Twenty children from 3 to 12 years of age, with their moms, grandmothers and nannies, gathered at the Corte Madera Library to create postcards for the Casa de la Esperanza Orphanage in Tijuana, Mexico.  

The Hillside Church of Marin in Corte Madera sponsors this orphanage and partnered with the library for this program.

Victoria Gonzales, who works for the Marin County Free Library as the library community builder, was there to facilitate the art session alongside Lisa Rodondi.

Rodondi works with the Traveling Postcards organization and has personally delivered many handmade postcards to children all over the world.  

All the materials for the project were provided: blank postcards, colorful papers, maps, stickers, gems, lace, magazines, markers, glue sticks and more, for kids to make their one-of-a-kind creations.  The children were focused and having fun creating collage postcards that will be hand-delivered to the orphanage this Christmas.

Sisters Genevieve, 5 ¾, and Samantha, 7, were there with their nanny, because, as Samantha shared, “we wanted to do art.”  Genevieve thoughtfully said the postcards were going, “…to kids that didn’t have a mom and dad.”

Shayna, 11, came to this event with her mom because, “We saw this event when we were signing up for other activities here and thought it sounded cool and fun.”

When asked how it felt to make these postcards for an orphanage, she shared, “It felt good, I kept thinking the whole time where they were going…” Her colorful postcards had messages of hope and learning.

Colby, 4, and his sister Hayley, 6, were there with their grandmother.  Hayley told me, “I love art and I love making postcards … and I love doing (things) for homeless people and homeless dogs… I’m saving up my money for dog shelters, for lost dogs, cause we have a rescue lab … so they can get more dogs into the shelter… It feels like we’re making things (postcards) that are really, really pretty and nice for (the kids in orphanage).” 

As Colby patiently waited for his sister to finish talking, he gently added, “Me too.”

Brenna, 10, was there with her sister, Avery, 8, and their mom.  Avery told me, “it was fun,” creating postcards that read, “Happiness, be happy, Love, Avery” and “Have big dreams … with hearts, stars and an angel…”

Brenna had very special messages on her postcards.  As she showed me her cards she explained, “This one says, ‘you are fabulous don’t let anyone tell you you’re not.' This is a message to them that even though they are in an orphanage and their life might not be that great at the moment, they have to focus on how cool and nice they really are.  And, my other one says, ‘love others, love yourself,’ because you need to love yourself to do well and you need to love others to do well… (This experience) was fun and very morale boosting too.”

The hour was filled with the joy of children thoughtfully creating fun, meaningful messages for children they will likely never meet.  The room was filled with love and compassion, which will soon be delivered to an orphanage far away. 

Until next Wednesday, remember, it is all “for the love of kids…”

In joy, Marilyn 

For more information about Caroline Lovell’s grass roots organization, Traveling Postcards, please visit her website: Traveling Postcards