08/16/2026
❤️🇨🇮 SUNDAY AYA SPOTLIGHT — CINDI & JOHN HERRMAN 🇨🇮❤️
Today’s Sunday Spotlight is especially close to our hearts.
Meet Cindi & John Herrman, parents of Carrie and Jenifer, and two of the people who have quietly been behind AYA Project from the very beginning. ❤️
While much of what you see happens thousands of miles away in Côte d’Ivoire, Cindi and John have been part of the work happening here at home — collecting, sewing, packing, organizing, encouraging and somehow helping us turn some of our craziest ideas into reality!
In 2023, after years of supporting AYA from home, they finally traveled to Côte d’Ivoire and experienced firsthand the people, places and communities they had heard so much about.
Today, we’re sharing AYA through their eyes — in Cindi & John’s own words. ❤️
“We’ve been the home support for AYA since the beginning. Our daughters and son-in-law make the plans — sometimes pretty far-fetched ones! — and we figure out where we can help.
Mamas need clean birthing kits for home births? Boom — we’re collecting blankets! Over the years, those kits have grown and improved: plastic sheeting, gloves, soap, string, cutters, gauze, onesies, hats and blankets. What started as about a dozen kits per trip has grown to 40.
The village children needed clothing, so we started collecting. And wow, did that take on a life of its own! Friends, family, neighbors and thrift shops all joined in. Some trips have meant 10–12 fifty-pound suitcases of clothing being lugged across the ocean. Then came sandals, flip-flops, school supplies and whatever else we could find.
For years, we helped from home and heard the stories.
Then in 2023, we finally got to go.
We had heard so much about Côte d’Ivoire — our son-in-law’s home — and about people we felt like we already knew. We also knew AYA trips weren’t vacations. Behind those beautiful beach and travel pictures were long workdays in incredible heat, nights spent trying to find help for someone who desperately needed medical care, and days when the team gave everything they had and still wondered if they had done enough.
From the minute we landed, we were in awe.
But if you know us, you know where we really wanted to be — the village.
As our van pulled into the schoolyard, the children cheered. I was in heaven.
As someone who spent years in education, I immediately noticed what the school didn’t have — windows, good lighting, computers, shelves of books, abundant paper or fancy supplies.
But what I noticed even more was what they did have.
Pride.
Their work was excellent. Their cursive was beautiful. Their smiles were enormous. The teachers talked with us about reading programs, math, testing, attendance and parents understanding schoolwork — conversations that sounded surprisingly familiar.
They worried about classrooms that couldn’t be used, deteriorating cement floors and other challenges. But most of all, I saw how much those teachers loved and believed in their students.
One of my favorite days was paint day. Everyone seemed to be working — except us!
We were the “old people” sitting under the tree with the mamas, grandmas and children. 😂
My granddaughter Maddy and I read to the kids — I read in English and Maddy read in French — while moms sat nearby nursing their babies. I don’t think five minutes went by that day without a child in my arms or sitting on my lap.
Then came giveaway day.
Suitcases opened and out came clothes, sandals, hats and little toys. It was chaotic and absolutely wonderful.
We watched girls put on dresses I had made. Children celebrated new flip-flops. A young man proudly wore his soccer shirt. And a pregnant mama walked away carrying one of those birthing kits we had packed thousands of miles away.
Suddenly, all those years of collecting and packing had faces.
That night we celebrated with our son-in-law’s family — our extended family now, too.
I sat with “Chicken Grandma” sharing a huge bottle of beer. She couldn’t speak English, and I couldn’t speak her language, but somehow we understood each other perfectly.
We talked about how much we loved our families and how proud we were of them. ❤️
That’s AYA to us.
For years, our job was helping from home — collecting, packing, sewing, supporting and figuring out how to make the next crazy idea happen.
Then we finally got to meet the people on the other side of all those suitcases.
And they weren’t strangers at all. 🇨🇮❤️
— Cindi & John Herrman
❤️ AYA Project | Travel With Purpose
