Track Our Plumpy'Nut Athletes!

We raised an AMAZING amount for Doctors Without Borders - our final tally came in at $12,760. We finished in the top 10 and won an additional cash award of $750. Get this, we have provided life saving nutrition to 337 kids. I'm excited, humbled, and feel so fortunate to be part of something this big.

Now, it's time to come together to cheer on our awesome women Triathletes!

Tomorrow, the two women who agreed to represent Team Plumpy Nut will finally face down Ironman Wisconsin. They race on behalf of the donors to this fund and the children who are its beneficiaries. Peg Lussenden and Judy Bergsgaard, a team of sisters who have trained for three years to make this possible, will swim 2.4 miles, ride a hilly 112 mile bike course, and then run a marathon. We hope you will join us for this amazing event and cheer them on, whether in real time on the course or on-line.

Tomorrow we will take a break from asking for your dollars and ask you instead to celebrate these two wonderful women who are racing for the cause by checking in on their race and sending then “Go Team” messages as you do.

Here’s how to keep track of the Plumpy Nut Racers:
1) Use Judy's GPS tracking unit to see her progress IN REAL TIME
if you use a web browser or IPhone www.MapMyAthlete.com/vemap.aspx?name=048780
if you use a PDA/Blackberry/Palm www.MapMyAthlete.com/pda.aspx?name=048780
2)Track the athletes overall on the Ironman website http://www.ironmanwisconsin.com/ using their race numbers.
Judy Bergsgaard race number is 2647
Peg Lussenden's race number is 2667

As you track Peg and Judy, feel free to leave virtual messages for them in the “comments” section of this blog. I've turned off comment moderation, so your posts will be real time.

If you live on the course or are out cheering and have access to a computer, please post Plumpy Nut Sightings!!! We want to know where they are, how they’re doing, and whether they are still smiling!!

The race begins at 7:00 Central US, and goes until midnight. Let's give our SisterShack some shout outs! These two women are AWESOME!

Thanks to everyone for being part of this extraordinary project! We are grateful to every person who has participated by giving time, energy, creativity, dollars, and, in the case of Peg and Judy, lots and lots of sweat equity! We hope you feel good knowing you are part of an effort that has resulted in saving nearly 350 children’s lives this year, and that you will join us to witness the conclusion of this year’s Plumpy Nut Ironman Campaign tomorrow.

Best wishes,
Meghan and Amber for Team Plumpy'Nut
*and lots of little full tummies of peanut paste called Plumpy'Nut

I care, therefore I am

all about PLUMPY'NUT and only PLUMPY'NUT for the next 48 hours. Here's the deal:

There are 48 hours left to win charity dollars for Doctors Without Borders and their tireless work to feed those most seriously stricken by the famine this season in Ethiopia. Ethiopia is the country where my son was born to a mother who could not feed him - there wasn't enough food. I am passionate about this. With 48 hours left....WE NEED YOUR HELP!

Doctors Without Borders, a nobel prize winning organization, is distributing a life saving food to children in Sub-Saharan Africa called Plumpy'Nut - it's a true lifesaver. $40 provides one full course of 5-6 weeks of nutrition that mom's can give to the kids without hospitalization. It's amazing stuff - and it's being used right now to rescue children from the brink of death. I wish I were being dramatic - I'm not.

I have joined, once again, a team of dedicated friends and an Ironwoman Triathlete, to raise money for Doctors Without Borders as part of the Wisconsin Ironman Triathlon and the Janus Charity Challenge. You can help US take a charity podium finish AND save a child's life, right now! We need to place in the top 5 for the charity competition to win an additional $2K to $10K for the distribution of Plumpy'Nut. Janus Funds gives this charity award in the race - and our racer is bound and determined to win (not the athletic competition - but the CHARITY competition!).

Here is the link to make a donation: https://www.kintera.org/faf/donorreg/donorpledge.asp?ievent=296288&supID=246858948

Here is a video featured on 60 minutes about Plumpy'Nut: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/10/19/60minutes/main3386661.shtml

I'm appealing to your sense of making Ethiopia a place where women and men don't need to relinquish their children because of a "temporary" hunger crisis. Please, do what you can. It's worth your time to save a life today.

*no athlete, no adoption agency, no individual person gains from our work - the kids who NEED THE FOOD get all of your dollars at emergency feeding stations in Sub-Saharan Africa.

A Quarter Under My Bed

Our fairy godmother is amazing. I heard this from her today:

So, today, I did a Your-Neighbor's-Life Depends-on-$40 scavanger hunt. $21.51 from my change cup, a quarter from under the bed, three bucks I didn't know I had from my wallet, a dollar in meter change from the car, and 6 dollars from various coat and jacket pockets. Remembered that some credit card company owes me 10.68 cents. Called and asked for a refund. Just over $40. HOW CAN IT BE THAT SOMEONE'S LIFE IS SAVED BY MY POCKET CHANGE? We need change, alright. Let us be the change we want to see. Be the change. :-).

Donate here, and leave a note with your story on my blog, please. Really, no amount is too little.

https://www.kintera.org/faf/donorreg/donorpledge.asp?ievent=296288&supID=246858948

Pedometers and Plumpy'Nut

Today by noon I had logged 13,000 steps on my pedometer. It's a fun trinket to use to measure my progress in my daily efforts to improve my health and reshape my body. The typical day's goal is to reach 10,000 steps per day, with 12,000-14,000 being better for weight loss programs. Today looks like it is going to be a banner day for me. I had a 2 mile run in the morning and shortly after I had my weekly meet and talk walk with Margaret. Dogs and little Blueberry are part of this second walk. It's the first time I've meshed the run and the walk (which also happens to be 2 miles) in the same morning. My legs and feet know it ... but I can't get over the irony of walking/running/eating in ways that includes goals that I, a person of privilege and wealth, pursue while others around the world who suffer from a serious lack of food, find themselves walking great distances often with sick and listless children in their arms, in order to find food and medical assistance. This is the irony of my pedometer and Plumpy'Nut.

Donate HERE to help feed those who don't have enough to eat: Doctors Without Borders has promised to direct all of the money we raise to Sub-Saharan Africa with special focus on Ethiopia. And, if you'd like to support my running program that is for a cause, donate HERE.

Now I have to go and take a nap. Another luxury in my life.

Plumpy'Nut : Second Annual Ironman Effort to Save Kid's Lives!

It’s time for the Second Annual Plumpy Nut Ironman Fundraiser to Save Kids!

If you knew $40 would save a child’s life, would you find it? Of course you would. Here’s your chance to save someone’s world! Here’s a chance to save your world!

Last year, for the first Plumpy Nut Ironman fundraiser we pooled our cash and scrounged under our couch cushions to raise $14,000 for Doctors Without Borders. Doctors Without Borders pledged to buy Plumpy Nut ---a nutrient dense energy food---to distribute to children in Ethiopia – children who were suffering from severe malnutrition. At $40 per child, we were able to create the resources to save the lives of 650 babies and toddlers! And because we raised this fund through the Ironman Janus Charity Challenge and placed in the top five fundraisers, WE WON ANOTHER $2,000---enough money to save another 50 kids. Working together, we were able to create a fund that turned around the lives of 700 children and their families and their futures. And it was important, Ethiopia was gripped by a severe food shortage last harvest season on account of very very late rains and a poor harvest.

And now we have a chance to do this amazing work again. Another Madison, Wisconsin woman, Judy Bergsgaard, has agreed to be this year’s Plumpy’Nut Ironman racer. Judy and her sister, Peg Lussenden, of Morris, MN, are both mothers and first-time Ironman participants, and they are gearing up to toe the line for Doctors Without Borders, for Plumpy Nut, for kids, and for us September 13, 2009, just a month from now. All the money we put together will go to Doctors Without Borders for their life-saving work with Plumpy’Nut. And if we can place in the top five again, Janus will give even more. Let’s make it happen!

Please think about making a donation and about spreading the word. Think about donating in honor of a child you love, a person who saved the life of someone you care about, a person who has inspired you to do the impossible, an endurance athlete, a mother, a sister, a friend, a nation.
If you need to know about the need for food relief please read this article about the tragic food shortages in Southern Ethiopia. Our little Blueberry is from Southern Ethiopia - it makes this personal. Being good global neighbors IS PERSONAL!

At $40 for each life saved, we have a collective opportunity to do something remarkable. When we pool our money as we did last year---from garage sales and bat mitzvahs and reducing our chocolate budgets for a month—we have the chance to see the energy of our money and our love expand.

Here’s the place to donate:
https://www.kintera.org/faf/donorreg/donorpledge.asp?ievent=296288&supID=246858948
As always, your donation is tax deductible - save your confirmation e-mail - and donate NOW!
Let’s win it!

*search my older posts by "Plumpy Nut" to read about our 2008 effort and then join us in '09!*

Plumpy'Nut - Winners for Children!

Folks, the results are in! After a couple of months of hard work, a handfull of radio gigs, many e-mails, hitting the refresh button for the daily fundraising update, pleas for your help, and a final surge that included digging deeper for children, the Plumpy'Nut Ironman Team has emerged with a 5th place finish!!!!! That's an additional $2,000 for Plumpy'Nut from Janus Funds - and who doesn't like taking a few bucks from the big guys? We raised over $15,000 total. We've provided a 6 week course of Plumpy'Nut to over 350 children. 350 children!

I am so proud of our accomplishment. Amber and I worked hard, and then Amber worked harder again as she trained for the Ironman event. To honor our friend's passion, our family will be at the race tomorrow morning at 6 a.m. for the swim start - and you can bet we'll be cheering LOUDLY for her triumph. But really, Amber is already a winner. Amber is compassionate, determined, generous, smart, gentle, and dedicated to friendship, work, social justice, and now...sport! This woman rocks. It is a privilege to call her "friend."

My deepest gratitude to those of you who contributed to our campaign. It means more than I can ever express to you. I know who you are - and I will carry your kindness in my heart. All we could do was offer the opportunity - and your collective answer is humbling and awesome. Thank you.

Radio Head

2 more radio gigs - tonight (national program carried in 12 east coast cities) and tomorrow morning (local Air America broadcast). "Raw," to quote Mr. Waffles. Click here to read an African news report and update on the famine in Ethiopia. You might try a search on the MSF website using "Plumy'Nut" and read their 5 part series on malnutrition in Ethiopia. It's a stunning story - and one that is familiar as I can now see these hungry people in more than my mind's eye. This is one of my images, taken during our Ethiopian journey only 2 weeks ago. Go here to donate and help us win the $10K donation for MSF from the Janus Charity Challenge.

Thinking and Talking about Ethiopia

I'll be on the radio tonight (WORT Access Hour). Amber and I are going to talk about Ethiopia and to discuss global and social justice. The question remains: how do we become good global neighbors? I will blog more thoughtfully about these things when I have some space to do so....at the moment, little blueberry is my number one priority and I'm pretty busy making a multitude of adjustments involved with welcoming a baby into our home.

I'm feeling like it's time to ramp up my thoughts here on the blog, but it's hard to craft the time to put down in words what my head is thinking all the time. For now, I hope some of the images of Ethiopia we took during our travels are compelling. Check out the shoe shining - how does a country address 45% unemployment. As one man told us, "Right now, education=frustration." I worry when I hear this, but I get it. I get the desperation. Later, I'm going to introduce Richard. Richard has a dream. Check back to hear about him.

Famine at Home - Our Son's Home

Please read today's USA Today article about famine in Ethiopia and consider contributing to my fundraiser in support of all of those who are suffering from hunger. I can finally say that when I watched the video I could literally FEEL Ethiopia as my tiny Ethiopian son sleeps peacefully in our bedroom. Donate here to save a life.
*Photo taken by my daughter last week in Ethiopia*

Press Release - Our Story

July 2008

(Madison, Wisconsin USA) Two local women are teaming up to raise funds for the international humanitarian organizationDoctors Without Borders---and to compete for a different kind of podium finish at Ironman Wisconsin.

Meghan Walsh, a west-sider finalizing the adoption of a child from famine-stricken Ethiopia, and Amber Ault, a Schenk-Atwood resident finalizing her training for the September 7, 2008 Ironman Wisconsin, are working to win a $10,000 donation to Doctors Without Borders through the Janus Charity Challenge at Ironman Wisconsin.

“Clearly, we like taking on big projects, like world hunger and ridiculous endurance races,” laughs Ault, a sociologist who is a diversity worker at the University of Wisconsin by day and calls herself a “very unlikely athlete.”

“Although I’m unlikely to set any records on the Ironman Wisconsin course, we’re hoping to win the Janus Charity Challenge at this year’s Ironman, nonetheless. I’m thrilled that Ironman has this second kind of competition going---to compete for a $10,000.00 donation to a great cause makes the experience far more meaningful.”

Athletes at each Ironman race are given the opportunity to compete for donations to their favorite non-profit organizations from Janus Investments, an Ironman Partner. The donations go only to charity, and don’t support Ault or the Ironman event. Ault chose Doctors Without Borders because of her interest in its distribution of a “revolutionary” nutrient dense food to children dying of malnutrition in various parts of the world; a six-week course of treatment with the peanut-based concoction, sweetly called “Plumpy’nut,” can restore a child’s health---for the grand sum of $40.

“For a bit less than most endurance athletes pay for a canister of electrolyte replacement powder,” she says, “we can prevent a kid’s dying from lack of nutrition. Of course we need to go for it.”

The Plumpy Nut Ironman campaign, as Ault and Walsh are calling it, is made even more meaningful by Walsh’s close connection to Ethiopia, one of the countries in which Doctors Without Borders is currently working to deliver Plumpy’nut. Her adoptive son, Ezkeiel, comes from the southern region of Ethiopia.

“The situation there is dire,” says Walsh, an anthropologist who teaches social sciences at Monona Grove High School. “Babies are put on scales in feeding centers to determine which, among the malnourished, is closest enough to death to “qualify” to be treated with Plumpy’nut. It’s amazing what this therapeutic food can do, but more of it needs to be produced and distributed so that it can be used to prevent kids suffering from serious malnutrition from getting worse.

“Plumpy’nut has a long shelf life, doesn’t need to be mixed with water, can be given to kids at home by their mothers, and is incredibly cost effective; $40 worth of treatment turns a child’s health around.”

Both Ault and Walsh have been impressed by Doctors Without Borders as an organization recognized with a Nobel Peace Prize for its work on health issues around the globe, and for its record of devoting an impressive percentage of its income to direct service---hence their decision to focus their fundraising in that direction. They’ve also been moved by the lengths to which families in famine and drought-stricken areas of Africa and Asia go to get their children to the feeding centers run by Doctors Without Borders.

“Women are walking overnight, carrying their severely ill children endless hours to get to a Doctors Without Borders feeding station to pick up a week’s supply of Plumpy’nut, turn around and carry it and the child home” explains Ault. “Ironman is a long trip, but it’s one we have a privilege of choosing to take, and doesn’t have these kinds of stakes. “

While Ault is preparing to go the 140.6 mile distance of Ironman in the dog days of summer, Walsh is preparing for a longer journey, the one that will allow her to meet her son for the first time and bring him back to Madison in August. They are hoping that in coming years they’ll be able to tell Ezkeiel about a Janus Charity Challenge win at Ironman Wisconsin as part of his welcoming celebration.

“The world is a smaller place than we often believe,” says Walsh, “ and we are all connected. The world my family and I are creating for Ezkeiel is one in which those connections, and our sense of responsibility for each other’s welfare, are a part of daily life. Our building this fund for Doctors Without Borders, and our effort to win the $10,000 donation for them through Amber’s Ironman Charity Challenge effort is part of that commitment to making our world a better one. People have been donating from across the country, and the sense of people working together to make a great impact on a solvable human problem is inspiring.”

As the donations to the Plumpy Nut Ironman fund, large and small, roll in, they inspire Ault to keep on with her training, a process she calls variably “daunting” and “rewarding.’ “When it gets tough,” she says, “I think of those women carrying their children in their arms across difficult terrain---no spectators, no water stations, no medics on the course to assist them, and no choice but to move forward---and I keep going. We are their aid station,” she remarks. “I’m looking forward to seeing Meghan holding Ezkeiel at the Ironman finish line September 7, as a reminder of how our worlds are connected in amazing ways, even when we’re all on our own journeys.”

To make a donation to Ault’s Wisconsin Ironman Janus Charity Challenge go directly to this website: https://www.kintera.org/faf/donorReg/donorPledge.asp?ievent=250249&supid=225436667 If you want to donate directly through Doctors Without Borders, you can do that here: http://www.firstgiving.com/amberault . Help these women win one for humanity!

Goats and Plumpy'Nut?

How are goats and Plumpy'nut connected? Read this NYTimes article to learn how it is TRULY possible to change a life with one act. That one act can be a goat, or it can be access to life saving nutrition. I am a believer. If I weren't, I wouldn't be working so hard on the Janus Charity Challenge.

If you need a little more transparency after reading my next entry (about the Plumpy'nut fundraiser), you can go HERE and donate directly to MSF. These donations "count" in our total fundraiser - and remember, Janus is going to give the top fundraiser additional donations to their charity! We hope to win the $10K donation for MSF! We plan on it. Yes, I am single minded right now. It's better than working on ZL's nursery - believe me.

Plumpy'Nut Saves Lives!

There is a HUGE global need for food relief. Ethiopia is one of the places in the world where malnourishment kills children, where mothers and fathers must make life and death choices about food and work and family every single day. It is a terrible reality that no parent should ever have to face. We must all make every effort to create a world where mothers and fathers don't have to give up their children in order for them to live.

Here is what YOU can do: donate to Doctors Without Borders and Plumpy'nut HERE. This website is part of the Janus Charity Challenge and will deliver urgent relief to starving children in the world, particularly in Ethiopia. All of your donation goes directly to hunger relief through Doctors Without Borders, a nobel prize winning non-profit organization.

Here is how it works - my friend, Amber, is a triathlete and is doing the Madison Ironman Triathalon. Part of the Ironman includes a Janus Charity Challenge - athletes can fund raise for a charity of choice and the triathlete fundraising winner will be awarded up to $10K in additional funds for their charity. The $10K award is being donated by Janus. Doctors Without Borders is Amber's charity of choice; and Doctors Without Borders will be the ONLY recipient of your donation. You can count on Doctors Without Borders to use your donation well. In 2007 nearly 88% of their budget was devoted solely to program services (1% went to management and 11% went to fundraising expenses - this means your money goes right to WORK!). Check out their website.

Why today, you ask? Ethiopia, and other areas of Africa, are in the grip of a severe food shortage. Many children are dying of starvation. World reports are ominous - and the need is dire. Doctors without Borders is delivering relief to many of these places - and they are using a revolutionary food called Plumpy'nut to save lives. You can watch a video about this amazing food source as it was featured on 60 Minutes here. It is possible 11 minutes of video that will change your life and ignite your passions!

If you are particularly interested in the dire food shortage in Ethiopia, read the article here from my son's hometown in Ethiopia. Or check out this photo essay recently seen on boston.com . Finally, news reaching us today from UNICEF confirms the enormous need for Plumpy'nut in this news article.

You can see why this is my personal passionate plea. Please make a contribution -all of us as drops of water can create an ocean of change. You will find my son, whose home country is Ethiopia, and me, at the Ironman. We'll be cheering on Amber and raising awareness for our cause. I pledged, when I chose to adopt from Ethiopia, that I would work with my whole heart and soul to be a force of change. So, let's rock this one!!!!!!