Thursday, May 2, 2013

20. finish trunk projects (32x32)



Nori bought me this trunk in 1994, just before I went off to boarding school (from which I would soon be "expired"). It went off to school with me and then it came back with me. It has become the Trunk of Incomplete Projects:

1. my own personal memory quilt which I started in 2009




2. honey-comb quilt started in 2009


2. erik's porcupine quilt started in 2012 - FINISHED APRIL 2015


3. california thrift store sheet quilt started in 2009 - TRASHED


4. knit mohair and button blanket started in 2007


5. Jen's Toki Doki t-shirt quilt started in 2013 - FINISHED 2013


6. Xy's pillows, made from a t-shirt lee gave her for her birthday - FINISHED April 2013






7. Lee's memory quilt started in 2012 - Finished WINTER 2012








8. Dick's memory quilt... not quite started yet… - FINISHED 2012

28. raise an anxiety-provoking amount of money for a good cause (32x32)

In October 2012 I felt restless. I was anxious about the upcoming winter blues and the fact that I was providing direct service as an employment specialist for people who have been diagnosed with serious mental illness. I thought that a good way to mediate the winter blues would be to create a training schedule, and I could hold myself accountable to the schedule by signing up for the Lavaman triathlon in Hawaii in March 2013 and compete with Tiffany like we did in 2011. I went to sign up for the race only to find that all race slots had been sold and that the only way to get in on the race was to sign up with Team in Training (which I knew about due to tagging along with the Greater LA team in 2011 at Nation's Triathlon).

Here is the most brilliant crowd-sourcing ever thought up: team in training.

and it all started organically:

"In 1988, Bruce Cleland assembled a NYC Marathon team to raise money in honor of his daughter, a leukemia survivor. Thirty-eight runners raised $322,000 for The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's (LLS) work to discover new treatments for blood cancers. During the next 25 years, LLS's Team In Training (TNT) has become the leader in endurance sports training for charity, funding significant therapies like chemotherapy and bone marrow transplants, which have a significant impact on blood cancer patients. Only Team In Training has trained over a half a million runners, walkers, triathletes, cyclists and hikers and raised over $1.3 billion to fund lifesaving research. Once you sign up, you'll be training with our huge network of certified coaches who will have weekly group runs with you and your team. You'll even have mentors for fundraising support as well as your own website for online fundraising."

LLS basically developed one of the most effective and cost-efficient fundraising models to date. In exchange for endurance sport training, the participant raises a certain amount of money for LLS. It creates a team of people all purposed and focused, supporting one another, and helping each other raise their fundraising goals. Participants have choices about which event they want to enter, then depending on the event, the participant raises an amount of money which ensures that LLS keeps their overhead to 22%.



"LLS receives no federal funding. Because of the continued support of you and our partners and sponsors, in fiscal year 2010 we were able to:

1. invest $72 million, which includes funding for 103 new grants to researchers in academic institutions and $8 million in
2. contracts through the LLS Therapy Acceleration Program
3. support 347 research projects in the United States, Canada and 9 other countries
4. provide financial assistance to patients
5. sponsor scientific conferences around the country
6. produce educational materials and videos
7. run dozens of Family Support Groups nationwide."

In order for me to ride with TNT to Lavaman I would have to raise $5,000 minimum (and buy my own plane ticket). I sent out some feelers on facebook to see if my fundraising idea (making memory quilts) had any legs. After 10 people committed to "buying" memory quilts from me, I signed up.

In January I started to sweat that I wasn't near 50% of my fundraising goal so I sent a letter to a wider group of potential donors:

“Do you want to know who you are? Don't ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you.”
― Thomas Jefferson

In six weeks, I'm getting in the water to swim 1500 meters then getting on a bike to ride 26 miles and then running 6.1 miles to help find a cure for blood cancer... in Hawaii! I'm going to get to swim with turtles and cancer survivors; ride along a tropical coast-line with heroes; and run alongside men and women who never ever ever ever give up. My goal is to raise $5,000 by March 1, 2013 and so far I've raised 30%! I'm going to try to raise $1,000 each week and I need your help! http://pages.teamintraining.org/nca/lavatri13/banannas

My main fundraising event is making memory quilts. Over the past three years I have collected a trunk full of event shirts, maybe you have a friend/spouse/sibling/parent who has a drawer full of old concert t-shirts which they never wear; maybe they can be more efficiently used as a blanket! You don't have to give away your memory shirts to GoodWill (I'm probably going to have to pay back some dharma for that statement) you can repurpose them and keep them close! Make them into a quilt that can be given to your children's children etc. Check out my blog, it has pictures of recent memory quilts made for the TNT fundraising! http://twoneedlestosay.blogspot.com/

Prices:
9 shirts for a child's blanket = $ 250
16 shirts is roughly a twin bed blanket = $350
25 shirts is roughly a queen bed blanket = $500
36 shirts (because I know some avid concert-goers who have more than this) is roughly a king bed blanket = $650

Please say you'll join me in this fight against blood cancer and donate money in exchange for a memory quilt!

Or, if you're not interested in a quilt, I also knit hats, scarves, and baby blankets and would love to exchange my crafty skills for a donation to the cause! Really, any donation would be much appreciated :)

Go TEAM!"

My buddies Kevin, Adam, and Kristina were all very helpful giving me feedback and direction on how to implement a fundraising campaign on facebook. Kevin said I had to update my status almost daily with information about training or fundraising. Adam suggested that I needed to solicit smaller donation amounts and to update my fundraising page (which TNT provided) because people still might think that I was looking for hundred dollar donations. Then Kristina reminded me to make my gratitude public, I needed to tag people in posts denoting that they were donating to my fundraiser, building social capital.

In the end, I raised $5,732! 115% of my fundraising goal! It took it's toll though. For an impetus based on decreasing mental illness during the winter, it had an opposite effect. From what I understand, there are some tacit rules to fundraising: if someone donates to my fundraising goal I should donate to theirs within the next two years and I should also not solicit further funds from them for at least two years.

All that anxiety but, now I have the fitness from winter training which makes my Spring that much more beautiful :) and i got to swim with turtles, in hawaii, with my best friend, learned how to hula, improved my race time, visited a volcano, played otter, went bowling at the white house, established Needles to say, smelled a coffee plantation, and ate a few things I never knew existed.

25. improve race time on another triathlon (32x32)



From Nation's Triathlon in 2011: "We got our times from the timing tent. My initial transition was 0:03, ride was 1:25, transition to run 0:06, and run 1:27; for a total of 3:01. This is not the most awesome time, BUT means that next event I am going to shave significant amounts of time off!"

This year I did 3:39! 0:37 swim, transition 1 0:08, 1:33 bike, transition 2 0:04, and then a 1:17 run. So I added 8 minutes to my ride (which is a bit disconcerting since I was riding the steel cherry bomb, Dottie, in 2011... with the rack still attached!) and shaved 10 minutes off of my run (which means that I've decreased my speed by about 1.15 min/mile!)

practice run along the coral:


National Capital Area Team in Training team


Me and Tiffany at the pre-race dinner


the night before, laying out all the items to pack in my backpack


Tiffany had the coolest head lamp


Some might say that my swim speed was due to a fear of blood in the water...(sent from Cara the morning of the race)




Go Team!


running along the coral, the final mile!

27. eat something I can't pronounce (32x32)

gochujang (which is an octopus chimchi, pronounced go-choo-jang) from da Poke shack with Donna, Tiffany, Elise, and David!


tsubugai (pronounced sue-boo-guy) clam from Kenichi Pacific... was very fishy. with Jen, Audry, Bobbi, and Tiffany


poke (pronounced poh-key) not like the verb to poke... but like you do the hokey pokey...


and rumbutan isn't hard to pronounced but I had never seen one before, found it at the farmer's market in Kona after Matt and Kait raved about it. it tasted a little bit like a combination of a kiwi and a grape with the pit of a peach. delish!

17. smell a coffee plantation (32x32)

Tiffany and I went to a coffee plantation after a 18% grade hill climb in Kona, HI.

1350ft ascent in 5 miles.... which I walked the last mile.






the roasting hut smelled like caffeinated heaven. There was a bit of nutty flavor in the air. It was smokey and heavy.


The islands of Hawaii actually have 10 out of 13 of the climates which is why coffee grows so well in Kona.


my christmas in april stash


ladies be crazy!

5. go play seal/otter/walrus (32x32)

played otter one day in Kona. I rode my bike to the old abandoned air strip and out onto the rocks. I found sea urchins and coral and crabs and snails. I watched the tide come in for four hours.









14. learn to hula (30x30)

1. go to hawaii


2. surround yourself with palm trees and Hawaiian things






3. channel them into your hips and arms and body and soul: hula.


14. visit a volcano (33x33)

Then we had poke (pronounced poh-key) bowls before going to Volcanoes National Park with some other members of the Greater LA Team of Team in Training.




Volcano and Full Moon. epic.








In the legend of the Ohi'a Lehua plant, it is said that Pele, the goddess of the volcano, was in love with a handsome Hawaiian King named Ohi'a. The king was smitten for a beautiful woman, Lehua. One day, Pele came upon Ohi'a dressed in her most beautiful gown and asked him to be her husband. He graciously (and diplomatically decline because Pele was known to be a jealous and volatile goddess) refused her offer. Pele was so incensed she turned Ohi'a into a grey and green plan, rooted around the volcano. The other gods thought Pele was being a bit harsh and tried to undo the spell but to no avail. They did however manage to turn Lehua into the flower that blooms from the grey green plant. It is said to be terrible bad luck to pick these flowers from the plant because you will be tearing the lovers apart. the end.