Some of you may have noticed that Kyra and I are related. Yes, she is my daughter and last month the most exciting event of our lives happened. She got married! While planning Kyra’s wedding, we were so fortunate to meet a wonderful woman. Elizabeth Cornejo is a gifted seamstress in Ventura who shared with us her story during Kyra’s wedding gown fitting.
Born in a tiny village in Nicaragua, Elizabeth started making clothes
out of baby diapers. She had a gift for design and studied with the
village seamstress. She would pray and ask why she wasn’t born in Paris
or America instead of her impoverished village. Finally she was hired
by Patagonia as a clothing model which brought her to the United
States. Now she has a successful alternation and dressmaking business.
We found her on Yelp and everyone referred to her as “Saint
Elizabeth”. At first we thought it was because of her amazing sewing
skills helping women look their best for special occasions. But it’s
so much more…. Elizabeth is a living saint. She gathers food,
medicine, clothing, books, and toys for the children in her village
and ships them out at her own cost. Her church helps some, but most of
her earnings goes to helping her village. She especially focuses on
the young girls, hoping to make a difference in their lives so that
they might seek education and make their dreams some true like she
did. She feels so fortunate to be able to give back to her village.
She’s even building a house in her village so she can bring others
with her to help.
When she found out Kyra was a nurse, Elizabeth hoped she might want to
come and help at Casa Materna, the local health clinic for women and
children. After the wedding, I stopped by Elizabeth’s shop to show her
pictures of how beautiful Kyra looked in the dress she altered so
perfectly. Elizabeth cried and thanked me profusely. She was packing
up Christmas presents for the children of her village. She told me how
her goal is to help the people who need it the most and having family
there helps her identify who really could use support…like the tiny
disabled girl who lives in isolation in the mountains above the
village.
Elizabeth is truly a Divine Daughter!
Well, our generous and compassionate DDU Board of Directors just met today and agreed to support this one woman saint.
Help us help her by joining DDU today!
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