"If you're going through Hell, keep going."
-Winston Churchill

May 21, 2011

Hakunu Matata!

Since there are those of you who follow me on my blog and not on Facebook, it has been quite an exciting week! First I will mention the Southern Belle fundraiser. As I previously said, the success was phenomenal! Our final count turned out to be 1,271 shirts!! Although we originally intended to fax the order last Monday, it was not placed until Friday due to late orders trickling in all week. This was such a big order that Southern Belle even had to order more supplies when we told them how many we would need. I am also happy to announce our T-shirt is one of Southern Belle’s top-selling shirts! We ask for your patience as we wait 2-3 weeks for this large second order (1,041 shirts!).  If you are an early bird and got your order turned in by May 2nd then Laura has either already contacted you or, if it is being shipped, it is in route as we speak. The first order could not have come in at better timing! Yesterday morning (Friday), Doug Walker from WLOX came to my house to interview Laura, my mother and myself. It aired on the 6:00 news last night and already our numbers have drastically jumped. Laura and I both wore our shirts with pride for the segment which turned out to be the best thing we could have done. Between Laura and myself, we have gotten tons requests about how to purchase a shirt. Because of this, we have decided to put the order form back up by the end of this weekend. I do not know the turn-in date for this order yet, but it will of course be posted on the resource page and the Facebook page once we have all the details sorted out. Please keep in mind we are not professionals, everyone who has been so graciously helping me are volunteers and have lives of their own. We try to respond to everyone as quickly as possible, but please keep this in mind if it takes us a while. If you are interested in ordering shirt, you may sign up for the e-mail list. As soon as we start taking more orders you will be immediately notified. You may register here:

Sign up for e-mail list!

Here is Laura and I in our shirts!


I continue to find myself blessed to be considered an inspiration to people, especially those who have never met me. Of course I have my bad days as well, but for the most part I have the attitude of “I will beat this!” but it has definitely been a roller coaster. It would not be normal for me to be positive and upbeat all the time, but when I find myself feeling down and throwing a pity party, I remind myself of all the blessings I have. I remind myself it could have been so much worse. I remind myself I have friends and family who are there for me, who love and support me. I remind myself that everything happens for a reason, that we may not understand it for a long, long time. When you find yourself in these situations, whatever the reason may be for your heartache or pain, you must take things into perspective. Think about those who are not as fortunate as you. I rarely find a situation where I cannot say “well, things could be much worse!” There have been many bumps in my road, when in the hospital it always seemed like two steps forward, three steps back. And though sometimes that would discourage me, at least it was not only backward steps. I truly believe in this quote and try to live by it daily, “Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react.” While you cannot control some people or situations, they cannot control you either. Only you can decide how to deal with tough situations and no one can take that from you. Like my shirts says… Will you say “why me?” or “try me!” I challenge you all to grab the bull by the horns and hold on- it’s going to be a rough, but fun, ride.

 You can check out both my stories from WLOX and WGUD below!

WLOX story & video

WGUD video

No comments:

Post a Comment