Update on Relay For Life

Hey guys-

I thought I'd update you randomly on how relay for life was going. I might also repost this on whatever wednesday so I can make sure everyone gets to read it (I know sometimes after people read the daily post, they don't come back till the next post and then sometimes miss things)

Let me just start out by saying THANK YOU! You guys have been AMAZING when it comes to donating money to relay for life. SO amazing that not even a week after I started, I am just five dollars short of my personal goal. However, I must say, by doing it so quickly, you guys have created a monster, lol. I keep thinking, if I did that much in a such a short amount of time, how much more can I do with the rest of the time? Not to mention, the rest of my teammates haven't raised any money yet, and while my personal goal was 200 dollars, our team's goal is 1,000. Normally I'd be kinda peeved that they weren't pulling their weight, but since this is for a good cause, I want to see just how close to that 1,000 dollars we can get! And, on a more... Conceited note, I am also only 35 dollars away from being the 3rd highest top participator. It would be AWESOME if I could just get there.

So, again, those of you who haven't donated, I am asking you to donate. Again, I realize money is tight for a lot of people right now. We ourselves are an one income home. But seriously, if you can give just a dollar, that is one dollar closer to finding a cure. I mean if you get a coffee every morning, and skip it for a week, and donate that money. If you ask your office if you can have a dress down day and everyone who dresses down has to pay 5 bucks, and you donate that money. It would be SO helpful, and SO many people would appreciate it.

I'm also looking for fundraising ideas if you guys have anything. Anything cheap and easy I can make and sell? And also, I really want to "reward" you guys for helping out, it means SO much to me, so if you can think of any way I could do that, let me know! (I mentioned having a bonus post, or giving people who donated a "spoiler pass" so that they could get a post early, or find out what's going to happen early...) I'd really like to make my first year a success and I need your help to do so!


***EDIT*** You guys are REALLY freaking awesome! I've now passed my goal and I'm a mere 15 dollars away from being a top participant, in less than a week! How awesome are you??? I don't think I posted the link on this blog for donations, so to make it easier to find, I'll post it here: www.relayforlife.org/dublin - donate, search for my name (Laura Erwin) or my team (Blooms for Hope)

I also just checked in with one of the people who runs a lot of the events. I will be volunteering at the Blarney Hop for Relay For Life (where our team can collect donations). So if you guys are in my area, check it out. It's in Dublin after the St Patrick's Day Parade on March 13th.

And thank you guys for the suggestions! I've contacted Wal-mart to see if we can have a bake sale outside their building, so we'll see if they get back to me!
Thanks so much y'all!

8 comments:

I have an idea to raise more money. I'm not sure where your husband works but when I did my walk for breast cancer I e-mailed people at work (only people I'm friends with). Your husband's company might have a policy against it, but maybe they don't. Although I'm sure this is an obvious idea.
You might be able to talk to a local grocery store or a Walmart around you and organize a group of people from your team to stand out front on a weekend day with cans to collect money.
I'm not so creative in things you can make to sell though. When is the event? So I can check back on your progess and maybe donate more towards the end.

 

I thought I had found a way to donate some money but it looks like my US cousin has vanished. But he'll be here in March, so I'll have him donate some money and give him euros so he can spend them here. Otherwise you have to e-mail me your address (only if you want to) and I'll post some dollars the very very old fashioned way.

 

A friend of mine does a fundraiser every year where a bunch of girls get together and make homemade cookie dough, shape it into cookies feeze it. They sell them by "the flat" (40 cookies) for 12.00 (CAD). She e-mails out to people and gets the orders before they make the stuff, gives people options a few different options of cookie types. It goes over really well.
Good luck with whatever you do.
Kat

 

If you have a local craft fair (not sure if those are just a crazy Minnesotan thing) you could see if you could join it for a weekend and sell homemade cookies, brownies, etc. There's a HUGE profit to be made in baked goods. If you think about it, it's just flour, sugar, butter, and a few other spices which are all extremely cheap. Sell cookies for $.25 a piece or 5/$1, brownies for $.50, etc.

If you do cupcakes, a box of mix is a buck, and icing is about $2. Sell normal sized cupcakes for $.50 and you make $12 (2 dozen)... minus the initial $3 or so spent, that's a $9 profit.

I don't have any other ideas though, I'm not crafty... I just like to bake lol

 

Some friends of mine did Avon walk for breast cancer last year and did a couple bake sales with donation jars out too, they did it at the local fire house during auctions and breakfasts there. Our local VFW does a bake sale once a month during Bingo also. You could get friends and family to help make stuff as well as your other teammates, great way for everyone to participate in the fundraising!

 

Well, let me just start off by saying I re-read what I wrote, and I said *I* a lot, and really, want a meant was, YOU guys raised the money fast. All I had to do was ask for it, which is the easy part.

Second, you guys have come up with some amazing ideas. Jeremy is asking at work to see what their policies are (some companies are against it. Like my Mom's work, you can't bring in your kid's fundraising stuff or anything like that, which I think is lame.)

We're also going to try to do a bake sale as well.

And Nic, if you want to mail it to me, I have no problem giving you my address. Just to come and murder me, please :-)

Also, if you guys see any online printable coupons for cake mix/cupcake mix, please email me and let me know!

 

If you decide to bake cookies, try the recipe on the package of Tollhouse Chocolate Chips. That's the one I use and everyone loves them. You can also substitute regular chocolate chips with other flavors like mint, peanut butter, basically anything you can find. Everyone always asks me to bring them to holidays and parties.

Check cake mix sites like duncanhines.com pilsbury.com bettycrocker.com etc. Some make you sign up, but it's all free and you usually wind up getting free recipes as well.

 

JillyBean you took the words right out of my mouth. The tollhouse recipe is my favorite also. At christmas I did some with white chocolate chips and have done them before with M&M's as well. For valentine's day I did Red Velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting - it might have cost $3.50 for the ingredients and it made 24.
I am signed up on all of those websites for coupons, just make sure your local store will take printed coupons. FOr some reason (I.m just outside of Washington, DC) some stores here take them and some don't.