PASTORS, COMMUNITY & CHURCH LEADERS

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If you are a director or minister to singles, we hope you will consider this meaningful and practical approach for single mothers. We believe that single mothers are one of the most overlooked and disenfranchised individuals in our communities and most likely in our churches as well. By encouraging them we also minister to their children who are often fatherless.

“Defend the poor and fatherless.”

SMORE for Women has designed all the guidelines necessary to host a Single Mom Day of Blessings. We suggest that Day takes place in a home when possible. If this is not possible the church facilities can be adapted to offer the intimate setting required. We have also hosted in community rooms of apartment complexes. Guests are limited to just the number that can be served there. There should only be as many guests as there are hostesses. We provide the instructional materials.

We would be delighted to show you how to create a day with blessings, treats, and encouragement for deserving single mothers. We even fill-in as hostesses if you need us to. 
I can be available to facilitate your first Day of Blessings for no fee except expenses for travel and lodging. This is a passion and calling for me. It is time that single mothers received the encouragement they so need from the community including the church. I will gladly explain in more depth when you contact me.

Gail Cawley Showalter
Founder

Do you want to host a DAY of Blessings at your church or organization? We would love to guide you through the process.

“I am overjoyed to have been part of the Single Mothers’ Day of Blessings. This event was truly a blessing to me. This was a day that I will never forget. I felt so refreshed, revived, and renewed. Thank you so much.” – Lana Green

SMORE Representatives

Are you a single mom with a passion for helping other single moms? 
Gail's editorial
Beaumont Enterprise Mother's Day 2013
May 2013

Education is the Key to Open Doors for Single Moms

More children are growing up with single mothers. Many of the girls become single moms themselves. Today 41% of births occur outside of marriage. Consider the children: 59% (389,481) of young children in poor families live with a single parent. Mothers who may be wondering how in this world are they going to manage to raise their children.

Before you judge, condemn, or turn the page consider the culture in which these young moms have grown up. Everyone, every girl, yearns to be loved, accepted, and desired. Women with just a high school degree or less, account for 60% of the births to unmarried girls. “Single mothers earn less than half of what households with a married couple bring in,“ according to Bryce Covert in Forbes. Many of the moms I talk with had a more than miserable upbringing, including abuse and neglect. It is no wonder when the first young man (or boy) comes along and says, “I love you, Sweetie,” they go for it. Then they find themselves either in an unhappy marriage or completely on their own to raise the child. They do not have the options to go on with their lives, as the fathers do, since in our culture the moms are committed and expected to take care of their children.

Single moms, divorced or never married, need a marketable skill or career. One third of the 12 million live in poverty.

I was divorced with three young children. Had I not had a college degree our lives would’ve been quite different. With a teaching certificate I was able to work in a job with insurance benefits and a schedule that matched my children’s.

As the founder of SMORE for Women, I’ve worked with single moms for several years. The ones, who have a marketable skill and a job, manage much more successfully. Education solves a multitude of troubles for the single mom and her family. She gains a skill, expands her horizons, her children see mom in a new light, and the family turns the corner to a brighter tomorrow. Here is the dilemma: how can a mother who is head-of-household, go back to school?

Buckner International strives to make life better for vulnerable families and has created a way for single mothers to go to college and turn their lives around. They have established seven Family Place facilities across Texas that provide families with the opportunity to live a safe and secure environment while obtaining a higher education. Buckner currently supports more than 130 single-parent families each year through self-sufficiency programs in Amarillo, Dallas, Lubbock, Lufkin, Midland, Conroe, and Houston. Families are provided support through the provision of affordable housing, high quality childcare, financial assistance, vocational training, parenting education, budget training, life skills and individual and group counseling

In two years a mom can turn her life and her future in a different direction. Her children will experience a life style change. She will earn an education that will open doors for long term employment. It is proven. It is happening.

Think of the change this can make not only for the mom, but also for the children and for our culture. Until the day when our culture changes and we cure this problem, this is a wonderful solution.

To learn more visit www.buckner.org/locations

Gail's  Editorial
The Port Arthur News -New Year's Day
January 2013

A New Year has arrived and millions of single mothers are struggling to pay for Santa. Dads are too often absent. There are 22 million children in single parent homes. That’s a bunch of expectations from a Santa without a workshop.

A great number of single mothers do not receive child support even though in Texas there are 1.3 million cases being handled by the Attorney General’s office. Custodial parents who do receive child support due have declined to about 40 percent in the last few years. This makes paying the electric bill and buying kids new shoes very difficult.

The facts are disturbing.  Almost one-third of single mothers live below the poverty level and that number is increasing.

Some children never see or even know their fathers. Their hopes of a consistent Daddy are not met. Disappointments sting when they return to school after the holidays and friends are sharing what Santa brought them.

 “Child support income is especially important to families in poverty, and reports show that increasingly, custodial parents find themselves below the poverty level,” said report author Timothy Grall, a survey statistician in the Census Bureau's Program Participation and Income Transfers Branch.   

I know dads can do better. I know that some want to do better. If you know an absent daddy perhaps you could cut out the following section . . .

Dads, I have a suggestion for you that could make a difference in 2013.

Why not buy your teen-age kids a pair of shoes? Boys like running shoes; girls love boots. And you could add a pair of socks. Jackets are also nice this time of year. Younger girls love dolls and boys collect trucks. If you need more ideas, the clerks in stores are happy to help a man in distress. Just ask. Shoeboxes are easy to wrap and don’t forget a gift bag for the jacket or trucks. It could be an after Christmas surprise or a New Year’s gift.

Just think, every time your son or daughter puts on the shoes and jacket he or she will think of you. The young kids will brag to their friends about the gifts “Dad gave me.” It may even open a door that has been closed for a while. A New Year with new shoes, jackets, toys, fewer disappointments, and some child support would sure be nice. Seems like a good way to start 2013.