It's All For The Kids

Most parents have had to take part in raising funds for some activity for the children. Baseball teams, dance classes, and even school programs cost money. Fundraisers are held to help pay for these things.

At school bake sales were the easiest and most popular. Cupcakes, cookies, and brownies would be available to the children and teachers for a small fee. The baked goods were dutifully cooked by parents.

The hard part of a bake sale was finding parents willing to man the table to sell those cupcakes. "I have to work", or "I have babies to take care of", or any excuse seemed to work. For everyone but me.

I would take my smaller children with me. They had small toys and books to keep them occupied while Mom sold baked items. We actually had a decent time. And I took them to lunch at a nearby cafe so the children were happy.

My grandchildren often sold candy for fundraisers. A big box of overpriced candy bars was given to each child. My grandchildren took two boxes, That was because Grandma would take a box to work and sell it. Sometimes I took a couple because more than one grandchild had a fundraiser.

What I would do is set the box in the break area. People like a snack at break time. In the box I placed an envelope with my name and the reason for the fundraiser. Also the price was included. People could help themselves and I did not have to approach anyone and try to "guilt" them into buying. It worked very well and I sold a lot of candy that way.

A newer type of fundraiser is selling pizza kits. Inside the box are the makings for individual pizzas. To make them you cover the dough with sauce, cheese, and pepperoni. Then you bake them for a few minutes and , voila, pizza for one.

They seem to be very popular. I know they were selling a lot of them for a while.

One of my co-workers had a daughter attending a school for students planning on entering the field of arts. That could be painting, broadcasting, or movies. For their fundraiser they sold pies.

These pies came frozen. Some were fruit pies that had to be baked. Some were cream pies that only had to be defrosted. They were delicious. Unfortunately the pies were expensive.

For the Mothers' Club of my daughter's dance class we were trying to decide which fundraiser we would have. I was tired of selling candy and baking cupcakes.

I suggested that we do something a bit more personal. Mother's Day was coming soon. Why not give personalized phone calls? The person purchasing the greeting would let us know what time they wished us to call. That way they could stand ready with flowers and/or candy to present after the call.

We sold a lot of calls. And they were very well received. We had several poems that had nice sentiments that we read and then we told them who had sent them the call.

I called the mother of a young man who was a friend of my youngest brother. I had known him since he was a little boy.

So at the appointed time I called. I read a nice poem and told her it was from her son. She thanked me and hung up.

After a time my phone rang. It was my brother's friend. He told me that he had almost called right after I spoke to his mother to yell at me.

Apparently she was so touched by the wishes sent to her by her son that she began to cry uncontrollably. When he tried to find out what was wrong all she could do was point to the phone. He thoought I had said something to hurt her.

When she finally calmed down enough to talk she told him that was the nicest thing he had ever done for her. She gave him a huge hug and kiss. Then he was touched. He just wanted to thank me.

It just goes to show that some of the nicest gifts are from the heart not the pocketbook.

It has been a while since I was involved in raising funds. I am grateful for that. I am also grateful for the experiences when I was involved.