Two fantastic fundraisers!

'Help them play, romp, live in some comfortable shoes!' - Melissa Hale

 Do you remember that a while back we blogged about how Melissa Hale was raising and awareness about the importance of the kids having new and good shoes?  Well, we are delighted to tell you that she has raised $607 or £390!

Neema (3)

This has allowed Bekka (who is now living in Nkoaranga and acting as our on the ground board member, in case anyone missed that post!) to buy lots of beautiful and, more importantly, sturdy new shoes!!  On her CrowdRise page, Melissa wrote: 'There are 30 children living there and I 'd like to raise enough for each of them to get a pair or two of new shoes!'  We are so proud of her for achieving this and very grateful that search for shoes that fit (and that each kid likes and will concede to wear) will now be significantly easier and more fun!  Thank you so much to everyone who donated, and especially to Melissa!!

Ericki (7)

We've been extremely lucky in these past few weeks to have several people taking on fundraising for us!  You may remember Carly Charlebois, Amanda Roberts and Ashley Pollari from Camosun College in Victoria, BC who did a candy-gram fundraiser for us for Valentines Day.  They have been busy fundraising again, this time with a bottle drive!  Here is what they have to say about how such a simple thing can raise a lot of money!

"In February we got together to raise money through our Candy Gram sale for Valentine’s Day. However, we wanted to do more for The Small Things, so we fundraised by holding a bottle and change drive, which proved to be extremely successful.

Over the course of two weeks we collected bottles and cans from friends, family, and businesses. We put posters out around the college about our project, which explained how people could help The Small Things by donating their cans and bottles. In order to raise the funds we provided a pickup service for those who wanted to donate but weren’t able to drop them off on the day. We also received a large amount of bottles from Hillside Centre and the Westin Bear Golf Resort & Spa.

Our bottle drive was held on March 24th, and we raised $536.00 by picking up and sorting bottles and change throughout the day. This fundraiser took a lot of work as we provided a pickup service, which meant spending a lot of time driving around Victoria collecting the donations. As well, we spent a fair amount of time raising awareness about our project by talking to businesses and putting posters up in different neighbourhoods. We think one of the key components of our fundraisers was how we were able to connect with people and talk with them about the issue of HIV/AIDS healthcare in Tanzania. Working with The Small Things enabled us to spread that word about the wonderful things they do everyday for Nkoaranga Orphanage and the children they help.

We are happy that we have been able to support The Small Things this year as part of our service-learning project for College."

Neema (3)

So this week, a HUGE thank you to all those who have been fundraising for The Small Things!  You are all amazing and we greatly appreciate everything you are doing!