printing.

Se7en7: Identity Design  – $1500 & up

• Complete identity design package.

Honeybee Consulting: Copywriting – $375

• Three hours of copywriting services.

Package 2 – Real Estate Services – Total Value Over $3,000

Laura Monroe: Virtual Assistant – $400

• 10 hours of virtual assistant services.
• The scope includes consultation and implementation on either a project, goal, or the creation of an action plan in area of the winner’s choice.

Mike Price: Logo Design – $500

• One complete logo design, and all finished digital media formats.

Real Bird: RealBird Pro – $297

• Three years of complete RealBird Pro service.

PlanOMatic: Photo Tour – $350

• One full-service flooplan creation and photo tour.
• This service is contingent on the location of the buyer. Please contact  aaron@planomatic.com for coverage areas.

Joeanne Fossland: Business Coaching – $800

• One full month of personal and business coaching.

Brian Gardner: AgentPress Pro Membership – $150

• WordPress AgentPress Pro Membership with StudioPress.

Gina Kay Landis: Licensed BPO Specialist – $600

• 10 hours of training & consultation for an office, team or single agent.
• Instruct how to construct a value assessment BPO (and how to get more BPO’s)!

As I write this, there are no bidders, but several watchers.

Thanks to everyone above who donated their services for these auctions!

That’s what happened at REBarCamp in San Diego in November of last year. Mothers Fighting For Others, was the charity chosen to support and Jim Marks lead the charge that raised over $4,000 to support The Gift of Education. By any measure, their efforts were a huge success. But a few of the attendees wanted to do more.

Brad Carroll, from Dakno, Mike Mueller, from AreWeConnected.com, and a few others began a brainstorming session to come up with an idea to raise more money. The idea was to piece together a package of Internet-based Real Estate Marketing tools and services and auction them off to benefit MFFO. Brad Carroll took the lead in contacting the participants and negotiating the pieces of the package and about a month ago, it all came together.

As fate would have it, the timing was perfect.

An urgent situation has led to the MFFO Board of Directors deciding to create a new home for 34 orphaned girls outside of Nairobi, Kenya. And my wife, Rocky, is headed back to Kenya in a few weeks. In response to the need Maya Paveza decided to try to raise $50,000 to meet the support needs of the home in honor of her upcoming 50,000th tweet.She wants to do it before the Rocky’s return to Kenya, which coincides with the 140 Character Conference in New York, where Maya is a speaker. If the $50k isn’t raised, she won’t tweet from her @mayareguru account again. You can follow the progress by watching the #50kfor50k hashtag on Twitter. But, we really don’t want her to stop tweeting. So…

The following services are being auctioned on eBay as one package right now.

ActiveRain – $715 Total Value
One Full Year Membership with the following:

• $348 – RainMaker
• $159 – RainCamp Ticket (closest Location to winner)
• $108 – Localism Sponsorship – 1 local community
• $100 – Outside Blog (includes support)
• Feature one post of choice – (complimentary

Mike Mueller – $500 Total Value

• One Custom Facebook Business Page (Includes 2 custom built tabs)

Dakno Marketing – $2682 Total Value

• SwiftSite with 5 hours additional design customization ($925)
• SwiftBlog ($550)
• 1 Year of Hosting both the website and blog ($708)
• Posterous Blog Customization (to match the design of the site/blog) ($199)
• 6 month membership to Dakno’s AllAccess Live Training

RealEstateShows – $1562 Total Values

• A whole office account up to 50 agents.

Nicole Nicolay – $2000 Total Value

• 2 hours of one-on-one social media coaching via phone/Webinar. Coaching can be used for a specific goal or project, OR a review of current social media strategies and Web presence. Nicole will also provide you with a custom social media plan, including revised/or new goals with recommended implementation tasks.

Altos Research – $960 Total Value

• One Altos report subscription one year (provided they are within their service area)

Diverse Solutions – Value Varies

• an IDX for a year (provided they are within their service area)

Drew Meyers – $150 Total Value

• 1 hour of consulting time  – SEO, Social Media Marketing, wordpress, or whatever the person wants to talk about.

WellcomeMat – $2100 Total Value

• A 10-Pack of WellcomeMat Pro for One Year

Jay Thompson – $300 Total Value

• 2 hours of 1-on-1 consulting

Total Value – Over $11,300

All proceeds benefit Mothers Fighting For Others. MFFO is a non-profit 501c3 organization (EIN/tax ID number: 26-0320699)

This is a great package for a small real estate office as well.

The individual items could be given as prizes to Realtors® in the office and the group packages could be used in mass. Note: After we launched this auction, several other real estate service providers stepped forward to offer their services for MFFO as well. We’ll be holding a second auction with a completely different package as this one draws to a close.

Click here to view and bid on eBay!

And thank you to everyone for your amazing support!

The following is a transcript from the show, which was interrupted by a 30-minute Twitter outage and a visit by the infamous Fail Whale. It was an interesting experience to be interviewed via Twitter and we’re looking forward to the opportunity to joining Fi Brownrigg (Fi), with Herald De Paris et Cie, and Melanie Amor (Mel), with Bel Air Magazine, again soon. You can also find them on The Herald De Paris et Cie Facebook page.

(Fi) Today we are very privileged and humbled to be joined by Racquel “Rocky” Turner, mom of six, wife to one, and founder of @MFFOdotORG!

• (Rocky) Good Morning! #mffo

(Fi) Thanks for joining us to talk about #MFFO, Rocky! We’ve been looking forward to having you all weekend.

• (Rocky) Thank you so much for having me.
  

(Fi) Hey, we already have a request Are you looking for MFFO’s link? RT @FloridaSunSales: @LeMorningShow link? for @headmutha

• (Rocky) The link to the site is http://mffo.org and our current campaign is http://bit.ly/bIxZSb #mffo

(Fi) Our other host Melanie of @belairmagazine should be along shortly! But in the meantime, Rocky, why don’t I start off by asking would you tell us more about your altruistic enterprise, “Mothers Fighting For Others?”

• (Rocky) MFFO, the charity, was started in 2007 after a volunteer trip with GVN to Kenya.
  

• (Rocky) I fell in love with the girls at the orphanage, came home, started the charity so we could begin collecting funds for their education
  

• (Rocky) We started with very modest goals, just a handful of girls who were then entering high school. Our hope is to sponsor 100%

(Fi) You originally went to Kenya with GVN – is that the Global Volunteer Network?

• (Rocky) But we’ve extended beyond just their education. Our goal is to open a new orphanage and take care of 100% of their needs
  

• (Rocky) Yes, GVN is Global Volunteer Network. They place volunteers all over the world.

(mel) Gooooooood #LeMorning Everyone!! Desculpe for lateness! 3rd Monday tweeting #LMS @ Peets coffee instead of my warm nest. #ATTfail
(Fi) What was it about the girls in Kenya that so inspired you with the drive to accomplish this magnanimous task? Any particular memory?
(mel) Hi FI! Welcome Rocky–great to have you here, so me, Fi, Jes & our #LMSviewers can learn!

• (Rocky) I realized, as they followed me around, clinging to my side, they what these girls really needed was love. A mom.
  

• (Rocky) It is a bunch of memories all wrapped into one. It was overwhelmingly powerful.
  

• (Rocky) These were my words at the time: http://myjourneytoafrica.wordpress.com/2007/10/05/day-6-my-heart/

(Fi) Morning, Mel! We were just chatting about #MFFO with Rocky Turner – sorry to hear AT&T has failed you again
(mel) Thanks Fi! Bah! #ATTfail won’t hold me back from @LeMorningShow & #MFFO

• (Rocky) Hi, Mel.
  

(Fi) Wow. What a powerful post, Rocky. WIth an experience such as that, I can understand the motivation behind your inspiration for #MFFO.

• (Rocky) What is amazing is that the emotion is even stronger today. It keeps me moving through the struggles toward the goal.

(Fi) The audio on that post is just unbelievably touching. If the rest of you can listen to it, you absolutely should: http://bit.ly/d6sk72

• (Rocky) Thank you. I was in the moment. It was amazing was what my husband, @respres, had to do at the time to get that up.

(Fi) Your husband transcribed that from a recording you made while in Kenya?

• (Rocky) Forgive the typos. It’s a bit early here in LA and the first day of Spring Vacation for my kids.
  

• (Rocky) Yes, my husband had to transcribe recorded messages I sent from Kenya. It was the only way at the time. Technology has changed!

(Fi) Haha, yes, thank you so much for getting up so early in LA to join us and educate us about your cause We do appreciate that.
(mel) What a heartwarming story, Rocky–making me snap back to what is important in life!
(Fi) … so what were some of the obstacles and hurtles that you needed to clear, in creating MFFO and so forth?

• (Rocky) No! Thank you for inviting me. It’s a privilege.

• (Rocky) Well, the paperwork to create a 501c3 in the US is a bit daunting. But really, that was not hard, just tedious.
  

• (Rocky) The real obstacles for @mffodotorg are distance and culture.

(mel) Rocky, do you travel back & forth often?

• (Rocky) Last year I went to Kenya three times. I’ll be leaving for my 2nd trip this year at the end of the month.
  

• (Rocky) I am going to buy “requirements” for the girls who are in high school

• (Rocky) Requirements = school supplies, toiletries, bedding, anything and everything they need to get them through boarding school.

(mel) can people can send those things also, or do y’all prefer donations to buy those necessities?

• (Rocky) It’s way too expensive to ship. And for 99% of it, we prefer to buy it there to help the local economy.
  

• (Rocky) There are things we do collect here, small school supplies, pens, pencils, etc. But most have to be purchased in Kenya.

(Fi) Great tip, Rocky – buying there, so as to help the local market. Thank you for sharing that advice.
(mel) Any special things that they can’t get in Kenya? I would imagine we (U.S.) would have essentials you can’t buy there?

• (Rocky) No, actually, you can get anything you need in Kenya. Of course “need” often means something different here in the U.S.
  

• (Rocky) @stepwise does have trouble finding soy latte’s though.

(mel) A very true point, Rocky!

• (Rocky) we work closely with @stepwise on @mffodotorg projects with the girls.

(Fi) Haha! I can believe it, Rocky. #soylattescarcity
(mel) Back at last!!!!! Sorry for the delay, #LMS! *shaking fist at twitter*

• (Rocky) It appears Twitter is back. Did we break it?

(mel) Let’s see if we can gather what is left of our time together…
(mel) Yes, we did break Twitter! *laugh* The downfall of having a groundbreaking show on twitter- I blame you, Rocky Now, where were we?

• (Rocky) Twitter is normally VERY good to us. The community here is amazing with its support. #50kfor50k
  

(mel) I, too, have found an amazing group of people on twitter…guess how I got on @LeMorningShow?! *laugh* about 4 hours ago via web
FYI, #LMS–our Guest Host is (Rocky) –Rocky Turner (alias @headmutha) of “Mothers Fighting for Others!” – via @LeMorningShow
(mel) Rocky is building an orphanage in Kenya, & changing lives! What questions would YOU like to ask her, #LMSviewers?
(mel) For those of you just tuning into #LMS this morning–we’ve endured some twitter isssssues, & have been unable to get back to our chat!
(mel) We’d like to extend our apologies to Rocky, our #LMSguesthost, who had to get up early today! Perhaps we can beg her to come again…

• (Rocky) You don’t need to beg. I’d be happy to return. Perhaps not at 6am during spring break.
  

(mel) *LOL* Agreed, Rocky! You name the day & we will be here, excited to talk!
(mel) Well, before must gallop off @8, Rocky-can you share ways #LMSviewers can find you & learn more about #MFFO, #Kenya & how to find you?

• (Rocky) Sounds like a plan. Thank you again for having me on. I look forward to sharing more about @mffodotorg

(mel) And, we look forward to learning & sharing more with our viewers
(mel) #LMSviewers, if you had a question for Rocky & didn’t get to ask, feel free to find her @mffodotorg

To date, I’ve spent time volunteering in Brazil, Thailand and in September 2009, Ethiopia. Whilst these trips were great in terms of giving me experience of voluntary work abroad, working with other cultures, (I have some fantastic memories of the people and children I worked with) in each placement I felt something lacking and came back home feeling like it somehow hadn’t been enough, and with a sense of disappointment.

There was also the financial side, which to be honest, didn’t really bother me until my Ethiopia trip. I had paid a lot of money, approx £6,000, to the 3 organizations I went with and questioned myself as to where the money went. I came back from Ethiopia and decided I wanted to do something “more” which is why I decided to follow up on a magazine article that I’d read earlier in the year.  The article was about the lack of underwear in Africa and the problems this posed. I set about doing some research and sending emails to people who distributed underwear in Africa. My idea was to collect underwear and take them to “wherever.”

In October 2009, I found Rocky online and was introduced to Mothers Fighting For Others. Fair to say my plan was a bit flimsy at this point. Rocky was the first to reply to my email and straight off I knew here was someone who could help me. Rocky’s energy, passion and dedication to the aims of MFFO was impressive. Here was a mother of six who was working so hard to improve the lives of others, at the IDP camps and the girls I would soon get to know at Saint Monica’s. I got an email from Rocky one Saturday night at the end of November, asking if I wanted to go to Kenya as someone had canceled due to illness. There was no hesitation or wanting to think about it – I was 100% sure I wanted to go.

On January 3rd, I left my home in Scotland with 1500 items of underwear to meet Rocky, Ashley and Mary. Going to Kenya with MFFO was completely different to my other voluntary abroad experiences. I’m truly thankful that Rocky replied to my email as this allowed me to go to Kenya and be part of something really special. Standing at those IDP camps handing out underwear and talking to people one on one, will be an experience I will never forget. After we had visited all the camps, I remember saying what a brilliant day it had been and Rocky laughed and said “it gets better.”

She was right.

The reason for me going was to deliver the underwear that my family, friends, friends of friends and colleagues had collected. It was that simple. However I did not anticipate Rocky and Ashley’s dedication to the girls at Saint Monica’s to “infect” me! I can honestly say that working with Rocky and Ashley made me realize what I had been missing in my other placements. Yes, it was really hard work as we shopped till we dropped, as January is the busiest month for requirement shopping.  We were always on the go as we visited the schools to pay school fees, visits to the bank, and spending time at Saint Monica’s with the girls, but I wouldn’t change a single minute of it.

Every day brought something new, whether traveling on a matatu, or visiting a different school, or just learning the Kenyan way of life. Shopping was great fun! I likened it to a game of “hunt the treasure” as there were just some items I had no clue about, but we learned fast! In the other placements, I sometimes wondered why I was there. I felt inadequate in terms of being of use and able to contribute, but not in Kenya. Rocky and Ashley involved myself and the other volunteer, Mary, in every aspect of what they did. I didn’t want to come home. I felt I was leaving another “family” and part of myself behind.

I used three different volunteer groups for my trips to Brazil, Thailand and Ethiopia. I was trying to find that “something” with each one, but never found “it.”  Just to let you know, I’ve booked to go back to Kenya with Mothers Fighting For Others in April. I think that says it all!!

Best,
Maria Macnamara

The design change, using a unique blog framework called Headway, is part of a move to more accurately reflect what Mothers Fighting For Others has become over the last three years. At our beginning, MFFO.org was simply a small group of Mothers who wanted to write about the needs they saw in the world. The original blog format served that purpose very well and subsequent changes to the design have all reflected the move from group blog to 501(c)3 charitable organization. It’s been an amazing journey.

This redesign marks another pivotal moment in the history of MFFO.org. We’ll be talking more about that in the near future. In the meantime, take a look around. We’re not finished with the changes, by any stretch, but you should get a good feel for where we’re headed.

We’re excited.

What is important is that we’ve not only changed the look of the site, but how content from the site is featured. The changes were made for several reasons. First and foremost, we wanted to make sure that current information was placed on the front of the site with the least amount of work. Our old site format required a great deal of “hand coding” to make changes to the front page. This required a lot of work. The result – the most important part of our site didn’t get changed as often as it should have been changed.

Our new format will allow us to make changes quickly and easily and will automatically promote posts in the categories that are most relevant to our biggest projects, Inspire the Child, The Gift of Education and Underwear For Africa. In addition, we can feature the best posts from our writers with a few clicks of the mouse.

We like it and hope you do too! Cruise over to the MFFO home page to see the changes!