So, I decided to start creating some t-shirts. Here are a few of the designs.

Hello everyone!
To begin, I will give a little background about myself as well as my reason for creating a livejournal.

Ok, my name is Katherine. I live in Iowa...somewhere between a field of corn and a field of soy beans. I am going to be a junior in high school in the upcoming school year. For the majority of my life, I have lived with my mother, grandmother, and aunt. My father moved out when I was six years old and just recently moved back in. My grandmother died about a year and a half ago. She was, in few words, amazing and I could not thank her enough for what she has taught me. I could go on forever about her, but I'll save that for a later journal entry. I grew up in a household of strong and independent women who brought me up the same way. They always told me that I could accomplish anything if I tried hard enough. Because of this, I have turned into a devoted idealist. This also leads me into why I created this journal.

At this point in my life, I have been asked so many times about what I want to be when I grow up. My answer is usually a stutter and a shrug of the shoulders. I don't really know what I want to be when I grow up. I do, however, know what I want to do when I grow up. I want to change the world. I want to make it a better place. I want to travel and explore. I want to meet new people and exchange cultures. I want to live and be happy. I want to help people. In esence, I want to show people in the depths of Africa and the highlands of China that there's a small town girl from Iowa that wants to help them. I want them to know that they are not forgotten and someone cares about them. 

I stumbled upon crossculturalsolutions.org  a few months ago and I found a starting point to accomplishing my goal of helping others. I was on the website for hours and I began to become really motivated about volunteering abroad. I thought that I could volunteer while on spring break and in the summer. I did some planning and found out that I could go to Costa Rica on March 15 and stay for a week and come back before school began again. The only problem is that I am not 18 yet so I need a parent to come with. I knew that my father couldn't go because of health reasons, but my mother could. My only fear was that she wouldn't want to. I was shocked when I told my mom and she was very interested in going. 

The chief problem now is money. It costs $1,695 each plus airfare. In total, the whole trip will cost about $2,626 each. We plan to fundraise and hopefully reach our goal of $3,500. This is where you, the reader of my journal, can help. Before anything, I appreciate you for reading all of this. Whether or not you can donate to our cause, I still hope you continue reading my journal. At this point in time, I am not asking for money, I am asking for your attention. In the upcoming weeks and months I am going to be posting videos documenting our fundraising efforts. I will create a account on the crossculturalsolutions website for donations, but again, you do not need to donate. I would rather have your attention than your money. I want to teach you about volunteering abroad and hopefully, we can together change the world. 

Thanks for reading!