My 9 year old handed me $15 of her own money during the yard sale last weekend, and told me she wanted to donate to me, as well as my sister, Dana, and Sindy, who I walked with last year. Last night I finally got the chance to get online and make the donations for her, and she wrote a special little note to each person. Of the 5 of us who walked last year, Sindy and I will be in Tampa in 2007, Cheryl is walking in Philadelphia again with her cousin, and Dana will be in Atlanta. I don’t know if Chris will be walking again in 2007.
Hope you all got your Gracie donations!
This week we’re enjoying a week off school for spring break, and the kids have been outside a LOT enjoying the beautiful weather! I can tell they’re getting a little bored with the bikes and swingset though, and it’s still too cold to swim. I wish we had more sports equipment for use outside, like these soccer goals! Our backyard is wide enough that we could set up a little field in our backyard and let the kids go wild. I love the pop-up soccer goals - those would store in our garage perfectly!
Since my yard sale last weekend was for charity, I was able to get a nice little blurb about it published in our newspaper. In addition to the classified ad I paid for, the local editor gave me a writeup in the community pages section, with my name, address, 3-day info, and all of the sale info. I didn’t think much of it once the sale was over, but today I came home and found a letter in my mailbox from a stranger in town. Inside was a check for $30 and a nice note from a woman telling me she was donating because her mom had breast cancer. I’m writing a thank you note tonight!
I just think it was so sweet that someone went out of their way to help a stranger like that.
Have you heard about all of the Hollywood stars and the trend with colonics? I don’t think I’d ever want to try that, but it makes me wonder how something like that catches on. I guess if you’ve ever suffered from constipation you know the pain of it - I’ll never forget when my son went through MONTHS of it when he was a preschooler. He spent a lot of time crying and in pain, but he was scared to go, because he knew it was going to hurt. Quite the catch 22 for a little guy to deal with! And you don’t want to get started on laxatives, because that’s not a long term solution.
Something like Oxy-Powder can be used instead to cleanse the colon naturally and take care of all the processed foods that your colon can’t deal with.
The next time your kids ask to go on the computer, or watch a TV show, make them work for it. Suggest that for every block of TV or internet time they want, that they earn it by running around outside. Studies have shown that just 15 minutes a day of outside play can help children avoid becoming obese. My oldest ALWAYS wants to be on the computer or in front of the TV, but we’re encouraging her to go outside and ride her bike, or take the dogs for a walk, instead of plopping on the couch and doing nothing.
Children who did 15 minutes a day of moderate exercise (equivalent to a brisk walk) were 50% less likely than inactive children to be obese.
The 3-Day people have some great promo materials for walkers - shirts, signs, socks, banners, hats - all kinds of stuff. But I’d love something personalized with the URL of this site, and they don’t offer this. I came across a site selling Yard Signs, and they also do magnetic signs and banners for cars! Not only could I display the fact that I’m walking in 2007, but I could personalize it with the URL to this site and maybe even drum up a few more donations.
I’d even consider putting a sign in my yard to show off my 3-Day pride!
If you’re a reader at my other blog, you already know by now that my 3-Day fundraising yard sale was a big success! I had $474 at the end of the day on Saturday, and we got rid of a LOT of stuff. One trip to Goodwill later, and my garage is clean and clear.
We did get quite a bit of rain on Friday, but we didn’t let that discourage us…we just moved the sale into my garage and kept on going! We also had out donation buckets, and signs EVERYWHERE letting people know it was for charity. A lot of people “rounded up” their totals to add to our total, several who didn’t buy still handed over money, and even more emptied their change from wallets into our buckets. Even my son added a penny when he bought a table top football game from his aunt. (The sign on our bucket said “Every penny helps”, so he put in 1 cent…LOL!)
Thirty has hit hard. In addition to all of the gray hair I’ve sprouted, requiring me to color my hair monthly, fine lines and wrinkles and making themselves known. I’m probably not the first to experience fine lines and acne all at once - not fair! I’ve been too worried about the breakouts to worry about the aging, but I can see I need to start worrying. I’m slender, and that’s not helping me now, because I think the lines are a lot more visible on my face.
Time to start browsing the anti aging products available online and off I guess. It’s a whole new world to me - I’ve heard of some of these products before, but I’ve never had to shop for them. I’m clueless about what vitamins and minerals and Retin A and other new drugs can do for me. Do you have a product you swear by for anti aging? Are all antioxidants created equal? I’m exploring uncharted waters here….
The yard sale is tomorrow. I’ve got a garage full of junk treasures to sell, signs ready to go, and children ready to shake 3-Day buckets for donations.
I can’t shake the nagging feeling that I’m forgetting something. Or that I didn’t clear out everything from my house that I wanted to sell. I’m going to open a closet in a week and find a ton of stuff that should be out front tomorrow, right?
Tomorrow is the big day. My husband has his appointment with the pulmonary specialist to discuss his sleep issues…or rather, his snoring issues, which give me sleeping issues! After the consultation tomorrow, he’ll be given an appointment to go for the actual sleep study. I’m going to the appointment with him so that I can give an ACCURATE representation of his sleep habits. I am very interested to hear what the doctor has to say.
