Hayley kicks cancer’s butt

Another New Tee, Some Charity Donations, and a Favorite Photo

October 11th, 2011 | Author: melissa

A NEW TEE:

When my daughter was in preschool, she fell in love with the ocean and everything blue. My son loves anything pink. We started to say, “Colors are for everyone” quite a bit at our house.

Then a mama from the Pigtail Pals Parent Community introduced me to her little Bella , and Bella’s double scoop awesome shoes. Blue shoes. Because colors are for everyone. I have had several parents tell me stories like Bella’s, where their child was teased or even bullied because of a color. Because of the simpleness of a color, and the ignorant notion that some colors don’t belong to some people because of their gender. Let’s take one more piece of childhood back for our kids, and allow them to teach grown ups what we seem to have forgotten: Colors Are For Everyone.

The very latest design out of Pigtail Pals: Colors Are For Everyone.

Available in long or short sleeve in a variety of colors for little boys and girl.

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CHARITY DONATIONS:

Pigtail Pals has always had the belief that with success comes the ability and responsibility to give back. September was a banner month for us, so we wanted to show girls what Social Responsibility looks like, and chose four examples of ways to affect the local, national, and global education of girls.

National Geographic for Amelia's entire classroom!

First up: Our local gift. I asked my daughter’s kindergarten teacher what she needed for her classroom, something she wasn’t able to afford for the kids she wished she had. She sighed, and said she really wished the classroom could have a subscription to National Geographic. The family I grew up in has always gotten Nat Geo. Even now my husband and I receive the adult issue, and each of my children has a subscription to the version for kids. I thought this was a wonderful idea. Then I wondered how a class of 24 five year olds would share one magazine. Since Pigtail Pals is all about teaching girls they are smart, daring, and adventurous, I purchased the entire class – each student – a subscription to the National Geographic Young Explorers magazine. This also gives our teacher lessons plans, whiteboard activities, and educational posters for the classroom. Now the little girls in Amelia’s class will see just how big our world is, and the amount of space for them in it.

New Moon Girls magazine and online community.

Next: Our national gifts. We purchased 2 sponsorship subscriptions to our fave girl media, New Moon Girls. Maybe you have seen the card we include with our orders that shines a light on the great work they do with empowering girls through responsible, intelligent, ad-free content. Both of our sponsorships will go to a library or school or girls group who is in need.

The night before Pigtail Pals went viral, I got an email from a customer and fellow blogger, asking for my help. Communities in Vermont and New York had their library destroyed by Hurricane Irene, and none of the children’s book had survived. When I clicked through to the link, the pile of muddy, wet, trashed children’s books made me cry. My family visits our amazing public library several times a month, with my kids checking out dozens of books with each visit. Not only was the library destroyed, most of the town was destroyed. The library staff is working to put back together their personal lives, and the town’s treasured library. I knew I wanted to help, but then Pigtail Pals exploded with back-to-back viral events and six weeks of my life went by in a second. Yesterday I called the Norwich Bookstore and talked to Liza, who told me how dire things were with the library and how the town was really coming together to rebuild. I sent in donations to the West Hartford Library in West Hartford,Vermont and the Wells Memorial Library in Upper Jay, NY.

Library in Upper Jay, NY destroyed by Hurricane Irene.

You can donate as well, or encourage your child to donate their allowance for the month. $5 buys a new book for a child who needs it right now. Here’s the info you need…

Make a check payable to the Wells Memorial Library and send to:

Wells Memorial Library PO Box 57 Upper Jay, NY 12987

Or you can call the independent book shop The Bookstore Plus at (518) 523-2950 and they’ll help you purchase a gift card for the library over the phone.

Make a check payable to the Friends of the West Hartford Library and send to:

Friends of the West Hartford Library PO Box 3 West Hartford VT 05084

Or you can call the independent book shop The Norwich Bookstore at (802) 649 -1114 and they’ll help you purchase a gift card for the library over the phone.

Students helped by Edge of Seven in Nepal.

Our final donation was made at an international level, to one of our favorite orgs, Edge of Seven. What you will learn in the first thirty seconds of the video with my friend Erin is that 600 million girls live in developing countries, and a quarter of them are not in schools. Nepal is one of these countries. $100 allows one girl to attend school by covering her room & board for an entire year. This girl will go on to return to her community, and invest in her people by becoming a nurse, a teacher, a social worker. Girls will go on to invest 90% of their income back into their community. ”Girls are the foundation of every community.” Will you join us in sending a girl from Nepal to school?

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Finally, I wanted to share with you a photo of my favorite teenager Hayley. She wore her new Full of Awesome tee to her follow-up MRI after surviving a rare brain tumor this spring. The scan was clear, Hayley is cancer free, and she is most definitely full of awesome. Through this entire ordeal, Hayley has been strong, courageous, gracious, and every day I have watched her make the choice to live full of awesome.