Mixed Nuts: VisionWalk 2010

Quotes

"There is no better way to thank God for your sight than by giving a helping hand to someone in the dark." - Helen Keller
When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, "I used everything you gave me." ~Erma Bombeck
You may never know how strong you are, until being strong is your only choice.- Unknown
Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see a shadow' ~Helen Keller
Promise me you'll always remember: You're braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.
Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened."- Dr. Seuss
"Life is 10% what happens to you, and 90% how you react to it."
"God doesn't give children with disabilities to strong people: He gives them to ordinary, everyday people, then He helps the parents to grow stronger through the journey. Raising a child with special needs doesn't TAKE a special family, it MAKES a special family."Author Unknown
I have been driven many times to my knees by the overwhelming conviction that I had nowhere else to go – Abraham Lincoln
Be always at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let each new year find you a better man. ~ Benjamin Franklin
There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as if everything is a miracle - Albert Einstein
The journey of a 1000 miles starts with a single step
Sometimes in the middle of an ordinary life, love gives you a fairy tale
Where there is great love, there are always miracles - Willa Cather
The Difficult we can do immediately, the impossible takes a little longer
Doing what you like is freedom. Liking what you do is happiness
There are two lasting bequests we can give our children. One is roots. The other is wings.
Be the change you want to see in the world
Don't tell God how big the storm is, tell the storm how big Your God is..........
Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it
Fall down seven times - get up eight - unknown
Despite our differences, we sink or swim together
Life may not be the party we expected, but while we are here, we might as well dance
"The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones." -Confucius

Saturday, October 2, 2010

VisionWalk 2010

Today was the day.

Finally! I am sure most of my readers will be glad to learn that VisionWalk is FINALLY come. Because I am sure you are sick of me constantly reminding you that it is almost here.

(these are perogies. Yes....they are weird)

You're welcome.

Today was a beautiful day. It started very early for us (for a Saturday) because we needed to be there around 9am. It was an hour drive to the walk, so we had to leave pretty early.

It started out cool, but by the time the walk started, the sun was shining and it was decently warm.

We made our quota - we raised $10,600+, and we had the largest team. That is what I wanted to do and we did it!

Thanks to everyone who showed up. I wish we had an actual count of who we had - but our guess is between 70-80 people.

This picture is MOST of the team. (about 60 people) Some people showed up after the picture, so we missed a few people!

It was a great day. We raffled off our Finley's Fighters basket.

My cousin, Louann was the winner! Finley got to draw the name in the end of the walk.

We had people come to our table even from other teams, which was great! We even sold a few wristbands and t-shirts to them as well. They all wanted to meet Finley and hear our story.

We were met with a few tears, which is always hard. But now they know about her. And they will fight harder when they think about her.

Arlington and Finley were celebrities at the walk. Cainan wasn't interested in being on the stage, or he would have been up there too.

Arlington went on stage twice to dance and Finley went once.

We had a team t-shirt contest.

There were a lot of teams there! 451 people registered to walk, but I don't think everyone signed in. So I think there were more people than that.

Anyway - it was down to two teams - ours and another.
The one guy took off his shirt to try and ~~cheat~~ win.

But I had a better strategy...... I grabbed Finley.

That did it. We won the contest!

Finley was the ribbon cutter who started the race. She loved that she got to cut it with scissors. Highlight of her day.

Here is a little slide show of our team walking:

(click on the little x above in the slide show, and that will get rid of the advertisement)

After the walk, we hung around awhile, and said goodbye to our team.

Then a large number of us went to lunch at the Cheesecake factory before heading home.

It was a great day. Foundations Fighting Blindness of Pittsburgh at raised over $55,000 at days end for retinal diseases. And they will collect until December 1st so hopefully they will reach their $65,000 goal.

They are a fabulous organization. We are grateful for FFB. We wouldn't have had a direction to go after we found out about Finley's diagnosis if we didn't have them. They gave us hope. So we thank them.

Now that we have branched out to our own Fund, we have FFB to thank. They gave us the confidence that we can do this for Finley. This is is important for us to fight the most for her and the hardest we can.

So please - visit our RDH12 Fund for Sight HERE. And visit our Finley's Fighters sight HERE. We have already collected over $3000 for our new Fund and we are so excited! We are off on a running start. But we need your help.

I will post all the pictures of our trip to Connellsville High School on Tuesday. We had a fun day there as well!!!

See you Tuesday.