More Art Kit Donations!

We have made arrangements to donate another dozen art kits this week to South Valley Santuary in Midvale. "South Valley Sanctuary is a non-profit organization dedicated to providing shelter and supportive services, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, to men, women and children who have been victimized by domestic violence." Last year they provided shelter to 238 children and their parents. They are excited to receive art kits for the children in their shelter. I really wish we had more than 12 kits though.

We won't get to visit the shelter in person, but I think it will still mean a lot to Cameron to know that his art kits will go to children who often have to flee their abusers with nothing.

Although we have sold all of Cameron's cards (3 dozen sets total), we are excited to continue this project. Cameron has really enjoyed sharing art supplies with children in need. We hope to create more cards to sell in the future and continue to share art kits.

Cameron and Kylie at the zoo last month.

Cameron's Video

We made our first art kit delivery yesterday to Primary Children's Hospital. Cameron was so excited to take his first set of art kits to the "primary kids." Although we couldn't personally deliver a kit to any of the children, they did allow us to take them to the play room at the hospital where the art kits will be used. They were so sweet to Cameron and so touched by his generosity. We forgot to take the squeeze punches, decorative scissors, glue sticks and construction paper (they were in a seperate box). We delivered them today and Cameron was so excited to see Marie again (she was our donation contact at the hospital). When we left, he was sad that we wouldn't be seeing her again. We plan to deliver the next group of art kits to the homeless shelter. We still have a few more sets of cards to sell. Please email us if you are interested in purchasing them.

We have more video from our visit and will post it as soon as we download it from our friends camera. Thanks Niecia for videotaping for us! And thank you everyone who has helped Cameron with his Card Project!!

Art Kits are Ready!

Remember these?

Well, look at this! This is what $180 in art supplies looks like

(with some punch, scissor and paper donations).

Yeah!!! We have 24 art kits ready to deliver to Primary Children's Hospital next Wednesday. Each kit has a sketch book, coloring book, washable markers, crayons, pencils and stickers. We will also be delivering some Fiskars squeeze punches, decorative scissors, glue sticks and construction paper for their craft room. Cameron is excited to deliver them and the hospital is very excited to receive them. This has been such a fun project. The kids helped with flattening craft ribbon and Kylie sharpened lots and lots of pencils (have to love automatic pencil sharpeners =) We just need to decorate the outsides of the bags and they are ready to go.

THANK YOU to everyone who has helped out by buying cards, making extra donations (thanks Mumzy, Shirley, Wendy Jo and Jenna!), and helping to sell cards (thanks Mumzy and Shirley!). Thank you Fiskars for the scissors and sqeeze punches.

We will continue Cameron's donation project with the sales of his remaining cards. We may even make future cards with new drawings. We would still really like to make art kit donations to the homeless shelter and domestic abuse shelters as well.

Cameron's Donation Cards are Here!

Cameron's cards are finally done! I ordered them with the cheapest postage so that we could keep the card cost down. It felt like forever for the order to arrive but we finally got them today. I also decided to only do sets of 4 cards and took the 4 pictures that had the most votes via email and message boards.

The cost will be $7 for a set of 4 notecards with envelopes. The insides of the cards are blank and Cameron's picture is on the back. Half of that cost will go towards the cost of printing. (It cost $3.52 per set to print them.) The other $3.50 will go towards art supplies for kids at the local children's hospital as well as the homeless shelter.

I ordered 12 sets of cards to start with. Cameron has already sold 4 sets to family and friends. He is really excited to get the art supplies so that we can take them to the hospital. A friend of mine who works for Fiskars is also sending some children's scissors to include with the art kits (Thank you May!). Cameron also wants to include a small toy which I think is a great idea. If you are interested in ordering cards, please email me. Thank you everyone who has been supportive with votes and suggestions.

Cameron's Project

Two days ago, Junior Achievement talked to our son Cameron's kindergarten class about thinking of ways they can make money to help others. He came home so excited, telling us he had to make money and he was going to start selling his artwork. He insisted he was going to sell it to his friends who, of course, will pay lots and lots of money for his drawings (hee hee :)

Hold on, back up....... Why does he NEED to make money and what does he want to do with it? He is only 6. He told me he wants to help the kids at the hospital. When his daddy broke his back we went to Primary Children's Hospital (next to the hospital we were at) to go to the cafeteria. He saw the kids there who were sick and drew some pictures for them. He said he wants to give the money he makes from his drawings to them. Is this for real? Our 6 year old wants to give money to other kids instead of buying toys? He insists that he really wants to do it and drew a picture that he wanted to sell out on the street to passersby. He even got really mad at us and started to cry when we told him to wait because we needed to make some phone calls and it would take time. Time is not something well understood by small children. They want it and they want it now.

I did make some phone calls and the hospital said they would be happy to take donations. However, rather than money, we offered to buy washable markers, crayons, coloring books, and drawing pads. We are also going to look into making donations to the homeless shelter and domestic abuse shelter. Cameron is soooo excited and wants to do it now!! I wanted to share this with our family, friends, and crafting acquaintances and get some feedback. I have gone through the mountains of drawings he has done the past couple of months to find some to turn into greeting cards. I am trying to decide on a price to list them at if I sell them online. I have set up a one question survey at:
http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/survey.zgi?p=WEB227KMGV6YQP

A set of 6 cards will cost $4.90 to have professionally printed. There will be 6 different images in the set. I forgot to mention on the survey that all proceeds, above the cost of the cards will go towards buying supplies for the kids at the hospital and shelters. I have spoken with Primary Children's and they are excited for the donations and to meet Cameron.

If any of you can help with the survey I will really, really appreciate it. Also, will you please look at the pictures below that we are deciding between for greeting cards. I would love to know your favorite 3. You can respond to this post by clicking the comment link below. You can respond anonymously if you aren't a blogger. Also, if you have voted on Fiskateers.com, CircleofCrafters.com or via email, please don't vote again. You can always leave a comment though :)

Thank you!

29 March 2008 Editing to say that the overall winner with votes from my wonderful Fiskateer friends and friends and family who emailed me was K ~ the tow truck and car. The other pictures with the most votes were C ~ Blue Flatbed truck, A ~ Butterfly and flower, and J ~ School bus with barn. The animals were also popular with D ~ Penguin with baby and N ~ Cat on sidewalk. I will be ordering one set of prints to check the quality of Costco and I am also going to check prices locally. Thank you to everyone who voted. I can't wait to get the cards printed and help Cameron sell them. Please stay tuned for more information.