The Fundraiser...And How You Can Help!

After much prayer and contemplation, Kevin and I have decided to do a fundraiser for the travel expenses back to Ethiopia.  This is totally out of our comfort zone and it's our first time at this rodeo...

But between the truck breaking, the window incident, Mr. Peabody's vet bills, the first trip costing twice as much as we planned (thank you fuel prices), the speed of the process (praise God!), the cost of travel shots/medicines, Dane's dental surgeries and eye therapies, my recent medical bills, etc. etc. etc. it's been a year of financial out pour. 

So we will be doing a Garage Sale.  As is typical Patty-style, we have started this a little later than we probably should have, but we are going to make the best of it and power through it!

We will hold it at our house, in the front yard, garage and backyard the weekend of September 23-24th.  We are shooting to raise the cost of the travel expenses for the second trip and anything we raise beyond that will go for the items needed by the Mati Orphanage in Ziway, Ethiopia that need to be purchased in-country.  Some of the things they needed that we would need to buy there are water container to filter rain water to clean water, printer/copier, laundry machine.

So, we are all in and here's what you can do to help:

• Donations of used household items (no encyclopedias or hide-a-beds please, pretty much anything that Goodwill will take we will).  If you are willing and able to drop them off, we we love that, but if not, we will pick them up.
• If you are at a garage sale, know someone who is having one, or having one yourself let them know we will take their "leftovers" same rules as above, on pickup and restrictions) and I can send you my phone number privately if you would like and I will be making fliers for this shortly. (If you are planning any big yard/estate sale shopping days, please let me know and I will give you fliers to drop off!)
• Pricing, Cleaning and Organizing - We will be doing runs to houses and garage sales through the 20th of September, but we will need to have people check the incoming items for potential high value items on eBay and then pricing and cleaning items as they come in so that we can get top dollar without a bunch of left over items!
• Setting up and tearing down on the sale day(s).  We will have the ability to do some pre-setup since we will be using our garage and our backyard, and we probably won't tear down at night.
• Sign makers and posters!
• Baked goods for the days of the sale - We will be selling drinks, snacks and probably some hot dogs too.  If you are a whiz at making treats, cookies, etc. or have a way with the BBQ, we would love your help as part of the fundraiser!
• When it comes time for the Garage Sale - Tell all of your family and friends for us!
• Pray for success of the event and to raise enough money for the trip expenses as well as the Mati Orphanage items!

A couple of disclosures: If the items donated are something the orphanage and/or foster home have requested, we will earmark those to go to Ethiopia (see 8/12 post for more details).  Next, at the end of the garage sale, we hope to send any leftover items on to another good cause, but it may not be adoption related if we do not find another family doing a garage sale as a fundraiser that is able to take the items.

And for reading this post, we will post the first ever picture on the blog of Dane's little brother, Isaac!  100% of your help on this will be to help him get home and to help his "classmates" from the orphanage in Ziway!