St John's United Church of Christ Griswold

05/27/2026

Starting this Sunday (May 31) and for the rest of the summer through Labor Day, our worship service time will be 10 a.m.

05/20/2026

Much needed improvement!

05/20/2026

Looking good!

05/20/2026

Hearts and Hands for Haiti had an amazing sewing day! 22 of us kept really busy working mostly on diapers. We are trying to reach our goal of 10,000. We welcomed a new sewer, Diane. Leon couldn’t work, but he enjoyed visiting with everybody. And the snacks were great as usual.
I forgot to mention today that we received a $100 donation from St. John’s women’s fellowship and Helen Lindman gave us a $200 donation. This will all go towards shipping and supplies. We are grateful!
We had lots of outside sewing this month, so hopefully I don’t miss anyone.
Cheryl got us off to a great start with 40 diapers and Mary added 30 and with ours today we had 144 diapers, bringing our total to 8806 diapers. Janet gave us a Headstart by sewing about 100 pads in. We have a ways to go to 10,000. But we’re optimistic.
Mary added over 100 health kit pads to Tammy’s 34 bringing that total to 713.
Tammy made six more beautiful large tote bags to add to our 651, total 657.
Tammy also had six pair of shorts to add to our 3452 bringing it up to 3 458.
Tammy 15 kids tote bags to add to her 48 bringing that total to 63
She also had three receiving blankets bringing that total to 426
Peanut butter total of 85+2 brings it to 87.
I am absolutely overwhelmed at the way people in this group help each other, compliment each other and just generally enjoy each other‘s company as we sew for our Haitian friends.
Again, thanks to everyone who supports us with T-shirts, suitcases, peanut butter, and many other things. We cannot do this without you.!

05/20/2026

Such a fun group !

We had some special visitors at the museum this morning. The fifth graders from Griswold CSD walked themselves across town for their second visit to the museum this semester!

We'll post more details about their visit and our special guest in the next few days!

Curious about what cool things they found inside? Come check it out for yourself.

Open Wednesday through Sunday, 1 to 4 PM

04/16/2026

Hearts &Hands for Haiti  had an excellent workday on Wednesday the 15th. 20 of us got lots done. As we are shifting to diapers, we have a goal of 10,000 diapers before Jean Jean and Kristi come for their visit in July. So we are going to need all the help we can get  the help we can get. If you aren’t busy on the third Wednesday of the month of May  come and join us!
Our totals for the month of April are enhanced by all the outside workers donations. I thankCarol in Cedar Falls, Tammy for going above and beyond as usual, Deb from Atlantic with her huge donation of dresses,736 to be exact. Mary for her new project of Healthcare care pads, and Cheryl with her getting us started on finishing diapers at home. All of these totals have been added into ours so if it looks like we’ve been crazy busy, it’s thanks to outside help.
The total for the month of April follow.
Pb donations from Tammy help bring our total from 39 to 85.
Tammy made three more tote bags totaling 648+3=651
Mary, besides finishing some diapers at home brought in 100 finished pads for the Healthcare kits.
Tammy’s Healthcare kits 667+12=679. We can all help Tammy with this project  by donating granola bars, regular bar soap, regular size, toothpaste, toothbrushes, washcloths, size 14 children’s underwear and protein packs, such as tuna in the foils.
Carol, from Cedar Falls brought in 40 pairs of shorts plus 19 of
ours brought that total to 3452.
Mary finished 19 diapers plus our 69+Carol’s 100 and Cheryl‘s 20, brought that total to 8664.
Debs 736 dresses +281=1017
Carol brought a bunch of flip-flops for the kiddos.
We are blessed to have these outside contributors.
I have a bunch of pictures of my favorites!
Again, thank you to all of our outside donors and to all of our faithful workers! There is no way this project could continue without you!

03/18/2026

Hearts and Hands for Haiti had a wonderful sewing day! We celebrated our annual soup supper results and we are grateful to all of our supporters!
Today there were 21 of us working diligently on shorts and diapers. We managed to finish 47 diapers and 22 pair of shorts. The sewing machines were buzzing away while the rest of us tried to keep up!
Our tracer/organizer, Bert was off to Iceland and we missed her, but can’t wait to hear about this trip! And also it was Barb‘s birthday.  As usual our treats were great!
Our eyes are on our 10,000 diaper which is not in the too distant future. We are at 8464 including the 47 diapers we made today. We thought we might make it by the time Kristi and Jean Jean come in July, but we would have to push really hard!
Our other totals for the day….
Adult totes 646+2 from Tammy gives us 648
Shorts 3371 Plus 22 equals 3393
Healthcare kits 655+ Tammy’s 12 equals 667
Dresses 2818+3 from Tammy equals 2821
Peanut butter, 36+3 gives us 39
Once again we thank all of our supporters for the suitcases, T-shirts, material, sewing machines, thread, and monetary support. Our Haitian friends also thank you!
Also, a heads up in July, Kristi and Jean Jean will be joining us for lunch and updating us on the progress at United Christians Internation in Haiti!  We would love to have you join us! Let us know if you plan to attend!💕💕

02/19/2026

Heart and Hands for Haiti had 18 very busy workers yesterday at St. John’s United Church of Christ. We were starting from scratch on diapers. We just switched over to cutting diapers again so that slows the process a bit. Two of our regular workers had hands surgery. Dennis managed to join us for treats. Still missing Ron, one of our faithful cutters.😔
Our numbers today were good because we had lots of help from our friends in Nebraska, Holy Stitchers.Tammy also brought in some boughten diapers and 2 nebulizers. Janet brought more receiving blankets.
Diapers us 20+ 189 HS =8415
Adult Tote Bags 26 HS + 620= 646
Shorts us 22+ 50 HS =3371
PB 26+2=28

We are so grateful for the outside help we receive! We are blessed.

Our annual annual soup supper fundraiser is coming up March, 8 2026 at 4:30. Hoping you can join us as we enjoy each other’s company and raise money for our shipping costs.

Again thank for your continued love and support.

01/21/2026

This crazy windy day in January we had 22 folks working for Heart and Hands for Haiti. We had a toasty place to work and got lots done.
We had two new workers, Chris and Mary. Great additions to our team! We did something a little different today. Some of us helped Tammy put together her women’s healthcare kits. We made a couple mistakes, but I don’t think she’s gonna fire us. It takes a lot of time to put all that stuff together and get rid of all the wrappers as we can’t send those to Haiti. Each women’s health kit starts with a sling backpack, underwear, women’s products, two granola bars, one protein pack, probably tuna, one toothbrush, one toothpaste, one bar soap and washcloth. These are such a wonderful gift for our Haitian women friends.
Tammy also started us out with lots of sewing at home. So this will all be included in some of the totals. She is such a great addition to this group. We missed some of our regular sowers today!

Small tote bags/children’s bags
33 +10 equal 43
Receiving blankets
416+7 equal 423
Women’s health kits
595+60 = 655
Dresses 2805+13 = 2818
Shorts 3295+4 equal 3299
Women’s tote bags, 610+10 equal 620
All of these products were sewn at home and brought in by Tammy to send our Haitian friends.
Diapers, 8136+90 equal 8226. Cheryl worked on some of these and had them ready to just top stitch for us. Which was a huge help to us.
 We will be having our annual soup supper fundraiser March, 8. It is to help with our shipping costs . More
information will be coming.
 Once again we would like to thank all of our friends for their donations of T-shirts, suitcases, and your continued love and support for our Haitian friends.

01/09/2026

"We will hold fast to love in places where hate invades.
We will hold fast to compassion when cruelty reigns.
We will hold fast to justice when power flaunts violence."

Read Conference Minister Tanya Sadagopan's commentary on the senseless killing of Renee Good today in Minneapolis at the hands of ICE agents. Read it here: https://www.uccmn.org/2026/01/07/peace-peace-there-is-no-peace-in-minneapolis/