Sole Hope Shoe-Cutting Party

In the fall issue of Life:Beautiful magazine, I read an article about an organization called Sole Hope. Sole Hope provides shoes for children in Uganda to prevent foot related diseases caused by a sand flea called a jigger. These jiggers burrow into feet as children walk barefoot, lay eggs and in the foot and multiply, causing serious infection and disease. Sole Hope removes jiggers, provides shoes to prevent jigger bites, provides education about disease, and sprays homes and school to decrease the jigger population.

One way to help is to host a shoe-cutting party. Sole Hope provides a pattern and support materials and when they receive the cut shoe pieces they take them to Uganda where a worker is paid a fair wage to assemble the shoe.

I decided to host a shoe-cutting party. It was something so different for me to think about. I really enjoyed the whole process. First, I reached out to local friends via facebook to collect materials. Materials needed are denim and cotton fabric and plastic.

I had 8 ladies come to my house to cut shoes today. I decided to organize by material. There was a denim table.

A plastic table.

And a cotton table.

Three different pieces are needed from denim and they are cut with a regular fabric scissors.

Two different pieces are needed from cotton and they are cut with a pinking shears.

A heel support is needed from plastic.
It was easy to chat while we worked. =)

Each piece is labeled with the shoe size and then organized into what is needed for one shoe and secured with a large safety pin. It takes 12 pieces for one shoe!

Chrissy and I did the organization and cut out a few pieces so that there would be 9 complete shoes.

I've really enjoyed learning more about the Sole Hope organization. I think it is the simplicity of the solution and the creativity of being about to do something tangible--not just send money--that really caught my attention. Most recently I read on their blog that they are ready to contract with 2 local nurses to do follow-up care on children who have had many jiggers removed from their feet.

Check out www.solehope.com and consider hosting your own shoe-cutting party!