A 'lil HooHaa

Messing with the blogging world since 2005

relay for life

The winner of the scarf is…

The scarf made for this fundraiser.

A few months ago, I held a sort of a contest.

As a way to raise money for the Relay For Life, I was trying to figure different ways to get people involved. With that came the idea of a quilted scarf. My mother is an excellent quilter and found a pattern. I purchased most of the material and away it went.

For ever $5 somebody donated to me or my mother’s Relay fundraiser, they received an entry.

In the end, we had nearly 200 entries for this scarf. Before we get to the winner and such, allow me to first thank everyone who donated.

See, while winning this scarf is a wonderful thing, the better thing is the fact that we raised a lot of money for the American Cancer Society.

Including self donations (registrations, luminaries etc.), between the two of us, we raised nearly $1,000. For that, thank you.

Even better — our team, which consisted of seven people, raised $1,950!

In the end, that’s what this is all about.

I’m willing to bet that most people have been touched in one way or another by cancer. It’s an awful, awful disease and hopefully, one day, there will be a cure. It’s events like this that give us the chance as a society to beat this disease.

We’ll be cooking up a better idea or two for next year as a small fundraiser and I hope you’ll enjoy that and give yourself a chance at winning it.

Anyway, to the scarf.

I used the randomizer at Random.org for this. For every entry a person had, I put their name in this. Then I had the Randomizer run a few times to make sure everything got shuffled and mixed. On the final run, the winner is Rod Pudney. His odds were high though has he had made a very generous donation for this.

Rod says he isn’t a scarf wearer but come this winter will give it a go as it’s a unique item. And, well, it’s a pretty sweet scarf.

Thanks everyone for donating to this cause. I’m humbled beyond words with how many people donated for this cause. Every dollar counts and I appreciate it.

Until next year’s fundraiser… thank you again!

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!

Thank you to all who donated

The Relay was again successful!

Thank you.

This post goes out to all of you who donated to my page for the Relay For Life.

Despite frigid (and below freezing) temperatures this past Friday/Saturday, we endured and stayed as long as we could. Our area Relay runs from 6 p.m. Friday until 8 or 9 a.m. on Saturday.

I made it until about 3:30 a.m. before I had to go home, take a quick nap and warm up. I returned at about 5:45 a.m. to help Darren tear down our tent and clean up everything. We chatted with a few others as the sun started to warm things up a bit. I finally got back to bed around 8 a.m. and slept into the early afternoon.

The Relay can really wipe you out for a weekend with the all-night event and then having to catch up on sleep and such.

Alas, it’s for a good cause. And well worth doing.

Each year, I set my goal for $500. And with such a small team, our goal is usually $1,000. We reached both this year.

For those of you who donated, again, thank you. My personal goal was well met with a late push Thursday night and I ended with $610 raised. The team did well, too, as we raised $1,950. I’m not sure if that includes everything we gave that night, though, so I’m hoping we’ll be over the $2,000 mark once they add everything up.

In the end, that’s what it’s all about.

The event is to Celebrate. Remember. Fight back.

And, to raise money to try and find a way to beat the hell out of cancer.

I hear so often people say that they relay because they can. I do as well. But I also do it as a way to give back and, hopefully, be able to see a cure for this disease in my lifetime. Will that happen? Who knows. But I can continue to hope.

And try and raise money.

So thank you again. Many times over.

As for the raffle… oh yeah! I didn’t forget! I’ll be going through, adding up number of entries and running it through the Random.org randomizer in the next week or so and then will announce the winner via e-mail and on the blog. I have the scarf ready to send out, so I will be announcing that soon!

Until then… thank you!

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook! 

My last-second plea to get Relay For Life donations

If you have a few bucks to donate, I'd appreciate any support!

I have a feeling everyone reading this has somehow seen what cancer can do to someone.

Whether you’ve dealt with it directly, or read about it, or know someone who has dealt with it, you know what it can do. And who knows when or if a cure will be found, but they are continually trying to find it.

For those who don’t know, my father had cancer twice — colon and lung. The first time, he beat it. The second time, the disease won. After a long and courageous battle, he died on Aug. 17, 2007.

Not a day goes by that I don’t think about him.

Cancer is one of the worst things you can see someone go through. My grandmother died of cancer. I watched one of my best friends — in his early 30s — deal with it. I have other family members and other friends who have battled or are currently battling this disease.

It knows no age. It knows nothing about race and/or sex.

Relay For Life 2012

It knows only that it attacks people and it is a nasty, nasty disease.

Ever since my father died, I have participated in the American Cancer Society’s Relay For Life in our area. It’s an excellent event. Though the event itself sometimes can drag on, the idea of it is wonderful. And in the end, I’m actually only concerned with one thing when it comes to the Relay for Life — raising as much money as we can.

That’s where you come in.

Many of you who read this blog, I know. Others, I don’t. But I still ask the same — will you donate to my fundraising page?

Every dollar counts. No matter how much you can give, it helps. I understand the economy at this point. It’s not the greatest. But for some things, I always try and give. So anything you can give, I highly appreciate.

This year, I’m trying to spruce things up a bit. So, for every $5 you donate to my personal Relay For Life page(you can do luminaries, too — just do them through my page!), I will give you one entry for a random drawing to win a quilted scarf. The scarf, which is flannel, was quilted by my mother. It’s really nice and warm.

So, donate $20 and get four entries. It’s as simple as that!

The details about the scarf:

  • Material: Flannel.
  • Dimensions: The scarf is about 5 1/2 inches thick and about 58 inches long.
  • Who is it for?: Unisex.

If you want a little more info about the scarf (and more photos), check out the original post I had a couple of months ago.

So this is my final plea. I am trying to reach my personal goal ($500) and need a late push to make it. Even if I don’t make it, I’m happy with how much I’ve raised — and that our team has made its goal as well.

And, remember, you have a chance to win that wonderful quilted scarf! (Click on the link above to see photos and get the info… hopefully, that will sway you to donate!)

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook! 

Contest: Give and win

A hand-made quilted scarf.

The above image is a scarf that was made by my mother. It’s flannel and quilted.

And it can be yours!

Every year, I come to the blog in hopes of soliciting some donations for my Relay For Life fundraising. It’s the one time of year I really try to give and get people to give.

After all, I would say the majority of us have all been touched by cancer in one way or another.

This year, it’s the scarf.

To win?

Donate.

For every $5 that is donated to my personal Relay For Life page, you’ll get one entry to win this scarf. It’s as simple as that. So if you donate $20, you get four entries.

Our local relay runs this year from 6 p.m. April 27 to 9 a.m. April 28.

Therefore, I’ll say that this contest runs until noon on April 28, 2012. Don’t wait until the last second, though! If that happens, I’ve found people forget. And with this, every dollar counts when fundraising!

When that time comes, I might be sleeping after being up so long! But at some point that day, I’ll do a random draw for the winner. I’ll likely use random.org by putting every entry in and then hitting the button 10-20 times to really randomize it.

I’ll then mail the scarf to the winner.

This counts for any way of donating, as long as it credits to my account. So you can buy luminaries in honor of or in memory of someone you care about. If you let me know who you did the luminary for, I will also try and get a snap shot of said luminary for you. I can’t make promises, because sometimes it’s hard to track them all down. But I will try my hardest.

I thank you in advance for helping with this fundraiser.

You can donate by going to my personal Relay for Life page.

Some other photos of the scarf:

The more the scarf is washed/dried, the more frayed and "worn" it gets as part of the look.

Folded up.

Another view.

Details about the scarf: 

  • Material: Flannel.
  • Dimensions: The scarf is about 5 1/2 inches thick and about 58 inches long.
  • Who is it for?: Unisex.

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook by clicking the button on the right side of the page!

Day Zero Project: Completed No. 3

A Day Zero Project goal of P.J.’s has been completed!

Goal completed: Attend a rally for a cause I really care about.

Date completed: April 29-30.

Number: 3 (remember, these goals will not all be done in order. It’s a random list where the numbers actually are).

Description: I had seen this one on the Day Zero website and thought it would make for a good addition to my list. It seems like a good thing as it gets you out into something and doing something for something you believe in.

Why I wanted to do it: Because, truthfully, it’s worth getting involved in some things.

How I did it: My “rally,” is a borderline rally, but for this list, it works. I attended and participated in the Relay For Life. The Relay is a fundraiser for the American Cancer Society. This rally, the Delaware County chapter, raises more than $100,000 each year. The Rally is a great evening of people coming together to celebrate those who have beaten cancer, remember those who lost the battle and support those who are currently fighting the disease. There are ways to raise money, events to participate in and people walking constantly. In the end, it’s people coming together to try and beat this awful disease. Our team raised more than $1,600, so we did pretty well, I think. Overall, a rally worth attending.

About P.J.’s Day Zero Project: Day Zero is a project where people come up with 101 things to do over 1001 days. I started the project on Oct. 10, 2010 with an anticipated finish date of July 8, 2013. Goals will not be revealed until they are completed. A private list is at the Day Zero website and the list will be made public upon completion of the project. It’s my thoughts that if things are kept private, should I not do them, change or find a way around it, I’d only be cheating myself.