Fundraising Reports
A wonderful amount of fund-raising going on for Smiles -
somewhere just about every day. This makes such a difference to what
The Smiles Foundation can do in Romania, because to fulfill our dreams
and maintain our projects, we need your help in raising the financial
support to keep it moving.
In June, Strathaven Gymnastics Club
held a fun day to raise money for JFL Phase 2. Nail painting, hair
braiding, tuck shop, guess the bear’s birthday, airtrack, parachute
games and more were enjoyed by the 100 gymnasts in the club.
Coach Lindsay McKinlay, who was been to Romania on several
occasions, held a raffle, with the winning two ticket holders
getting to cut her hair! 14 inch pigtails were chopped off and
donated to a wig-making charity for children. The sponsor money from
the haircut and the money raised at the fun day totalled £1,100.
In addition, lots of clothes were donated for taking to
Romania. Massive thank you to everyone at the club who gave so
generously and especially to the coaches and acro team for their help
on the day and their on-going support of the work Lindsay does in
Romania.
Straidbilly Primary School
chose Smiles as one of two of their
Charities this year. Their challenge from Barbara was to raise money
for Gepiu Summer Camp. The school of 114 pupils held a Christmas Carol
Service, a Zumba Class and entered an Education Young Enterprise
Competition to launch a business venture. They produced Bird Feeders,
made their product and had a school sale for their Charities. On
Friday 30th May at their School Assembly Barbara was presented with a
Cheque for £1016.55.
Congratulations Straidbilly for your successful fundraising and
support to Smiles this
Open House & Garden Party at
the home of Mrs Campbell, Ballybogey, Ballymoney with her son John and
grand daughter Jenny. A beautiful Garden display and a beautiful sunny
day, many enjoyed a time to relax, have tea and cakes, and a chat.
Car Boot Sale at Mountsandle Christian
Centre, Coleraine
where the income from the Table Rental and proceeds from the Tea and
Coffee Room as well as our own Sale tables brought a very successful
day out.
Coffee Day at the home
of Andrew + Barbara Brown.
This was a very interesting and well supported day with attractions
for everyone, including second hand clothes sale, cake
& pastry sale, manicure,
foot spa and massage (for some, relaxing after the work was done of course!) |
Ayrshire Fiddle
Orchestra
is a teenage orchestra. They are raising funds
at the moment to take the young people on tour.
Many of the young people were playing for
the first time in public they agreed to
split the Ticket money between themselves and The Smiles
Foundation and so 2 very worthy causes
were supported.
About 120 folk came along to
support the evening and raised over £600,
£300 for each Charity.
|
Lynda
Donaldson from Carlisle, leads a double life, becoming Peppa Pig
for parties to raise money for The Smiles Foundation. Lynda is one of
our original supporters of the charity, and ORIGINAL is definately
what she is for this piece of fundraising! She also did a sponsored
bike ride as Peppa Pig!!
|
11
year old Lily from Pembroke in Wales decided she wanted to do
something for SMILES, so she got sponsors and walked 11 miles with her
Mum from Milford Haven to Pembroke to raise money. £265 for the Joint
Facility of Live in Salonta. Thank you Lily.
|
Christabell Wilson,
Mum to our Leeds Administrator Dawn, celebrated her 70th Birthday in
December and requested donations for Smiles in lieu of presents. She
was also thrilled that the total could be doubled by the Matching
Gift, meaning her birthday raised over £800 for Smiles.
(Thanks Mum!).
|
The
Troon Fun Run for Smiles
The first prize of the 3 mile run was a Mini for the day, donated by
Monty’s Car hire of Troon.
This was won by Lewis Brown. Scott Cowan was second and Alex Benson
was third. Total money raised is still being collecting, but it
should be in excess of £500 for Joint Facility of Love. |
Chris & Pat Calow
have now completed the Pembrokeshire Coastal Walk raising over £1000
for the
Vision Project.
Read their
report and enjoy the
wonderful photographs.
|
13
year old Luke Revie from Troon,
Scotland climbed Kilimanjaro
sharing the proceeds between The Smiles Foundation and two other
charities, with over £500 for Smiles 100 Club.
An amazing achievement!
(check out the report from our
Northern Irish Team who also did the
climb this summer!). |
Karen Evans from Gloucester organised a Charity Boat Trip
with the Willow Trust to raise funds for Smiles. |
Jennie
Hoy (daughter of our CEO) completed the
Reading Half Marathon raising over
£500 for Smiles and was also very pleased to come 8,151st out of
18,000 runners. 'not bad for a first timer' was her quote - does
that mean you are doing it again Jen? |
Fourtowns
Primary School had a collection at their Carol Service and
raised £1,007 for The Smiles Foundation. The choir have been to
Fourtowns a couple of times before when they were in Northern Ireland. |
Flower
Arranging at Catshill. The evening was a great success and
raised an amazing £2,030.00 for the
Smiles Foundation’s Centre for Children with Disabilities in Romania.
Many thanks to Virginia, Diana and all who attended and helped to make
it such a memorable evening. |
Barclay Kennedy
representing the Smiles Foundation! £1,500 was the money raised when
we took a stand at the Moira Model Farm
Exhibition, Northern Ireland
|
Maureen
Climbs Up The Wall!
On September 11th 2010 Maureen Gartland successfully
tackled the ‘Three
Wall Challenge’
at the Staveley Centre for Healthy Living. This tremendous achievement
was all in support of the Smiles 200 Hundred Love Club’s drive to
build a centre for children with disabilities and a home for the
elderly in Bihor county in NW Romania.
Maureen has already collected £500 in sponsorship - and if anyone
still wishes to donate they can do so!
Maureen climbed three
walls on that memorable Saturday, each one harder than the one before.
The photographs say it all. Chris, the Centre’s young Outdoor Pursuits
Leader, was absolutely amazed at the courage and determination of this
wonderfully lady.
When she first
walked through the door, supported by her two sticks, telling him how
she battles with MS, I think he wondered what he had let himself in
for!
Now he wants
to know more about the Foundation that inspired her.
Maureen wants to
say a very big ‘Thank you” to all who supported her through prayer,
encouragement and sponsorship.
|
In
Training...... for Kilimanjaro
Currently there are 16 people interested in going to Kilimanjaro next
Summer. A few photos from the first practice expedition for the
Kilimanjaro trip! The team were blessed with a
beautiful day and the 6 inches of snow arrived in the area the next
day! It was really beautiful in the
Mourne
Mountains. Brian McKee (Trustee) led the first trip on a
relatively easy route to Lough Shannagh and then a bit of a climb to
the top of Doan mountain. The next trip is in April when more people
are free to join. Please contact
Penny Kennedy for further
information.
|
School
Fundraisers ...
In February pupils of Stewarton Academy
presented our Scottish DA, Ann Cowan with their fundraising cheque for
nearly £700. Thank you and well done to everyone.
|
FLOWER ARRANGING ENTERTAINMENT
“CANDLELIGHT SOIREE”
On Wednesday 11th November at Catshill Baptist
Church, local ladies Virginia Davis and Diana
Kitely (as Rose and Hyacinth) entertained an audience of one
hundred and fifty ladies with a Flower Arranging Demonstration
entitled “Candlelight Soiree”.
A wonderful evening was enjoyed by all present and raised £2,000
($3,200) for The Smiles Foundation, towards the provision of a Centre
for Children with Disabilities in Cihei, Romania. Some ladies were
able to take home the lovely flower arrangements made during this
superb evening.
We are extremely grateful to Virginia and
Diane for their support and do thank all who came along and helped to
make this evening such a tremendous success. We also thank
Karen Bales of Burcot Grange Nursing Home
for providing the refreshment of tea, coffee and delicious home made
cakes!
Joan and John Mayo
Smiles Ambassadors (Bromsgrove)
The entertainment was based on the classic
UK TV series "Keeping Up Appearances", also shown in the US on PBS
television. |
|
|
the
lady with the hat and colourful jacket" is Hyacinth Bucket (pronounced
Bouquet) aka Diana Kiteley; the other lady is "Hyacinth's sister Rose"
aka Virginia Davis. |
|
Fundraising at Ingatestone Elim Church
Three months ago, our
three, 9 year old grandchildren were enjoying an afternoon
blackberry picking in the garden with Granddad.
During a drinks break, they looked at my
photographs of the summer Mission Trip and were obviously very moved
by a photograph of a house in Salard. They could not believe that
anybody could live in those conditions, especially as there were
children there too. I explained that our summer Mission team had
promised to raise money to re-house the family, and their immediate
response was “Nana, we could sell the
Blackberries in Church”. This was the beginning of their
enterprise! We sold cakes, blackberries, tomatoes, in fact anything
that people donated went!
Our small church was
very generous and this resulted in the children raising £300 for the
re-housing project and a further £210 for Christmas S.O.S.
They want to continue to sell and people have
come to look to buy from us, so we will continue once a month to have
their ‘Stall’ and the money will go towards our Summer Missions Trip
donation.
Marcia Weeks
Smiles Ambassador (Essex)
|
Mission Trips, especially through
the summer, are great for being able to raise important funds for the
work of Smiles projects throughout the year. Often up to
£50,000 / $100,000 is raised by
Mission Trip visitors and others back home during June, July & August.
That’s 10% of our entire operating budget for the year from summer
Mission trips.
Many people find coming on a Mission trip, a great opportunity to do
special events to raise extra funds for Smiles and we appreciate all
that is done by so many to raise so much to make such a difference.
This summer we’ve got off to a great start.
|
The Special
Gift Day Offering at the opening celebration service on
Sunday June 8th at Tileagd Community Church totalled
£11,789 / $23,578 which is truly fantastic. We thank God for His
provision and those who so generously gave to launch the work of
the Community Complex. |
|
|
We also have the stunning new
12
month Calendar for Smiles. A beautiful new
fundraising tool, with over 80 full colour photographs and every
Smiles project featured month by month. A super personal calendar
and also a wonderful gift. At £5 / $10
this fundraiser can contribute significant funds to the projects
with your support. |
Contact us now to order your
personal copy and supplies to sell locally.
Telephone:
UK - 0113 276 5060 or USA - 423 239 9525
E-mail:
info@thesmilesfoundation.org |
Many others have also been doing
some great fund-raising.
First Baptist Leesburg raised
over $4,000 (£2,000) towards Mission Trip projects. |
|
Claire
Smyth of Northern Ireland did a Skydive in April and
raised £1,000 ($2,000) for Smiles. |
Hilary and David Kent of Great
Ayton, England raised a £1,000 ($2,000) for Smiles in lieu of
their Wedding Anniversary.
Considerable funds were raised in the
Belfast marathon last month along with further funds
from Fiona Presho who held a
birthday party with an ‘allo-allo’ theme with gifts to Smiles
instead of presents.
Every day we are informed of more fund-raising activities and all
of them, big and small are crucially important for the work of
Smiles to keep growing and impacting lives in Romania. |
|
|
Thank you for all the plans
and events going on right now and for the weeks ahead.
|