And Now For a Little Quiet Time

Ahhhhhh, it has gotten a little bit more relaxed around here. I love organizing everything, but at the same time it's a lot of work. Now I can focus on my family. Madeline is doing ballet so it's fun to see what new things she has learned. Mom would be so proud of her and I wish she could have been able to go to her recital. But, I have to look at the other side of the coin too. Mom got to know Madeline for the first 3 years of her life and Ben for the first 7 months. All thanks to a donor.

There is a young man that is doing his class speech on organ donation. I hope that I am able to help him out if he needs it. I hope that he brings about some awareness for organ donation as well.

I have graciously had "Donate Life" bracelets (think LiveStrong only green) given to me and I proudly wear by bracelet.

If you have the chance, please watch the video I posted. I think Hattie does an excellent job of showing just how important organ donation is.Click here to hear Hattie's story!

A Charitable Donation

I just got a phone call from the Wellington Fire Department! They would like to give a donation in memory of my mom! I'm so happy to hear this. It just makes me feel like what I'm doing is really helping.

The Gift of Life Network is a government funded organization but there are so many other great foundations. I mentioned the Toronto General Hospital, The Liver Foundation of The Kidney Foundation.

We will see how things go. But I'm just so excited about this!

Our Drive

On October 8 I set up an Organ Donor Registration Drive outside of the Picton Home Hardware. There was a large amount of people that stopped in to the store. Of all of them I would say 2/3 either knew there was a change and had registered or thought they were registered and took a form. The other 1/3 walked right by us or ignored us. This was very frustrating for me given the history I have in relation to organ donation. I'm happy to have had 5 additional volunteers that were helping me in spreading the word. I was suprised by the number of people that wanted to give us money although they were more surprised that we didn't want any! I hope it helped some people to register and save lives.

Donor Registration Drive at the Picton Home Hardware.

It Rained. It Hailed. The Wind Snapped Our Ribbon. But Our Spirit Wasn't Broken!

Super Madeline! Battling the evil unknown
and bringing awareness to life saving Organ
and life enhancing tissue donation!

Pumpkinfest, although wet, cold and windy, was a success. We had a float full of people who wanted to show their support for organ and tissue donation awareness. I couldn't believe the crowd that was out to see the parade!


Unfortunately my 8' high green ribbon was snapped in half on the way to the parade by the wind and the booth was only up for about 1.5 hours because of rain. There were disappointments, but through it all there were smiles and laughter. We brought awareness to the community and even made it on Countylive.ca!

Our Police Escort.

Marilyn and Joanne show their support
even in the rain and hail.

Our somewhat smaller ribbon, but still lots of smiles.

PUMPKINFEST!

I've been planning and planning and now it's finally here! It's almost like planning a wedding. Of course you can plan and plan but you can't control the weather. Here's hoping the rain stays away! I'm just so excited to see how things turn out. The float is ready but I haven't looked at it yet. I'm going over tonight to see it.

We're setting up the booth tomorrow morning and Picton Home Hardware has been amazing again and is providing us with a tent.

I will definitely post pictures so that you can see how things went. I'm just a giddy as child at Christmas. I just can't wait.

Happy Birthday

Today is my first birthday. My first birthday without my mother here to celebrate it with me. I've had a few moments where that thought has become hard to bear. Every year mom made me the same birthday cake. I thought about making it myself, but it still wouldn't be the same. Sure, it'd taste the same, maybe it'd look the same. It just wouldn't be the same. When I was a kid my birthday wish was always for things like toys or outfits or books. I'm sure you remember what it was like. This year my only wish would be to see my mother. Give her a hug. Tell her I love her. Thanks to a donor I was able to do those things for over 9 nine years. I didn't realize how precious that time was and maybe took it for granted. I certainly understand a lot more this year than I did last year.

Tonight is the Celebration Dance for Terry and Wannett. I'm excited to go out with my hubby. I'm happy for Terry that he received the gift of life. I'm amazed by Wannett because she truly committed the most selfless act. I'm proud of my community for banding together in support of these 2 people. Hopefully I can post some pictures from the dance. It's going to be a lot of fun.

Mom's 10 Year Anniversary

10 years ago today my mother received the Gift of Life. I wish she could have made it to see this day, but sometimes things just don't work out the way you want them to. What did 9 and a half years mean to her? She got to travel to Mexico, St. Thomas and across Canada. She was able to see me graduate highschool and then university. She attended my wedding and was able to fly out to Calgary to meet her grand daughter, Madeline. Although it was up in the air, she got to meet Ben last September. What would 9.5 years mean to you? Hopefully you'll never have to find out and hopefully you can help someone else never have to find out. Register to donate life saving organs today. You can help up to 8 people get their lives back.

My Day as a Student... Sort Of

I wanted to update about yesterday. I went back to school! (I wish!) I went to the Picton highschool and gave 2 presentations about organ donation. I think it went well. The students were very receptive to it and hopefully I will get some volunteers for the Donor registration Drive on Saturday. I explained the significance of receiving an organ and I showed on one slide what the extra time meant to my mom. I had 5-6 girls in tears while I explained her story. I don't know if that's considered successful or not, but I hit home on how inportant it is.  I also generated a Jeopardy game afterwards and gave out prizes to the winning teams. That went over really well and I could tell a good chunk of the students had been listening because they knew the answers. It was pretty cool. I will likely go back in Jan-Feb. I enjoyed it. It wasn't my intention to make people cry, maybe if I hadn't of choked up it would have helped! Be that as it may, this is real. If I get emotional it's because I'm living this. People who don't experience this can't portray the emotion that I can and get the point made like I can. This is why I like to talk about it.


I want to thank Ms. Curran for letting me to speak with the class. I didn't have many pictures, but really, what was I supposed to photograph? I put up my favourite picture of mom and the kids. I tried to explain to the classes that while mom was sick you have to look past the sickness and see how happy she was to be with her grandchildren.


When all of this started my friend and co-worker said to me 'Make sure you get pictures of her with Ben'. I didn't want to, I didn't want to remember her like that. Now I'm so grateful that I have that one shot.

Guest Appearance

Tomorrow I make my debut in the classroom. One that I have been in before actually. It was a classroom of mine when I was in highschool. However many years ago that was. I'm giving a talk to some grade 12 students to raise awareness about organ donation. I've done some research on people that have had transplants at the Gift of Life website and also on beadonor.ca. I think I'm ready. I just need to make the actual presentation! HA! I made something like an Organ Donation Jeopardy so hopefully it will go over well. My goal is to get these students motivated to raise awareness as well. You never know if you or a loved one will need an organ donation. It's a tall order, trying to tell teenagers their not invincible, but hopefully I'm up to the challenge. I remember what it was like to be a teenager, and I was invincible too.

I'm also going to be looking for volunteers to help with the Donor Registration drive on Saturday. October is a very busy month for me. I took the challenge, and  hopefully I'm rising to it. I'm not doing it for me though. I'm doing it for everyone waiting on that list. Everyone who has watch a loved one wait. Everyone who may need a transplant. No matter how invincible we all are.



Mom and Madeline - 6 years after her transplant.