Dear Clan of Mahlou Blog Readers:

Recently, my life has become quite overwhelming with new responsibilities at work and a number of activities at home along with an increasing desire to finish writing my next book, Raising God's Rainbow Makers, which, I guess, means that I really should be working on it more seriously than I have been able to do up until now. I find that I cannot keep up with posting on a regular basis. For that reason, I will be taking a hiatus of at least several months. I do hope to occasionally post an installment of the "Rainbow" book as I finish various pieces.

Thank you all for being loyal and interactive readers. I have enjoyed getting to know you, and I will continue to pray for the well being of you, your family, and friends.

Elizabeth Mahlou

The Day After

A friend of mine, finding herself with too many leftovers from New Year's Day celebrations packaged them into small bags and cruised the streets of Los Angeles, where she lives, looking for those in need of a special meal. Seems like an excellent idea! Imagine if everyone did that? Let's start a movement -- and not just for New Year's but for every major celebratory day in 2013!

Happy New Year

May the new year bring you much of what you want and more of what you need! Thanks for taking the 2012 journey with me. Looking forward to what 2013 may bring. (I actually stayed awake through the passage into 2013, the first time in more than ten years. I hope this is a good portent of things to come -- for me and for everyone else.)

Four More Days to Help a Hungry Child

Dear Friend, Ending childhood hunger is so important to me that I needed to send you this reminder. If you've been waiting to make a tax-deductible gift to the No Kid Hungry campaign, the time is now. There are only 4 more days until we kick off the New Year, and we're counting on you to make sure we hit the ground running in 2013. You don't have to take my word for why ending childhood hunger is a priority; hear what 17-year-old Austin has to say about his struggle with hunger: "Childhood hunger in America is important to me because it happened to me. It hurts and I hated it and all I wanted was to eat. Too many kids today go home from school and are not sure if they will have a meal that night. It is no joke and we need to do something about it because no kid deserves to go without food." Austin's right: we must end childhood hunger. Too many of our kids are facing hunger. How can our nation's children succeed if they continue to suffer? That's where you come in. I urge you to make your tax-deductible gift to the No Kid Hungry campaign today and take advantage of our special matching gift offer. A generous Share Our Strength donor is personally matching all gifts, up to $500,000, making your gift go twice as far in making a difference in the lives of children struggling with hunger. For example: $46 can connect a child with a summer of meals and a year of school breakfast. Your $46 becomes $92! $100 can help deliver mobile meals to a child in need for three months. Your $100 becomes $200! $250 can help provide meals to a child in an afterschool program for a full school year. Your $250 becomes $500! When you give to the No Kid Hungry campaign, you do more than connect a child with healthy meals. You bring hope to children like Austin who are struggling with hunger. Thanks for all that you do for No Kid Hungry. Best wishes, Jeff Bridges P.S. Please give as generously as you can today — and remember every dollar you give will be matched dollar for dollar to make twice the difference. ©Share Our Strength, 1730 M Street NW, Suite 700, Washington, DC 20036 Website: www.NoKidHungry.org Contact us: contactus@strength.org To unsubscribe: unsubscribe

Christmas and Our Cats

It has been a while since I have blogged about our cats, but come Christmas, they are always on our minds. After all, they definitively limit what we can and cannot do at Christmas.

For example, we cannot have a Christmas tree. Why? Because Intrepid, pictured below with a toy reindeer we bought for Nikolina eats anything with leaves, whether living or plastic. We found that out when we threw out all our denuded plants when he was a kitten and were given a plastic replacement, which he imbibed without our noticing, due to his swiftness, within just a few minutes. Later, with all that plastic inside him, he was in real pain. Thank goodness, we were living in Amman, Jordan at the time, and the vet, who knew us well, came immediately to our house and Intrepid's rescue. Since then, no plants and no trees, not even artificial Christmas ones.

So, we burn the yuletide logs and put up lights (ours are going up this year on Christmas eve, not according to the dictates of traditional Advent, but because it has been raining so much lately that we have not been able to get them up -- it is supposed to stop raining some time on Monday).

Secret Santa, Mahlou Style

Last night Donnie and I decided to play secret santa at the K-Mart store in the nearest city (his idea, and ultimately, his money). We drove there before going to dinner at the Foster's Freeze there. After waiting quite a long time in line at the layaway counter -- we wanted everyone to get through so we could have a little "secrecy" -- we finally had our turn. We explained to the sales clerk at the counter that we would like to pay off a couple of Christmas layaways, especially ones with toys for children. Not having done this before, we did not know how it should work, and neither did the clerk have any experience in this. She pulled four possibilities, one for Donnie and one for me and a couple of backups in case people could not be reached. (She wanted to make sure that whoever was "surprised" would be able to come to the store and pick up the layaway while she was there; otherwise, there was no way to guarantee that the connection would be properly made between owner and package.) She called the first family, and apparently the sister answered and promised to get the word to the layawayer, promising that she would make sure that the package would be picked up before the store closed. The other three did not answer; it was getting late, and we were getting hungry. So, having taken a lot of appreciated time from the clerk, we left as a couple young mothers came up to the layaway counter. As we were walking toward the store exit, we heard someone calling to us, "Excuse me, excuse me." We turned around to see one of the young women who had come up to the lawaway counter as we were leaving. Yep, it was the person's whose lawaway we had paid off -- clearly someone who probably needed the help. She hugged us and thanked us. So much for being a "secret" Santa!

Flash Mob Christmas Style

 A friend sent me a youtube of a flashmob -- a flashmob that is perfect for the Christmas season. Click here and see!