Hi Folks,
You may recall that I was coming down with
a cold during the last sale more than two weeks ago...well, I'm still
recovering from the darned thing! What a nasty one, a very energy
draining virus and the worst cold I've had in many years. Anyhow, I'm finally feeling much better and my energy is mostly back.
As
many of you know, my little 2 year old niece Elena was diagnosed this
spring with a rare genetic disease called Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA).
This debilitating illness affects the nerves controlling the muscles in
her body. Luckily her condition is of the less severe variety but
nevertheless it is doubtful that she will ever be able to walk and she
has a number of associated disabilities that will require constant
lifelong care.
My sister Megan realized that the family
would need a van with handicap accessibility and was quite shocked to
discover how expensive they are. So they held a couple of fundraisers
over the summer including an online one. I had posted a small link to
it on the blog here (which I have recently taken down). I can tell you
that we were all absolutely blown away by the MANY kind and extremely
generous donations as well as the supportive words. Truly we cannot
thank you all enough! It's very humbling indeed.
Well,
Megan's original goal of a brand new van turned out to be a little
ambitious but she finally settled on a more affordable used Honda
Odyssey with low mileage. The family is currently having it outfitted
with the necessary wheel chair accessible gear and it should serve them brilliantly for several
years. Elena is doing pretty well all things considered and I look
forward to seeing the whole family around Christmas time.
Today
I have a cute little item to offer. I came up with this idea over the
summer while thinking of my family situation and I gave it a lot of
thought. The Atwood Sweetheart is a simple lightweight key fob design in
304 stainless steel, just a hair under 1/8" thick. The tool does
feature a cap lifter but I think it's most important and meaningful
function may be a bit loftier. Is there anything better than love in this world? I think not... With that idea in
mind, half of the proceeds from the Sweethearts will be donated to
charity, in this case Cure SMA, (curesma.org) which is the only
organization devoted to Elena's illness. In future runs of Sweethearts, I
might do something different as far as a charity target but this seems
like a great place to start.
The Sweethearts will run
$45 each plus shipping and the link is below. Once again, on behalf of
my sister Megan, niece Elena and our whole family, I thank you all so
very much and God Bless!
Sweethearts are sold out for today but I have a few more coming shortly. Thank you all once again!
