Another reason I fight!

This is the face of Hodgkins Disease:

And this is the face of leukemia:


Today, we are not here to talk about me (for once...lol). The second photo is Taylor Walling, she is nine years old, the daughter of my friends Marcy McClellan and Billy Walling, and she was just diagnosed with leukemia. She was barely diagnosed last week and is already putting on her gloves and is ready to fight. She is the face of a fighter, she is one of the reasons that I am a fighter through "Team Joni".

I have been talking to Marcy and trying to give her as much advice as I can to help her through what is going to be a very trying time for her. In just the few short days since the diagnosis, I have been watching Taylor on Facebook and via Marcy and am seeing a remarkable little girl. She has been very positive from visiting with princesses, to ordering up pancakes for breakfast and watching her favorite shows on TV. She is going to be in the hospital for 2 weeks to start and then her treatments will resume on a schedule of outpatient and clinics. I think at her young age, she is handling her situation with grace and a great attitude - she has been brought up very well :o)

Taylor is surrounded by great people! Her family is a great support to her - I can tell just by seeing her face in the photos. She has step-parents, brothers and sisters, aunties, uncles....the list could go on forever. I love to see the out pouring of well wishes, prayers and happy thoughts that are shared on her FB page. Here are a few more pictures of this amazing little girl and her family...




So, why am I dedicating a blog to Taylor you ask? Well, I know that my blog has generated a TON of support for me and I have been added to so many prayer chains and groups that I cannot even count. Although Taylor has a great prognosis, I would like to ask that you add her to your prayers too. For those of you that do not pray, think a happy thought for her, raise your glass in a toast to her or just send a positive vibe her way once in a while. Whatever it is that you have done for me, send it her way as well. I believe in the power of positive thinking and what it has done for me, I would love to be a part of helping Taylor by sharing my support team with her.

Thank you everyone for your constant support and love, you will never know just how much it means to me! I will do a separate entry on my progress - this one is for Taylor :o)

xoxo - Joni

Bake Sale Success!!

So, since Team Joni has more than 6 weeks to raise funds this year, we decided to have some fundraising events! I was looking for ideas when my friend Allison suggested a bake sale. She said she has a lot of friends that are amazing bakers and she could ask them to donate their skills. I have never been a fan of bake sales and did not think it would be much of a money maker, but I am willing to try anything once! We found the 20th annual Run-Through-Redlands where we could pay $45.00 for a booth and sell our stuff....so that would be the site for our first fundraiser...a bake sale!

We had tons of stuff donated from cookies to pies to muffins to loaves of banana bread, cupcakes and Starbucks coffee...etc...etc!! We decided not to price anything and leave it up to the people to decide how much they wanted to pay/donate...and boy did they! It was amazing that some people would pay $5.00 for the same thing another would pay .50 cents for. It didn't matter how much, because they were all donating like crazy and it was awesome!!!

We had a "crew" of 5 of us working the booth - Lori, Sara, Raven, Allison and myself. And did we work it! We made sure each person knew that their money was going to cancer research :o) Here are a few pics of us.........



I took my hat off for a photo-op with Allison, whom I am naming Co-captain of "Team Joni" for all of the hard work that she has put into the team so far! (She doesn't know that yet, I'm gonna let her find out when she reads this :o)


And here are a few pictures of our booth and the yummies that we were selling :o)






Ohhhh...so I guess you want to know how much we made huh? We made $527.76!!! Holy Cow! And I was not a fan of bake sales! I am completely blown away and am so excited to put this money on the books for "Team Joni." Absolutely none of this would have been possible without our bakers. I would like to extend a HUGE THANK YOU to the following people:

Barbara Walker
Kim Eisenman
Suzy Neal
Shawna Hernandez
Susan Darveau
Kelly Smith
Nicole Scott
Sherry Christian
Amy Coley
Linda Houston
Stara Affatati
Kale Flordelis
Jennifer Hamman
and Lisa Kirkland

We cannot Thank you enough! And be ready, we will be hitting you up in about 6-months for another go-round ;o)

Thanks to this fundraiser and everyone that has donated, we have pushed right past $1500.00 and are on our way to our $10,000 goal! We can do it!

Thank you again to all of our bakers. Thank you Lori, Sara, Raven and Allison for working the booth. And a special Thank you to Allison for getting all of the bakers lined up and organizing this for us - you did a great job!!

xoxo - Joni