JEANS DAY!!!

I have an awesome school and to make them even more awesome, they did a jeans day fundraiser for AHOPE. Each student who brought in a dollar could wear jeans. The money will go to fund a field trip for the children at AHOPE. The kids were really cute about the whole thing, one little girl didn't even wear jeans but brought a dollar to help out anyway. That rocks!!!!!

We raised $478!!!!! Can you believe it??

More thank you's

A big thank you to Julie Mensik for organizing a donation drive at her boyfriend's bar. While the turnout was small, I still certainly appreciated the support and donations from Julie, Chris, Liz, Stephanie and Silvia!!!!

Thanks for all the watches Silvia!

Thank you to my babysitting kids, Sydney and Isabelle and their parents Bill and Maureen for your kind donation and all the cool watches!!

Thank you to all my friends at school who have continued to donate $$ especially Pat Barlow, Louise Puzek, Olga Vazquez and the Specials Teachers.

Gloves!!!

An old, dear friend of mine who is a nurse at RUSH donated many, many, many pairs of sterile surgical gloves which is something needed by AHOPE. It is on the donations list and Marianne said it was definitely something the nurses there wanted. I am stuffing as many as can fit into my suitcase and then shipping the rest to Vanessa at Flights for Change. This is an awesome organization of Continental flight attendants who take supplies to AHOPE several times a year.

THANKS MARGARET!!!!

Brunch with Gale Gand

Gale Gand is hands down my favorite chef and Chicago personality. Thanks to a keen eye of my friend Wendy, I was notified that she was a co-hosting a brunch at The Bristol restaurant with the Chicago chapter of the American Institute of Wine and Food(founded incidentally by the infamous Julia Child). It was to promote her new brunch book, which is another culinary masterpiece. Well, brunch was to die for. Crepes with bananas and homemade Nutella, strata with wild onions, noodle kugle, pear coffee cake, bacon waffles, yes bacon waffles, asparagus with eggs, hmmm... I feel like I might be forgetting something, but regardless amazing!!!!

Then as we were asking Gale if she'd take a photo with us, she asked us to send it to her because she forgot her camera and wants to post it on her blog. I am in heaven, will send you the link when I see it up there. YUM!!!!

Thank you's!!!

I want to thank some recent supporters:

My book club members:
Meg Heron Blake
Eileen Blake
Jeanine Kupec

Jen Belongia

Senator John Milner

Anna White
Gina Cook

Donations Wanted.....

I just got the updated needs list from AHOPE. While there are many needs, so many of them are so heavy and bulky. Unfortunately I have limited luggage space, so I've decided to collect wristwatches. They are looking for children/teen watches for ages 8-15. There are about 35 children at Big AHOPE and I hope to bring enough for everyone. The watches in the picture are ones my mom and I purchased today at Kohls and Walmart. We got them all from $7 to $11 a piece.

Please let me know if you'd like to donate a wristwatch.

Kiva Loans

As I wrote in my previous post, I got my mom a Kiva Loan for Mother's Day. She went on the site and wanted to choose a woman from either the Ukraine(where her family is from) or Ethiopia(obvious reasons)... but since at the moment there are no loans from there.. she choose a single mother from Tajikistan. She choose Inobat Narzullaeva because they were the same age. Inobat works in the clothing market, selling traditional caps. She wants to diversify her selection. Good luck Inobat, I hope you get your entire loan and that it helps!!!