Bigger and Better things!

So, with our first walk behind us, we decided it was time to shoot for bigger and better things for our second year. We raised our goal to $7,500 and with doing so, thought we should do some added fundraisers to help reach it. In May, we sent out emails and collected people's unwanted treasures for a multi-family yard sale. This was a great success with raising $520 to go towards our team goal and anything that did not sell was donated to goodwill. We'd like to put a shout out to everyone that donated items to our yard sale and a special thank you to David and Kori Harris for letting us borrow their driveway. You guys are awesome, not only did you donate your prime location, you also had to deal with the whole Gale family for the entire day! Yikes, that's a lot to ask.

Be sure to start saving any unwanted goodies because I'm sure we will do this again in the spring:)

Unfortunately I was not thinking and didn't take any pictures.

As a last minute idea to try to bring in more funds, we decided to have a walk kick off party at Steve's Pizza. We figured everyone needs to eat and why not donate a little to the cause at the same time. We sent out emails asking everyone to join us and spread the word and little Ranse made up a flyer to pass out to his entire football team.

We weren't sure what to expect, we hoped for a good turn out but you just never know. We were blown away when the entire pizza place was packed with our friends, family and football team. We counted around 130 people that showed up to support Michael's Crew. Steve's Pizza donated 20% of the sales before tax and we were very pleased to pick up a check for $275 the following day. The owner was very pleased and invited us to come back and have as many fundraisers as we would like.

Thanks again to everyone that came out that night, when I know it would have been so easy to just stay home. Let's just say we have the absolute best friends and family in the whole world!!!

Here are some pictures I took that evening.

Walk To Cure Diabetes 2007

In October 2007, Michael's Crew walked at the state capitol with about 4,000 other walkers. As I already mentioned, our team consisted of a little over 50 people and raised $5,000. The Sacramento walk raised over $400,000 that year to go towards research. It was a wonderful experience and the whole family couldn't stop talking about doing it again the next year, especially Michael! JDRF held a special awards banquet for walk captains and their families and Michael received a glass trophy of a sneaker for his outstanding efforts in fundraising. Anytime someone new comes to the house, Michael will go get that sneaker and show them. He is so proud to have his very own trophy.

The walk has become a new family tradition that we will participate in until there is a cure.

Here are some photos from our very first walk!

Michael's Crew....how it all began

Michael on his third day in I.C.U.
Ranse and I were in Mexico when we got the news, so we brought him home a special gift.
Even in the hospital, Michael was dressed as a pirate and having sword fights.

Michael's Crew was formed last year at this time, when we formed a team to participate in the "Walk to Cure Diabetes". Michael was diagnosed with diabetes 3 months after his third birthday in February, 2007. We learned of JDRF (Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation) at this time and all of the fabulous efforts they have performed to research diabetes and hopefully one day find a cure! We also learned that they host many walks all over the U.S. to raise funds for research. Well, let's just say that was exactly what our family needed. We decided to join the fight and help raise funds for researchers to find a cure.



Since Michael loved pirates, we decided to have some fun and spruce things up a bit with our team. We provided t-shirts for our team with Michael's picture on the front in a pirate hat and on the back is our "family treasure map", starting with the date that Michael was diagnosed and following a trail to a treasure chest with the words above and below it that states, "Our Treasure.....A cure for diabetes". I have to give props to Taylor for coming up with this idea, I absolutely love it!!! So, along with the shirts we also provided our team with eye patches, bandannas, pirate necklaces and tattoos. Everyone was a good sport and I think it added a little extra flare to our first walk.



We set a goal to raise $5,000 our first year and reached it! We were also very excited to have around 50 people join us at the walk. Michael's Crew definitely made a statement with how many people were on their team and Uncle Brian stood out as he surprised us all by arriving to the walk in a full Pirate costume. I didn't even recognize him at first. When I first saw him, I was disappointed because I thought that someone else had come up with the same theme. I finally recognized him once I saw him standing next to Emily. What a relief! We were the only pirate team.



Above are some pictures from when Michael was originally diagnosed in the hospital. I will write about our latest happenings under a new entry coming soon!