Project 50/50

(Pic stolen from Facebook, thanks, Shay!)
Back a few weeks ago, we had the honor of housing a new friend overnight. Her name is Shay. Shay is homeless. And amazing. Missouri was her 46th state in the last 46 weeks. Blogees, this girl is nuts. In the oh-my-gosh-I-want-to-be-just-like-her kind of way.

I've hesitated writing this because I wanted to do it right. Then I started a draft and my vision kept growing. Let me back up.

Shay was homeless for about 6 months before she started a journey that truly changed her life and countless others. She calls it Project 50/50. The short version? She's traveling (living out of her truck) to all 50 states in 50 weeks. Along her journey, she's doing can (and sock) drives and then redistributing them to the other homeless she meets as she goes along. Her original goal was 10,000 cans and she hit that a couple weeks ago. She estimates she's collected over 4,000 socks. That's legit. She's proving, to herself and anyone who's interested, that you can truly give all you have and God will keep providing. And God has shown up in some crazy ways. Her stories are amazing. I can't even start one of them, cuz this post will just.keep.going.

And she has a cute dog.

She finishes her project mid-December with a huge celebration in Chicago. While we can't go, I thought of something to do to honor her hard work in this project.

Starting today, I'm collecting cans and socks until December 18th and want you to join me. While you're out getting supplies for Christmas for your fam, pick up a few packs of socks and a few extra cans. Tell your friends/family/blog peeps.

**Checking my blog stats, I've had visitors from 46 states over the last 30 days, any chance we could get all 50 states involved in the drive??? I would normally think this wouldn't be realistic, but this is the same audience that gathered/organized 130 stockings FULL of goodies for soldiers a couple years back. I'm thinking big here. I'm thinking at least 100 cans in each state? Do the math. That would be 5,000 more cans. I like it. 100 pairs of socks x 50 states? I'm kind of in love with that.

Once you pick a few things up, email me so I can keep a running total. Then we can arrange a pick up! Depending on how many we get, I'll figure out where to distribute them (STL peeps only).

If you want to be the host in your state, email me and I'll start a post with links to those taking up the torch. Post it on your blog, do it for your church's give-away pantry, enlist your kiddo's classes, go door to door, whatevs. My email is katie l mohr at g mail dot com.

Some deets: Shay recommends tube socks, and pop tabbed cans of fruit, tuna, refried beans and soup.

You can also follow her journey on Facebook (she's an amazing photo journalist), twitter and her blog.