Mom Spotlight: Meet Jennifer Powell

One of my favorite things about publishing Macaroni Kid is the chance to connect with other moms in our community. Often times these connections inspire me and remind me of the ability of one person to make a difference. It is with this in mind that Macaroni Kid Springfield launched this article series to spotlight these special women. My hope is to introduce you to some amazing moms living right in our communities who not only are doing unique and wonderful things but also deserve to have some attention brought to their mission.

What is your MISSION? What do you want to accomplish?
Well I don’t know if it’s a mission or a mantra!  My desire is that when presented with a problem, I hope I have the courage to get involved and make it better.  It’s not easy, and often very tiring.  I am easily overcome with the awfulness in the world and from where I stand, in my kitchen surrounded by unfolded laundry, I just ask to be presented with something that I can help with and make a difference in the lives of others. My absolute favorite Charity group is called Mary Anne’s Kids because it’s local and I can see it when we make a difference.  It provides relief to children in foster care that is not covered by the foster care system.  They help provide for dance lessons and class rings and Halloween costumes.  All the things my kids come by without a second thought.  Mary Anne’s kids lets our family help from the sidelines until the time is right when we can actually take a child in to our home. We throw a Christmas Party every year and at first it was just a bunch of friends coming over bringing gifts and dessert with them.  We ended up with a lot of stationary and cookies that lasted until Valentine’s day.  The next year we asked friends to forego a gift for us and make a donation to MAK.  Every year since we have had a makeshift holiday party/fundraiser that helps the kids. Last year, every invitation came with a request to adopt a foster child for the holidays.  My friends took this on as a personal challenge and every day I came home there were more and more packages in our porch room dropped off for the kids.  It always made me cry to see them arrive.

My fun, uplifting mission right now is to get the old Wilbraham Peach Festival reinvigorated and brought back as Peach Blossom Festival.  I personally took it on as a challenge to see if I could actually help pull off something so large scale from the ground up – the whole fact that we are doing this is pretty daunting! The actual mission of the PBF came from a conversation we had in one of the United Mother’s meetings I attended where we were all talking about how we are asked to help raise money for so many different groups that we love; the school, the scouts, the church. We were also talking about how nice it would be to have a community event again like the old Peach Festival. We thought to put the two together and now we are the facilitators of a large community event specifically designed to help community groups raise the money they need to do the great work they do.

What inspired/encouraged you to do this work? Is there one specific moment when you knew this was what you wanted to do?
Most of my community involvement comes as it presents itself to me.  I didn’t go out to find these things, they found me.  There are a lot of awful things we hear about in the world and I regularly ask God to give me the courage that I won’t turn a blind eye to what he puts before me and that I chip in and help when that happens.  The nicest thing is that the people I know are all up for that challenge too!  When I reach out and ask for help for one thing or the other, people come, they collect clothes, give money and do whatever I ask.  It is really amazing!

How did your life before children influence the mom you are today?
I had a pretty selfish life before kids and marriage.  I managed a restaurant and worked all hours and every holiday. I went on fancy vacations with the intent of just lying around a pool and drinking cocktails.  Now the idea of doing that is really unattractive to me. I can’t imagine a vacation without my kids. When I go to work I feel guilty that I am not doing one thing or another for my family and not getting other things done.

There is some kind of out-of-this-world compassion that I really felt once I had my kids. Now I see the man begging on the street as someone’s son.  That foster child who needed Christmas presents is just a boy or girl, like my own children, who through absolutely no fault of their own had the bad luck to be born into unfortunate circumstances.  

What part do your children play in your current mission? What lessons/values do you hope they are learning through this process?

I am surprised by how much my kids understand what my husband and I do.  I think they are just vegging out watching TV and then all of a sudden my daughter is standing next to me asking if she can give her favorite shirt, the one that doesn’t fit her anymore, to a child who would like it. Some of the things my husband and I get involved with rock us to our cores as adults and sometimes the kids don’t understand things correctly.  Talking about it is the best thing for us, especially when they get that far-way look and are suddenly quiet. I don’t want to wreck my children’s innocence but there is a healthy amount of knowledge that they can handle and I think it makes them good, compassionate people.  It is also comforting to them, as well as to me, that we are at least doing something to help.

What do you do to take care of yourself and how do you make time to do it?
I have a hard time taking care of myself. I wish I was a woman who had a standing hair appointment! Instead I walk-in to the Supercuts when I just can’t stand my appearance any more. I only buy new clothes when I have a special occasion, which means I have a killer closet full of holiday clothes! Once and a while my daughter convinces me to go to the mall for a pedicure, which I consider a guilty pleasure. I am considerably overweight and have wanted to tackle that problem for a long time. I think that change will come.  I know there will always be laundry to fold, emails to send, dogs to walk, groceries to get, and dinner to make. That won’t ever change. I just need to carve out a special time for me and overcome the thought that it’s selfish to take some time alone to make myself better.  I’m not there yet but I’m working on it.

What can we do to support you in the community?

I am always so pleased with the responses from the community when we put out pleas for help and participation.  I just wish more people felt the courage to get involved and make a difference.  With the upcoming Peach Blossom Festival on June 17, 2017 it is the PERFECT opportunity for people who have always wanted to help to get involved in a small manageable way.  If everyone found a way to help their favorite group at the PBF we will have a very successful event.  Finger’s crossed!