NAPLES, Fla -- A local group is trying to weave a thread of hope for nearly 200,000 orphans thousands of miles away.

The children in Tanzania have no family, very little clothing and little opportunity for education, but one southwest Florida group is doing its part to help these children one stitch at a time.

Lis Wilson is the Vice President of Tumaini Fund USA. The non-profits sole purpose is to help the hundreds of thousands of orphans in Tanzania, one of the poorest countries in Africa.

"Our goal is to make a difference to them, provide love, clothing, housing, food, basic necessities. But, the main goal is education and to break that cycle of poverty," says Wilson.

The original Tumaini Fund was started in the British Isle of Guernsey by Dr. Susan Wilson. Her passion to help orphans in Africa quickly spread to this group of volunteers in Naples.

Twice a month they gather at Trinity by the Cove Episcopal Church.

Wilson says, "these children won't leave their huts, their surroundings and go to church in their ragged clothes so we provide them with these little dresses and it gives them the ability to go to church."

Tumaini Fund USA's founding president J. Douglas Burke says, "this is a faith based organization and the idea that we are able to say to these families with these dresses you can now go to church and be proud that's a very practical solution."

With every snip and every stitch, they're weaving hope for these kids thousands of miles away.

Susan Joy Smellie volunteers her time as a sewer. She says, "we'll pick a favorite fabric and we'll say, oh won't she look cute in this. We really think of each one individually as we're sewing because we're making them individually."

Tumaini is the Swahili word for hope and this project is appropriately called Sewing for Hope.

Marilyn Wainscott says, "these are children and they need everything and we can give them just this little tiny bit."

So far one shipment of dresses has been delivered by Dr. Susan Wilson herself. This batch will head to Tanzania next month. In total, these women have stitched nearly 300 handmade dresses with no sign of slowing down anytime soon.

"These are orphans," said Smellie. "They don't have somebody to love them and if the dresses mean love to them, even if there were no other need, that would be enough to keep me sewing."

So far, two other Naples churches have joined in the efforts, but they are always looking for more people to help sew the dresses as well as fundraising dollars for Tumaini Fund USA.

Tumaini Fund USA is an approved 501(c)(3) charity and all donations are tax deductible. If you want to get involved with Tumaini Fund USA or learn more about Sewing for Hope you can go to www.hopefundusa.org or www.tumainifundusa.org