Fundraisers

I know that one of the things that I search other adoption blogs for is a great fundraiser idea.  I thought I would blog about some of the ones that we have had.  We started the process about a year and a half ago, so we have been doing intermittent fundraisers for a while now. 

Garage Sales-We have probably had between 4-6 garages sales already.  We email all of our friends ahead of time and ask them to start saving up all of their junk.  We try to let people know a couple of months ahead of time, then a month or so and then we start picking items up, and then we send out a last minute reminder about a week before.  Our first garage sale was MASSIVE!!  The funny thing is that we do not have a garage.  LOL  We had some wonderful friends volunteer their double garage to store everything and then hold the sale at their house.  That first garage sale made us $1000!!  We had so much stuff that we had another one the Wednesday after with the leftovers.  Since then we have tended to take whatever is left right to donation spots, because we do not have storage in our house for much, so it takes over the whole basement.  At that particular garage sale, we even had someone stop by and ask if he could pick up any of our items that we had leftover to take to Joplin, since it was soon after the tornado had hit there.  We have also had people mention that they were having a garage sale in the next couple of weeks and we have offered some of our leftover items for them to sell.  We  have tried to resell items on craigslist or at Once Upon A Child, but that hasn't really worked out for us, so we just choose to donate and bless others now with the leftovers.

Bows-Last year I decided I wanted to learn how to make bows, like the girls hair bows.  My mom's best friend is awesome at it and she taught me how to make them.  So, I made up lots and lots of bows and we sold them at craft fairs last year.  It did take a lot of time, but I just  made them slowly at night and gathered up lots of types.  The holiday ones went really well and I've heard that school colors and sports teams go well too.  We were able to sell them at a homeschool craft fair that was only $20 per table as well as at a church who, when they heard that it was a fundraiser, gave us our table for free! 

Fundraising sites-We have joined some fundraising sites, like Ordinary Hero and 147 Million Orphans, but we haven't had too much from these.  We haven't really promoted them too much either, though.

Yogurtland-A local business, Yogurtland, let us do a fundraiser where we were able to keep 10% of the profits from a 2 or 3 hour period.  We did check with a couple of bigger restaurant chains (Chic-Fila and Applebees, etc.) and they said that they really only do that for bigger organizations.  It might be worth it to look into more local places, though.  This is one we would like to try again.

Water Bottles-Sounds funny, right?  Well each time we did a craft fair we printed up labels and put them on water bottles and gave them away or sold them for $.25.  Last year we promoted Ordinary Hero and this year we promoted Chris's quarter rings and attached a link to our blog.  People are definitely happy to take a free water bottle!!

IPad drawing-When the IPads first came out, Chris bought one and we did a drawing.  We sold tickets for $20 I think, and then we did the drawing with a video of our daughters drawing the winning name and posting it.  We also guaranteed we wouldn't sell more than 100 tickets so each ticket would be a guaranteed 1 in 100 chance of winning.  We didn't even sell a full 100, so the odds were even better.

Quarter Rings-Right now we are focusing on the quarter rings, because they are really so cool and people were really interested in them at the craft fair.  Chris also has a real talent for jewelry, unlike my many hours learning how to make bows including hot glueing my fingers to the point of major blisters!  We promise we will get a link up here for the rings soon.

The other thing I would recommend to anyone is just to be open to what God can put in your path.  We have had opportunities where we could just say that we would do something for someone "for an adoption donation" and we have just needed to be open to opportunities we hear about.  We have also had friends just hand us checks out of the blue! We also have a separate account just for the adoption, so all of our money goes right into that.  Obviously, anythings we don't have money for in that account comes out of our regular account, but it is a good way to keep it separate. 

"And God is able to bless you abundantly, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work."  2 Corinthians 9:8