Motivational Monday: Caring & Community Go Hand in Hand

 If you are new to my blog and would like to know why 

I started Motivational Mondays, please go HERE.

In this day and age, when every week seems to bring with it a new disaster, whether it be the floods that have recently taken place in Canada; train derailments taking place in Quebec, Canada, or Paris, France; the devastating storms that plagued the mid west States in the US; or the recent terrorist activity that beset the Boston Marathon; the amazing sense that continues to prevail within regions marred by adversity, is a strong sense of community. People continue to reach out, lend a hand and open their doors to neighbours and strangers alike.  I am going to share with you, three such stories today.

First up is the story of Carlos Arredondo--a man who became a hero during the recent bombing in Boston.  Arredondo, a peace activist who lost his son, a military man serving in Iraq, was touring the country with a coffin filled with his son's possessions.  He was at the finish line of the Boston Marathon waiting to greet someone who was running in his son's honour.  When the explosion happened, not only did he jump in to help out the National Guard troops, police and firefighters, he also stepped in to provide help and support to a young man with a serious leg wound.  He used his own clothing to make a tourniquet to help slow the blood loss and continued to talk to him to help him keep calm as they waited for the ambulance arrive. 

Then there is Jocelyn Rempel.  Jocelyn was herself a victim of the recent flooding in Calgary.  Her home was so badly damaged it had to be condemned.  Even facing this devastation, she still reached out to others.  Rempel owns and operates a food truck and took her truck out to feed volunteers and evacuees.  Such selflessness in a bid to help out the people in her community.  Fortunately, Rempel also received assistance from a stranger.  Her food truck was hired to cater a party celebrating the Calgary Stampede.  However, what she didn't know is that the party was a fundraiser for her.

Finally we head to Newton, Connecticut in the US, where some local high school students are reaching out to help people who were affected by the tornadoes in Oklahoma.  Newton of course is no stranger itself to tragedy with the shootings that took place December last year at the Sandy Hook School.  The high school students are working in conjunction with an organization that was created to help the local children deal with the aftermath from the shooting tragedy.  A group, including 19 students along with chaperones, will be heading to Oklahoma this summer for a week during their school vacation in order to give back to others who have experienced tragedy. 

While many believe that we've become a jaded, uncaring world, it is situations like these that remind us of how many people are still out there, caring about their fellow man.  Several other people reached out to provide aid during these horrific events as well.  These three examples above are just a sprinkling of the compassion and caring that still exists in a world that is becoming more cynical.  Well, it is time to fight back and prove to these cynics, that there are still altruistic souls among us.  There are many unsung heroes that surround us each day.  It isn't always about the person who sacrifices his own life or remains behind in unfavourable conditions, to help others.  Sometimes it is clearly a matter of reaching out and helping someone to rebuild when an adverse event takes place, as the children of Newtown, CT, plan to do this summer.  It can simply be about someone opening up their home, their wallet, or in the case of Rempel, their food truck to those in need.  It can be offering words of comfort and a hand to hold like Arredondo did.  More importantly it is about people opening up their hearts.  It is acts such as these that still demonstrate, that while we can't escape from the tragedy and heartbreak that surrounds us, we can be sure that there will be those people who will stand out to show us just what heights humanity can reach.

It is the midway point in our current challenge over at the Path of Positivity.  In case you've missed it, this month's challenge revolves around the concept of CARING.  I managed to find some time yesterday to create this digital design to highlight this concept...

To create this digital design, I have used the awesome freebie that Ike from Ike's World has out right now on her blog HERE but you'll have to act really quickly because it won't be up for long.   The name of the digital image is called KRAYZEE KATZ.  So in keeping with the KRAYZEE theme, I paper pieced the cats with KRAYZEE KOLOURS that no self respecting cat would normally be seen in.  Then I digitally coloured in the noses, eyes, tails, and patterned areas of each KAT.  The digital papers I used are from Pixel Scrapper.  I am submitting this design to the Digitally Sweet Challenge blog where the theme this week is 'Anything Goes with Bright Colours'.

Next I whipped up a new sentiment on caring to use as part of my design.  If you'd like it for yourself, here you go...

If you missed the one I created last week, you can find it over on the Path of Positivity blog.  The post for the latest challenge, which I hope you will consider joining us on, along with the free sentiment can be found HERE.

As always, the quotes are much larger than appear but can easily be reduced in size without distorting the image.  I need to make them rather large because when they are imported into programs like Word or Publisher, they end up rather small and then it becomes difficult to enlarge them without affecting the quality of the image.  This quote is in png format at 300 dpi.

Just a reminder that there are also three days left to go in the voting for challenge #3.  While we've had over 200 people visit our top seven post, only 25 have voted.  So if you haven't already, I'd really appreciate you taking a moment to do so.  Voting is quick, easy and painless and if you leave a comment after voting, you have the opportunity to walk away with a digital paper created especially for you. To check out the Top Seven and cast your vote click HERE. You have until Thursday, July 18th at 11:55 pm to have your say in who walks away with the Voter's Choice prize. If everything goes according to plan, the winners for Challenge #3 will be announced next Monday.

As always, references, image details, download instructions and a summary of my terms of use can be found below.

Until next time,

 

References:
CBC News.ca. (2013). House lost to flood, Calgary woman still helps others. Available: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/house-lost-flood-calgary-woman-still-helps-others-142725978.html. Last accessed 15th July 2013.

Duke, Alan . (2013). Boston Marathon bombing heroes: Running to help. Available: http://www.cnn.com/2013/04/16/us/boston-heroes. Last accessed 15th July 2013.

Gardner, Noelle . (2013). Newtown students come together to help Oklahoma tornado victims. Available: http://www.wtnh.com/dpp/news/connecticut/newtown-students-come-together-to-help-oklahoma-tornado-victims#.UeR3fKy0RSM. Last accessed 15th July 2013.  

Fonts Used:  

• Prism
• Luvable

Click the font names to take you to a download location.  While Prism is free for commercial use, the license info for Luvable is unknown so use caution if you plan to use it on something you intend to sell. 

If you are not sure how to copy the image, check out the download instructions page.   If you haven't already, please become familiar with my terms of use found in the copyright tab at the top of this page.  Quick summary of Terms of Use:    

• Do not claim the image as your own.
• Credit 'Decosse's Dynamite Doodles' somewhere on your creation.  Use caution if you plan to sell handmade creations using this sentiment as one of the fonts is unknown.  Also, be sure to become familiar with my full terms of use.
• Do not share my images with family, friends, etc.  Additionally, do not post any images to file sharing services like Pinterest®, 4-Shared®, etc.  Instead, please direct people to my blog so they can grab the image for themselves.
• If I have signed an image, do not delete my signature.
• Leave a comment on my blog.  It is currently the only way for me to know if any of my freebies are being nabbed.  Additionally, it will help to inspire me to continue to create and offer future freebies.