It was a Friday, so we had Flour & Flowers; plus it was the first week of the month with cinnamon rolls. I was up and putting artisan loaves in pans at 5:30am when Nyein Nyein arrived with her little boy, and we got started on bread & cinnamon rolls.
Thida arrived for The Breakfast Club around 6am with her two sons, and they began serving fruit & soy milk to the kids around 6:15am. It was a school sport day, with four teams competing, so the kids were decked out in their team colors as they came for breakfast early—most arriving around 7am. Thida was out of the six kilos of longan fruit before 7:20, so we made do with watermelon, bananas, and apples from our fridge until 8.
Also by 7am, Pyo Pyo & Pwe Pyu Hey joined us for bread & cinnamon roll making. Mwei Mwei came to watch the kids. In all, they baked 22 loaves of bread, rolled out 120 tortillas, and made 173 cinnamon rolls.
Our morning was chaos: four of us baked here while kids ran in and out of the house. Stephen had breakfast with a friend and then went and one of The Reinforcers to deliver the sound system for the evening. He picked up lunch on the way back for all the bakers and us.
They asked about Bingo all day—I had promised we’d play this week but haven’t them the day. They chatted about how we hadn’t decided yet, which I corrected that I had, but just wasn’t telling them! They begged me all day to know.
Flour & Flowers finished baking around 1:30pm. We rested for about thirty minutes, before we had to shower and pack up the bread and load up the flowers.
As they walked out the door I asked if they were free on Sunday evening and might want to play Bingo? It was received with shouts, jumping, and cheers—grown women with children, jumping in our doorway to play Bingo this weekend! It was well worth the game all day 🙂
Because of reports of raids this week, Pyo Pyo didn’t make deliveries with me. I picked up Thida at 3pm instead, as she has legal paperwork. She doesn’t know the Flour & Flowers system, though, so we…made do. It was a lot of explaining and chatting while driving, until my head hurt.
Stephen left the house at 4pm, in a friend’s borrowed car, to take the two Reinforcers to the restaurant in town having a grand opening. They set up the sound system and did sound checks with the band; had dinner together and got started at 6:30pm.
I got back from deliveries about 6pm and did finances with Pyo Pyo, before heading out the door to the concert. I chatted with friends while The Reinforcers had their first paid gig running live sound. They did amazing! I think they exceeded many people’s expectations, both Stephen & the two guys, which is always fun to see. We had people asking about opportunities in the future!
They loaded up the car twice with gear, and we crashed at home around 11pm.
That’s eighteen hours later, spent entirely with the community. In those eighteen hours, eight people from our community had work and earned money for their families. In those eighteen hours, we had good conversations about the adoption system & children’s homes, about what their kids want to be when they get older, about inside jokes, about an absent father, about our weight (of course!), and all about Christmas and Bingo.
It worked, guys.
Flour & Flowers: it worked. It made profit. Four women took home money to their families and still got to see their kids through the day. It was relational. The loaves were beautiful, and every one raved at the concert about how much they love it. It’s a popular business to sell delicious things.
The Breakfast Club: it worked. It fed kids healthy food. It created stability. It was relational. And it will happen every school day this month because Thida is amazing.
The Reinforcers: it worked. It made profit. It kept kids in school. It gave them new skills. It was relational. And it looks like it might grow!
It’s working, and even on the most epic days, it’s worth it!