Organizando en Mexico

For the past 13 years, my husband Eric and I and our family have had the pleasure of working with Ciudad de Ángeles (City of Angels) in Cozumel, Mexico. Ciudad de Ángeles provides a home for orphaned, abandoned, abused, and needy children living in Mexico. It gives these children a safe & healthy environment based on Christian principles. Watching the girl we sponsor (Chanti) grow from a 7-year old just rescued from a dire family situation into a confident, beautiful young lady who is attending college and working part-time has been such a joy for our family. We visit Ciudad every year to spend time with her and to help at the campus.

Front Entrance to Ciudad

I was thrilled to be able to use my organizing skills at Ciudad again this year. Last year, I organized a small storage room for tools. This year, I worked in the storage room for clothing and linens. With a rapidly-changing population of growing children in 6 houses, the need to keep extra supplies and to stay organized is essential. I was very fortunate in that the room was in pretty good shape already. There was an abundance of metal shelving and storage containers in some degree of order. My challenge was to remove any stained or worn-out items and to make sure remaining items were organized for easy access. The fact that all of the current labels were in Spanish presented an additional challenge. I certainly learned a lot of new Spanish words! For example, calcetina=sock, sabana=sheet, toalla=towel. The other challenge was that I needed to use the materials they had on hand and couldn't go and buy labels or more bins.

Before

During

I realize now that I didn't get pictures of my helpers! Eric and Chanti helped, as well as a few other construction team members from Canada who were there that week to help on campus. I was so thankful for their help and would not have been able to do all of the work myself!

After

During this project, I was reminded of several principles:

• Basic organizing principles and steps are the same, no matter what or where you organize.

• It is a joy to use your skills and passion to benefit others.

• Any job is more enjoyable with friends, music, and snacks. :)