Filed under: Uncategorized
FOR MOST CURRENT UPDATE:
Please visit www.haileyandcartersdream.com for updates on my sister’s Valentines Day Miracle campaign during my leave of absence.
For information on lessons, please contact Steve Kelly at 815-519-0407.
Thank you for your loving prayers and support and gifts toward my sister’s family. We are making a miracle happen!
DAY FIVE
It’s 8:00 here (7:00 my time in Rockford) and yesterday was another exciting day.
Donations slowed to a trickle, which was expected to happen after the initial bump we got from the news conference. To be honest, I didn’t even check the total at the end of the day. At this point, that’s not what’s important, but I’m pretty sure it was a little under $2000.
What’s important is that more people are getting into the campaign and gearing up for the big day, Valentines Day. The Facebook group grew by the hundreds, and those are mostly people planning on giving then.
People are telling people, and we’ve heard from people as far away as Hawaii so far!
We got several radio interviews set up and are working on more. This morning I’ll be on WFEN and WQFL in Rockford and I’m waiting to hear back from others. Katie Crowther with WTVO and FOX in Rockford is also putting together a story and my wife Donna will be interviewed for that.
We’ve also heard back from an important celebrity contact that a friend of a friend made from us. I can’t say any details because we’re not sure how it will play out, but we just hope that this person will help get the word out just like everyone else is doing. Of course, they’re circle of influence is pretty big, to say the least.
We’ve been asked to put a thermometer or something up on the site but we hesitate to do that because right now it won’t look all that good. I think the thermometer is good for Valentines Day but for now we just keep talking.
Also people are doing something that we’ve realized is important: they’re not only telling their friends, they’re telling them again. In other words, they’re reminding them so the fire doesn’t die down by February 14. That’s so important because people are busy and even though they don’t mean to, they can forget.
Here’s a cool story… local Louisville rappers Quasso and Sly Still-on put together a song and emailed it to us, which we then sent to some other folks. It got to a good friend of mine, Rockford teenager Carly Gillespie, and all the sudden she’s emailing me a video she made using the song and pictures of Hailey and Carter.
We were moved by her efforts and today we’re putting it up on YouTube!
Speaking of YouTube, we got the news clip on DVD from FOX News Louisville and that clip will go up as well. So now, more people have the opportunity to see the story and give their gift of $10 to make the miracle happen.
So, I’m off to make updates on www.haileyandcartersdream.com. If you haven’t already been there or watched the FOX News story by Photojournalist Matt English, go there and watch it!
*****
DAY FOUR
(I skipped days 1-3… too busy… what do ya do!?)
If you don’t already know, I have taken a temporary leave of absence from the studio to help campaign for the life of my nephew Carter.
My sister Miranda, her husband Neil, and nephew Carter live in Louisville, KY. Their daughter Hailey still does too, just not at home.
They buried her two weeks ago when she lost her battle against a rare disease that affects the brain. It’s called Late Infantile Batten Disease, and comes from a defective gene that must be present in both the mother and father.
It’s brutal and fast.
And it’s the same disease affecting Carter. That’s why I’m here.
If our family can raise $1 million by the end of February, Carter can go into the parallel study of a trial program at Cornell University in New York. It’s no guarantee, but it’s the closest thing to a possible cure there is.
So, we launch this “crazy” idea to get 100,000 people to donate $10 at www.haileyandcartersdream.com by Valentine’s Day. How can that happen?
The same way millions can view the things they do on YouTube. Something strikes a chord (be it funny, political, religious, or whatever) and tells a friend who tells a friend who tells a friend who tells a friend…
All the news stations covered our official launch last Sunday at O’Shea’s Pub in Louisville (who, by the way, opened up on a Sunday just for us with a full staff!). Once we were done, people got it and were excited, including the perfect strangers who just came in because they saw it was open.
I use the term “perfect strangers” on purpose, because they each were perfectly where they needed to be at the perfect time!
Since that launch and the airing of the news, we have watched as donations have steadily continued, topping $10,000 in the first 24 hours! More importantly, thousands of people are enrolling in the fight. Sure, things surged at first and then slowed a little, but it’s still going.
We will get there.
One cool thing… yesterday we were looking at donations and one jumped out at us. It was for $1.74.
I couldn’t help but imagine a little child taking penny jar down and insisting to mom “this will help won’t it!?”
Thank you God for compassionate people! Thank you God for the millions that will come in to help not only Carter but research and other families battling rare diseases!
Thank you God for strength today to MAKE IT HAPPEN.
Leave a Comment so far
Leave a comment
