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Fundraiser Success!

The Need Knows No Season fundraiser was a great success, and raised over $56,000 for the Food Bank.

Click on the link to read all about it in the Renton Reporter.

Cub Scout Pack 809 - Pinewood Derby

In January, the boys sanded and painted their wedges of wood in the most creative ways. The car kits we used this year came from a Scout Council in the mid-west. The blocks were pre-cut in wedges and this allowed us to complete cars with the minimum amount of prep.

In March, the boys built display stands for the cars from wood that used to be kitchen cabinet drawers. Since January I've been telling the boys we would race the cars on a real Pinewood Derby track and with just a few weeks left in out schedule I set a date.

The track was located and pre-assembled and all the materials gathered to have a great race.

On Wednesday, May 27 my husband and I arrived around 10:30 to set up the track in the meeting hall. When the boys came rolling in after school the race officials and pit crew were there and ready for them. My daughter, Megan, a Venturer with BSA Crew 474 served as Finish-line Judge, my youngest son, Matt, a First Class Scout in Troop 449 was the Starting line Official and I served as photographer. And so it was that we held our first Pinewood Derby Car Race. It was an exciting time for all the boys. Some of the boys had not attended at the time we made the cars, but we were able to come up with enough cars for all the boys to race. We ran several heats and had several exciting issues. Cars jumping tracks, flipping from the track to the floor and a couple with wheels that were not set quite right causing friction issues. We even had two of the Boy Scouts join us to race their cars as their meeting got out early. The race officials also judged the cars based on appearance and each boy earned a certificate stating an attribute of the car he raced.

All the boys received a participation ribbon. Every boy seemed to enjoy the race and they are looking forward to the next time. Several boys have told me that next year they want to build their cars using regular car kits which means we will be designing and shaping their cars from a rectangular block of wood. Boy Scout Troop 809 still has 4 boys and the two youngest boys are the most active. We are hoping to build the program for both of these age groups into an even more exciting program than we had this year.

It is my pleasure and honor to work with these fine young men.

Written by Dani Killingsworth - Program Leader

The Salvation Army Famous Doughnut

Salvation Army Doughnut Girls
served on the front lines in France during World War I.
They wrote letters home, darned socks, served doughnuts, sewed on buttons, provided counseling and companionship to American soldiers -- many of the girls away from home for the first time.

Doughnuts were made with improvised tin can cutters, and all doughnuts were free..
click here to read about the history of the Salvation Army Doughnut.

THE FAMOUS SALVATION ARMY DOUGHNUT RECIPE

click here for the traditional doughnut recipe which makes 250.
This modified version of the traditional doughnut recipe is scaled down for home cooking.

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon shortening
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup milk
1 egg
cooking oil or lard for deep frying

Reserve 1/4 cup of the flour for the board.
Combine remaining flour with the baking powder and set aside.
Cream shortening, 1/2 cup sugar, salt, nutmeg and cinnamon.
Add milk and well-beaten egg and stir.
Then add the flour-baking powder mixture.
Work into soft dough.
Roll onto the floured board into a 1/4" thick sheet.
Cut into the desired shape and fry in the oil, heated to about 375 degrees F.
Turn donuts frequently while frying.
The fat should be hot enough to give the donuts a rich golden-russet color within 3 minutes.
While hot, roll donuts in remaining sugar.
This recipe will make about 15 good sized donuts.

ZMT 2009 Silent Auction

Zimbabwe Mission Trip Walkathon

Next Saturday!

The nine Zimbabwe Mission Trip members and their families will be walking 10 miles from Maple Valley to Renton from 9:00 am to 1:00 pm next Saturday, May 23rd, to raise funds for the Salvation Army Renton Corps' first mission trip.

click here for details

WINNERS IN THE RENTON REPORTER 2009 'BEST OF RENTON'

http://www.pnwlocalnews.com/south_king/ren/community/43646682.html

Follow the link above to check out the winners!!

The Salvation Army's Commissioner Visits the Renton Corps!

On March 22nd, Commissioners Phil and Pat Swyers visited the Renton Corps. During their visit, Commissioner Phil Swyers called Five of the ten boys in the Cub Scouts and one Boy Scout forward one by one, announced the awards they would be receiving and said something special about each boy. The Commissioner handed each boy a card with the awards attached, said something unique and special to each of them and shook their hand. The Cub Scouts were Justice Svenson, Carlos Escobar, Mark Cameron Johnson, Chris Tolliver, and Ethan Morris. The Commissioner also presented the Scout Badge to Christian Johnson.

Commissioner Pat Swyers awarded our very own, Raven Svenson with the highest award in the Sunbeam Program - the Commissioner's Sunbeam Award. Not only did she work hard, but so did the Sunbeams leaders as they completed the requirements for this award.

Applebees on April 20th!

Eat at the Renton Applebees on April 20th, 2009 between the hours of 5pm and 8pm and when you present the "ticket", they will send us 15% of all the proceeds!

click here for details

Man shares hope, faith he found amid despair

http://www.seattlepi.com/swift/402816_mary09.html

IT WAS A blind man who gave Terry Masango hope -- and hope that kept him from suicide.
Masango, the oldest of five children whose alcoholic father spent his money on beer and his anger on his family, grew up in "abject poverty" in the poorest ghetto of Harare, Zimbabwe.
"Sometimes we had two meals (a day), sometimes one," Masango says. "My father would come home drunk and cause problems for everybody. If he got angry, he would beat up everybody."
When Masango was 8, his mother packed up the children and went to live with her parents. He was 9 when his father's brother took him to live with his paternal grandmother.
Almost a year later, his mother came to find him. Shocked by his appearance -- "There was little to eat," he says -- she reunited with her husband hoping for better times for the family.
It didn't happen.
By 16, Masango was desperate.
"If you answered, you were wrong," he says. "If you didn't answer, you were wrong. It drove me crazy. I was filled with anger, pain, bitterness -- and contemplating suicide."
That week friends headed to church camp lent him money to attend. A respite from torment, he thought. But it would prove much more than that.
"There was a blind man teaching," Masango says. "I remember his message: It was about hope. He talked as if he knew what I was going through. I accepted his message. I said, 'I'll try this. If it doesn't work, I'll kill myself.' "
Back home, nothing had changed -- except Masango. Growing up a member of Salvation Army church, he'd "gone through the motions" of faith, he says. Now, he embraced it. He joined a group of students who met before school to pray, sought out good men who became surrogate fathers and eventually became a youth leader and taught Sunday school.
After high school, he got a job in a bank and brought his siblings to live with him.
"So, at 19 I was a parent," he says. "For the next six years they lived with me until I married and moved out, and left them in the house I'd rented."
He'd met his wife, Rutendo, at a wedding in 1997. Both felt drawn to the ministry. In 1999, six months after they married, they sold their house and furniture to attend the Salvation Army's School for Youth Leadership in Australia.
The next year they were sent to Spokane to help with a summer camp. One Sunday, Masango was asked to preach.
"I was walking down the aisles like we do back home," says Masango. "The people loved it and immediately offered me a job."
When training was finished, they returned to Spokane to work there. In 2004, the couple went to California to attend the Salvation Army's College for Officers Training.
"On the day we graduated in June 2006, we were told we were coming to Renton," Masango says. He and Rutendo are now captains of the Renton Corps of the Salvation Army, an operation that includes a large food bank and social service center. "We immediately looked it up on the Internet. I'd never seen a food bank that large."
It has been eight years since he and Rutendo were last in Zimbabwe. Her parents are dead. His mother has never seen their children, now 2 and 7. That will change in July, when he and Rutendo lead a 15-person mission trip from the Renton Salvation Army to Zimbabwe.
"If my mom had not returned to get me, I would not have the life I have today," he says, choking back tears. "Her love gave me hope and a reason to live. I've told people they're going to have to pull me off her lap.
"However," he says, laughing. "I think she'll push me off to hold her grandchildren."
Masango asked leaders of his old church in Zimbabwe what they needed. The answer: brass band instruments to replace the ones that were already old back when Masango played.
"We're hoping to get donated instruments to take with us," he says.
To help, call 425-255-5974.

Hard Times Cooking

Clara is a 93 year old cook and Great Grandmother. She is 100% Sicilian-American and grew up in a Chicago suburb, Melrose Park. She survived the Great Depression and claims to have actually gained weight during America's worst state of financial despair. She has shared some of her recipes on YouTube, and is putting together a cookbook.
Here is Pasta & Peas.

you can see more videos of Clara here.

Parables

Why do you think Jesus used parables to spread his message?

Often times parables can be confusing with their indirect meanings leaving people scratching their heads perplexed. So, why do you think Jesus chose to spread the most important message of all time using parables? Could it be that his message wasn't one that was reliant soley on what we are to hear, just some food for thought!! Discuss.....

Where is God when it hurts?

Life is tough and unbearable, sometimes. Where is God when things are horribly wrong, friends abandon me, and family seems not to care?