Morning friends!! So here we are the middle of August, kids are getting ready to head back to school, days are full of trying to put in those last minute summer plans, and LL4K has just finished up its summer donations! Yes, LL4K has been busy this summer donating hats to a couple of different organizations and fundraising for another. It's been a good summer indeed!
First off, the summer started with my kids Jonah and Krishtian running a LL4K lemonade stand for the Alex's Lemonade Stand Foundation for Childhood Cancer in June. This was our first experience with Alex's Lemonade Stand and it was such a fun experience and so well organized!! When we registered our lemonade stand, the foundation sent us a box full of marketing goodies which were very helpful during our actual sale. If you have never participated in this event, I would encourage you to check them out http://www.alexslemonade.org, it really was a super fun experience for the kids and people who stopped by were just so generous and wanted to help. Everyone who stops by has a story to tell because cancer affects everyone - most people want to tell you the story of their own cancer experience or of someone they know and love. LL4K and my boys will continue to support this amazing organization and we hope you will check them out too!!
Our next project to tackle this summer was collecting and decorating hats for Special Days Camp, Every Day A Hero Celebration, and to go in goody bags for children at Vanderbilt Hospital in Tennessee! Luckily, thanks to some generous donations we were able to get hats out to each of these events with a grand total number of hats and hairbows donated totaling 300! That is a lot of glitter paint, sparkles, and references to summer sports! :) LL4K is very humbled to be able to be able to support these organizations as they work towards improving the lives of children battling cancer and other chronic conditions.
This summer we also added a new member to our Facebook administrative team...our youngest brother Andrew will be helping LL4K out with social media work and marketing! We really needed to add some help because Luke of LL4K and his family welcomed their second child this May and my family will be welcoming baby #3 this October so things are getting fairly hectic this year for our families and we need to add some support to our team! We will also be welcoming a third grandchild this fall as our sister Kim adds to her family as well! Lots of blessings in the Gyomory Family! Please take a minute to welcome Andrew to our team and cheer him on as he adds this new role to his day! He is the youngest of the Gyomory kids and full of energy and creative ideas (both of which tend to be lacking in new parents)!
We hope that you continue to support the mission of LL4K, we are grateful to be able to help in whatever small way we can. Of course, I wish we could do more but we do what we can. As we close out the month of August and embark on the month of September, which happens to be Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, we hope you will continue to follow our Facebook page and help us spread the word of our mission. LL4K will be making a push during September to collect gift cards to donate to hospitals for parents and for hats for our winter donations. We will be doing our part and hope you will join us on this journey. We are grateful and humbled with the support of you our friends and hope you know how much we appreciate all you do to support us! God Bless Friends!!
Luke's Lids for Kids
Saturday, August 16, 2014
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Summer Fun
As I sit here and write this I realize that I have been very lazy in keeping up with this blog but I guess that comes with being a busy mother of two crazy boys with another baby on the way. I had a pretty rough start to this pregnancy with morning sickness so I apologize for not being more diligent in keeping you, our loyal supporters, up to date on all things Luke's Lids for Kids!
To start, we want to wish Luke of LL4K and his family a great big congratulations on their newest family addition, Baby Easton who is just a doll! We got to see him last weekend and let me tell you he is adorable! Congratulations to Luke, Heidi, and Big Brother Ryan! For those who have joined us recently, Luke is my brother and a survivor of Hodgkin's Disease which is a form of lymphoma. He has been in remission for a number of years and we do this to try and inspire other young people, but especially children, to keep their spirits up by donating fun and funky hats and headbands. Just something small but fun to make the hair loss that results from chemotherapy and radiation maybe a little bit easier to cope with. Each and every hat and headband is made with a whole lot of love and they are all prayed over before they are sent out so that hopefully the recipient can feel the love that comes with them.
Next up, this past spring a young girl from the Lansing, MI area captured the attention of the nation during the NCAA Basketball Tournament because of her association with the Michigan State University Basketball Organization. She was known as "Princess Lacey" and she passed away shortly after MSU was knocked out of the tournament. Her story became national news because of her inspiring battle with cancer and the devotion of the Spartan Basketball Team to her and we at LL4K were definitely inspired by this story and decided to make a donation in her honor to Sparrow Hospital in Lansing. We are humbled that Sparrow Hospital is accepting our donation and hope that this will be another partnership with LL4K. Here is a picture of a one of the bows that will be going to Sparrow Hospital (MSU colors with a single princess ribbon in honor of Lacey).
To start, we want to wish Luke of LL4K and his family a great big congratulations on their newest family addition, Baby Easton who is just a doll! We got to see him last weekend and let me tell you he is adorable! Congratulations to Luke, Heidi, and Big Brother Ryan! For those who have joined us recently, Luke is my brother and a survivor of Hodgkin's Disease which is a form of lymphoma. He has been in remission for a number of years and we do this to try and inspire other young people, but especially children, to keep their spirits up by donating fun and funky hats and headbands. Just something small but fun to make the hair loss that results from chemotherapy and radiation maybe a little bit easier to cope with. Each and every hat and headband is made with a whole lot of love and they are all prayed over before they are sent out so that hopefully the recipient can feel the love that comes with them.
Next up, this past spring a young girl from the Lansing, MI area captured the attention of the nation during the NCAA Basketball Tournament because of her association with the Michigan State University Basketball Organization. She was known as "Princess Lacey" and she passed away shortly after MSU was knocked out of the tournament. Her story became national news because of her inspiring battle with cancer and the devotion of the Spartan Basketball Team to her and we at LL4K were definitely inspired by this story and decided to make a donation in her honor to Sparrow Hospital in Lansing. We are humbled that Sparrow Hospital is accepting our donation and hope that this will be another partnership with LL4K. Here is a picture of a one of the bows that will be going to Sparrow Hospital (MSU colors with a single princess ribbon in honor of Lacey).
In the last few months we have received a number of hat donations from supporters and I wanted to take a minute to thank those people...Jeannie Martinez is a gifted woman who has crocheted a number of beautiful hats and headbands for LL4K, we are so blessed to have her support! My Aunt Jody Brusie has become a huge supporter of LL4K recently, making sure our bins are never empty and that we do not have to worry about fulfilling our donation requests! Thank you Jody for being such a wonderful and caring person, you will never know how much you are loved! She has also recruited friends to help and we are humbled that one of her friends has started making us beautiful and soft fleece hats! These hats are going to be perfect for our winter campers at Special Days!! Thank you and know that LL4K feels blessed for your support and we pray for your family! My son Jonah has some friends from school whose mother heard about our project and donated a bag of very adorable and stylish hats for our kids, so Thank You Farrell Family!! We love you guys!! Lastly but always first in our hearts, Thank You to our parents and family for all that you do to support LL4K! The hats, the shipping (GyomoryGuyInc - FedEx team extraordinaire), the promotion (my mom has made LL4K a household name in our hometown of North Branch); without your support this project would not be possible!! We are humbled by the support of everyone who helps us keep this project going! If I have missed anyone from the last few months, I apologize and blame it on preggo brain! God Bless You All!
Looking towards the summer! LL4K has committed to supporting 2 big events this summer with hats and headbands and we are excited to do so because both events are wonderful programs that celebrate some incredible kids and families. We will be supplying Special Days Camps with hats as usual and camp starts at the beginning of August. For those who are new to LL4K, Special Days is a camp for children with cancer and their siblings. I worked at Special Days for a number of years as a counselor and it has a permanent spot in my heart because of the care of the staff and the love of the campers! It is truly a wonderful place and we are honored to continue our support of Special Days! We will also be supplying hats and headbands to an event in Kansas City called Every Day a Hero. Every Day a Hero is a party for families of patients receiving Pediatric Oncology and/or Hematology services in the Kansas City area. Last year was our first time supporting this event and it was a honor to do so. The organizers of this event put so much care and thought into making this a night of fun and it is an honor to be able to support them again. So....that being said if you feel compelled to help us support these wonderful events please contact us at lukeslidsforkids@gmail.com. We would love to be able to provide enough hats and headbands for all the children attending.
Thank you all for your continued support of LL4K, truly we could not do this without your support and prayers! My mom always reminds me that if this wasn't truly making a difference then the whole project would have fizzled out a long time ago but instead every time I feel like we will not be able to come through on a donation we receive a call or email from someone wanting to help. God has his hand in this and for that we are blessed. I wish we could do more but what we do we do with love! God Bless Friends!!
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Sweet Times
Hi friends, I'm sure you may have wondered what's been goin' on here at LL4K? Or maybe not but that's okay too! :)
Since my last post, we have been busy busy busy and hopefully today I will be able to update you and inspire you to join our mission if you haven't yet done so! Since September (when I last posted) we have made donations to our local hospitals, including Lurie Children's Hospital and St. Jude's Research Hospital's Midwest Affiliate. The hats that were donated to those two hospitals were created by a group of 7th and 8th grade Confirmation Candidates from my local church. We hosted a hat making party and they were able to get service hours for participating and to say that they were successful would be an understatement! These kids came to our event with lots of hats and supplies and ended up decorating over 50 hats for our kids! I was so impressed by their enthusiasm and caring attitude! These donations also included hats that were made by a group of the cutest 1st grade Daisy Scouts who were able to earn badges for their work. Their hats were so sweet as they practiced their sewing skills on them (they are far more talented with a needle and thread than I am that's for certain)!
Luke's Lids for Kids also received before Christmas a bag full of beautifully knitted headbands by a local supporter, Jeannie Martinez. She is incredibly talented and her works of art are just perfect for our kids. We were also contacted by a family from North Carolina who asked if they could donate some hats that they had purchased from a store closing sale - how many hats you ask - 500 hats I say to you! Yes, the Cavanaugh Family generously donated 500 hats to Luke's Lids for Kids; new baseball hats which our kids just love! I am truly grateful for their generosity especially as we had started to deplete our supply after Christmas. It was truly a blessing to see those hats on my porch after the start of the new year.
Most recently, LL4K made our annual donation to Special Days Camp winter camp. As I have shared before Special Days is an incredibly "special" place and I am grateful to be able to partner with them for winter and summer camps. Our donation to Special Days included hats from the Cavanaugh Family, my friends the Koral Family, my parents Jack and Deb Gyomory, my Aunt Jody Brusie, headbands from Jeannie Martinez, and hats from the LL4K supply. I know the kids had a wonderful weekend at camp and truly hope they enjoyed all the different hats that were sent to them.
What's coming up you ask? Well let me tell you! Next week we are hosting another hat making party with the 7th and 8th graders, I am very excited for that and I am sure it will be just as successful. I would like to be able to make a hospital donation in time for Valentine's Day, maybe with a few extra treats included. We are planning for our annual Special Days summer camp donation and I am considering hosting a hat making party for the campers during summer camp. I am hopeful I will be able to get that worked out as I would like to also bring my sister along to give the girls a glam make-over as well. If you might be interested in joining us for that or helping to supply donations please feel free to contact us! In general, we are always looking for new donations so please please spread the word about LL4K!
And I would like to end with one of the most important developments for the LL4K Family! My brother Luke finally has received his own Lid! He has been hounding me for one forever, so for Christmas I finally relented and made him a hat (pictured with his hat and my Goddaughter Natalie)! Also even more wonderful news for Luke and his family, their family of 3 will soon be expanding to a family of 4 as Ryan will be getting a new baby brother this spring! So this picture of their family will soon be including a sweet newborn coming this spring! Please send them lots of love, prayers, and congratulations!
As always thank you for following us and continuing to support LL4K! It is truly a labor of love for so many different reasons! I hope you find a reason to be inspired by the work we do and will want to join our mission to bring smiles to kids living with cancer. It's an ugly disease, it's a pain inducing disease, and it is a life changing disease but if you meet kids who are living with cancer you will see smiles through the tears and hope in their eyes. It's my prayer that this small gift we are giving them makes that smile a little bigger and that hope a little brighter. God Bless friends and please feel free to contact us at lukeslidsforkids@gmail.com.
Since my last post, we have been busy busy busy and hopefully today I will be able to update you and inspire you to join our mission if you haven't yet done so! Since September (when I last posted) we have made donations to our local hospitals, including Lurie Children's Hospital and St. Jude's Research Hospital's Midwest Affiliate. The hats that were donated to those two hospitals were created by a group of 7th and 8th grade Confirmation Candidates from my local church. We hosted a hat making party and they were able to get service hours for participating and to say that they were successful would be an understatement! These kids came to our event with lots of hats and supplies and ended up decorating over 50 hats for our kids! I was so impressed by their enthusiasm and caring attitude! These donations also included hats that were made by a group of the cutest 1st grade Daisy Scouts who were able to earn badges for their work. Their hats were so sweet as they practiced their sewing skills on them (they are far more talented with a needle and thread than I am that's for certain)!
Luke's Lids for Kids also received before Christmas a bag full of beautifully knitted headbands by a local supporter, Jeannie Martinez. She is incredibly talented and her works of art are just perfect for our kids. We were also contacted by a family from North Carolina who asked if they could donate some hats that they had purchased from a store closing sale - how many hats you ask - 500 hats I say to you! Yes, the Cavanaugh Family generously donated 500 hats to Luke's Lids for Kids; new baseball hats which our kids just love! I am truly grateful for their generosity especially as we had started to deplete our supply after Christmas. It was truly a blessing to see those hats on my porch after the start of the new year.
Most recently, LL4K made our annual donation to Special Days Camp winter camp. As I have shared before Special Days is an incredibly "special" place and I am grateful to be able to partner with them for winter and summer camps. Our donation to Special Days included hats from the Cavanaugh Family, my friends the Koral Family, my parents Jack and Deb Gyomory, my Aunt Jody Brusie, headbands from Jeannie Martinez, and hats from the LL4K supply. I know the kids had a wonderful weekend at camp and truly hope they enjoyed all the different hats that were sent to them.
What's coming up you ask? Well let me tell you! Next week we are hosting another hat making party with the 7th and 8th graders, I am very excited for that and I am sure it will be just as successful. I would like to be able to make a hospital donation in time for Valentine's Day, maybe with a few extra treats included. We are planning for our annual Special Days summer camp donation and I am considering hosting a hat making party for the campers during summer camp. I am hopeful I will be able to get that worked out as I would like to also bring my sister along to give the girls a glam make-over as well. If you might be interested in joining us for that or helping to supply donations please feel free to contact us! In general, we are always looking for new donations so please please spread the word about LL4K!
And I would like to end with one of the most important developments for the LL4K Family! My brother Luke finally has received his own Lid! He has been hounding me for one forever, so for Christmas I finally relented and made him a hat (pictured with his hat and my Goddaughter Natalie)! Also even more wonderful news for Luke and his family, their family of 3 will soon be expanding to a family of 4 as Ryan will be getting a new baby brother this spring! So this picture of their family will soon be including a sweet newborn coming this spring! Please send them lots of love, prayers, and congratulations!
As always thank you for following us and continuing to support LL4K! It is truly a labor of love for so many different reasons! I hope you find a reason to be inspired by the work we do and will want to join our mission to bring smiles to kids living with cancer. It's an ugly disease, it's a pain inducing disease, and it is a life changing disease but if you meet kids who are living with cancer you will see smiles through the tears and hope in their eyes. It's my prayer that this small gift we are giving them makes that smile a little bigger and that hope a little brighter. God Bless friends and please feel free to contact us at lukeslidsforkids@gmail.com.
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