700 Follower Celebration - Random Acts of Kindness are My Gift to You

What a pleasure it is to be celebrating a blog milestone today!

It is a lot of work to keep a blog going & I'm so thankful to you followers & readers who make it so worthwhile! Many thanks to the 700 "Google Friend Connect" friends & nearly 200 Google+ followers for your support. 

As my gift to you, I have been working on

600 Followers Celebration & My Gift to You!

Oh my goodness!

I am so 

FILLED WITH JOY

it's time for a . . . 

I have a thank you gift for you -

to express my gratitude.

In preparation for this occasion,

I have been performing little . . . 

giving

in behalf

 each of you wonderful followers.

I'll start with my favorite . . .

• Tutoring & playing with a little girl who is a  Sudanese Refugee - 120 minutes {I must have done a great job - look how happy she is in the pic above!}

More random acts of kindness . . . 

• Helping two friends pick out paint colors for their homes {no charge, of course} - 30 minutes
• Preparing a "Happy Valentine's Day" dinner for a {single} girlfriend who is too ill to leave her home - 60 minutes

• Putting yellow ribbons & bows in my neighbors yard for their son's homecoming - 20 minutes

Still not there yet . . . 

• Taking anonymous Valentine's surprises to single friends - 60 minutes
• Working for 2 hours so that I could donate my earnings to a young person who is going to India to help the children there - 120 minutes

ALMOST to my goal . . . 

• Volunteering at my local food bank - 120 minutes

With my friend, Kaisey at the Utah Food Bank

• Making pillowcases for a children's hospital - 120 minutes

GRAND TOTAL 650 MINUTES

OF SERVICE 

IN YOUR HONOR!

Thank you for giving me a 

wonderful occasion to celebrate.

Won't you please join me by using your blog
 to do good?

500 Followers Celebration

SHUT THE FRONT DOOR . . .

my blog now has

Wa-hoo!

To celebrate, I recently performed a

in your honor.
{My gift to you is in the background of this photo. . .}

A few weeks ago,

I began collecting gently-used coats

from my own home & people in my neighborhood.

When I say "gently-used", I really mean

"gently-used".  I was so amazed by the

generosity of those who donated.

So many of the coats were new or of such nice quality . . .

Then I took the coats 
{I think about 40}
to The Road Home shelter.

I am so impressed with this wonderful place
which provides temporary shelter to families
& helps them 

"step out of homelessness & back into the community".
The director I spoke to was so thrilled to 
receive the coats, saying that their need is great
at this time.



On the day that I was there,
approximately 60 children were 
staying at The Road Home with their families.
{100 people staying in 31 rooms/average stay 30 nights}

I saw other people who were helping out too.
For instance, this 7th grader, "Sammy",
 collected funds to buy Christmas presents
for the children staying at the shelter.

Wow.
{*Lump in throat*}


MANY THANKS to you wonderful readers
who gave me something happy to celebrate.


My heart has grown three sizes!

You Made MY Wish Come True & I Celebrated With "Make-A-Wish"

I'm so honored that my blog

recently hit the 300 followers mark!

I'm celebrating with a 

GIVEAWAY FOR YOU (click here to register) 

& a Random Act of Kindness

for my community to share my joy.

I got this idea from my thoughtful 
blog friend, Jules at . . . 

who inspired me to use my blog to try to

make world a better place.

Today I visited my local chapter of the

Make-A-Wish Foundation

to make a contribution

in honor of all you wonderful readers.

   

 -"Blaise", whose wish was to travel to Nashville to visit cousins & grandparents -

This amazing organization grants wishes to children with

life-threatening illnesses "to enrich the human experience with

hope, strength & joy."

There are 66 Make-A-Wish chapters in the U.S. with

even more all around the world.

In Utah, we are blessed to have a beautiful building

that houses Make-A-Wish.

This is the WISHING TOWER (more about that later) . . .

There are only two other Make-A-Wish facilities similar to this one

in the U.S.--one in Dallas & one in Sacramento

(with a third under construction in New Jersey).

Each wish child receives a real key 

in this "castle box"

& brings the key with them when they make their wish.

The key opens this door to the Wishing Tower!
Cool!

Children gave ideas about the design of this building.

"Shanna", age 9 said, "When they tell their wish 

music plays & fireflies dance".

Which is pretty close to what happens in the 

Wishing Tower.

Then the folks at Make-A-Wish do all in their power to

make that wish come true. 

Once their wish is complete, the children are invited to

etch their names onto a star & it joins the others as it is

raised to the ceiling in a 

beautiful constellation

which is a reminder of each wish child - 

those who have passed on AND those who 

continue on with their courageous battle against

a life-threatening illness.

- "Justin, age 10 suggested, "every child who makes a wish

leaves a gold star on the ceiling".

Visitors like me can have a wish token to keep 

or to make a wish in the fountain . . . 

Last time I visited, I made a VERY important wish
about one of my children,
tossed my token in the wishing pond,

AND IT CAME TRUE! This time I kept my token.

As you can see, this is a wonderful organization!
I think "Daniel", age 15 said it best when he
suggested, "The wishing place should be
all joy & peace with nothing 
whatsoever to do with the hospital".
  

If you want to know more (or join me in donating),

Click here for the Make-A-Wish website

or

Click here for the Make-A-Wish Blog

ALSO, if you live in the area, there will be a special

event at The Gateway in SLC on June 25th, 2011 &

a bike-riding event in St. George on October 22, 2011. 

BTW, here's a breakdown of how donations are used . . .

Thank you, blog friends, for

giving me a reason to celebrate!

 I shared this at The Girl Creative's Linky Party

YEAR LONG LINKY PARTY & a 200 Followers Celebration

A while back I blogged about 

My "Aha" Moment.

I was inspired by my blog friend, "Jules" at

when she celebrated 100 followers

by giving to her favorite charity,

Olivianna's Closet.

I promised to follow suit when I

reached my next milestone.

Therefore, it is my pleasure to

celebrate each of you 200 

wonderful followers by giving

a donation in your honor

to a soup kitchen in my community.

(By the way, my heart is so full--I never dreamed that

200 people would want to read my blog--thank you!!) 

Here I am with "Brian" today at our local

Rescue Mission. My donation represents $1 for

each of Pixie Dust's 200 followers.

(In the background of the above photo, you can see the chapel where

services are held--as well as pillows & blankets which are used each

night for those with no where else to lay their heads.)

(Here we are in the area where food is stored. Each day, about

400 meals are served to anyone in need!)

If you'd like to jump on board by

"Changing the World 

One Blog at a Time",

I invite you to do something meaningful

in honor of your blog.

For instance, my blog friend, "Mandi" at

always asks  that we go out and do a 

Random Act of Kindness

when we register for a give-away on her blog.

Brilliant! 

Please share with us about the fun 

you're having while participating in this challenge.

I'm keeping this linky party open for a year!