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S2 Episode #01- Krista Blalock

Tia McNelly

The One With Krista Blalock

Welcome back— and Happy Thanksgiving!

And HAPPY 40th BIRTHDAY to our special guest!!! This week we’re interviewing the President and co-founder of Flourish Kenya, our charitable partner. Krista is a nurse, a wife, a mom of four, and a warrior in the fight to end unplanned teen pregnancy in rural Kenya.

We’re so excited to have Krista’s episode airing this week because not only is it her 40th birthday week, it’s Giving Tuesday week! We are thrilled to invite you into the story of how Collected came to partner with Flourish Kenya.

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Here’s some background on Krista + Flourish Kenya’s roots:

Photo by thelapointes.co

In 2016 Krista and our Founder, Tia McNelly had been working with a US-based nonprofit that operates schools in Kilgoris, Kenya for seven years. As a Registered Nurses, they were both heartbroken over the lack of access to health care in the area from the very beginning.

After several years of assisting in the development of the health and feeding program, Krista was brought on staff to manage the organization’s health program. As Krista pressed on, the complications and concerns of adolescent pregnancy and the lack of education and resources to prevent it became more visible. It became a tiresome task attempting to find the critical sexual and reproductive health teaching the students and community needed.

Having been a young, single mom earlier in life, seeing the devastating effects of this epidemic on the youth of rural Kenya became a burden too heavy to ignore. In 2016, with total support and participation from Krista’s husband Jason, and after many long hours of prayer and conversations with a local Kenyan friend, Christine Lemiso, as well as other close friends and family, the dream of Flourish Kenya was born. By the end of 2016, an amazing team of people was mobilized in the US and Kenya to make the God-sized dream a reality! Tia is a founding board member of Flourish Kenya and links arms with the organization in all she does.

Today, Flourish is combatting unplanned adolescent pregnancy and all of the negative outcomes associated with this epidemic with ground-breaking sexual and reproductive health education programs and plans for a safe house. Learn more and get involved at flourishkenya.org.

JOIN US THIS GIVING TUESDAY AS WE LEVERAGE GOD’S RESOURCES FOR FOR THE KINGDOM BY SUPPORTING FLOURISH KENYA!

Get exclusive content, giveaways, early access to the guest line-up, and more!

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  • This episode of The Collected Podcast was recorded and edited by Jacob Early.

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