Last year in April, we hosted our first ever fundraising event, "Blowouts & Bubbles for Babies", to honor HIE Awareness month. It was such a successful event, many attendees approached us and requested we have it again this year. On April 28th, we hosted our second annual event Braids & Bubbles for Babies.
This year, for a fun and trendy twist, braids took the place of blowouts. We also wanted to include men into the mix so we offered a relaxing 10-minute scalp massage for guys!
Braids & Bubbles for Babies brought in a total of $1,200, that will be going towards purchasing our Hugs & Hope care packages. To learn more about the items we are sourcing for our packages please visit https://www.leahspolarhugs.org/how-we-help
We had a few sponsors help make this fundraiser so impactful and without their time, talent and support we simply would not be here.
For the second year in a row, Chicago's premier boutique, Salon 833, has graciously donated their venue, products and staff to our cause. Because of their generosity, we were able to keep 100% of the net proceeds from our ticket sales. For a small non-for profit like ours, this is HUGE! Because of this sweet amazing team of stylists we are able to focus on our mission rather than dollars going towards overhead and expenses. From left to right we'd like to extend a hugest amount of love and gratitude to stylist and owner Lisa Caputo, followed by Liz, Mallory and Cerissa, who all worked hard making everyones braids fun and stylish. If you're in the market for a new cut, color or style we encourage you check them out. Salon 833 is centrally located in Chicago on Grand and Milwaukee. You can learn more about their amazing staff and services at https://www.salon833.com/#about.
In addition to the fantastic stylists at Salon 833, we were lucky enough to have some extra helping hands from Paul Mitchell. With only knowing our story from a quick phone call, Megan Horner, Educational Leader of Paul Mitchel Chicago, was happy to extend a helping hand.
We'd like to extend a huge heartfelt thank you to Megan for extending the invite to her students. With the help of Paul Mitchel students Chante, Andrea, Ashley and Dawn we were able to add more hands for braids and men's scalp massages, making wait times for our supporters more manageable.
One of the most memorable moments for us was other HIE families support our fundraiser. One family heard of our foundation through our mutual Early Intervention Physical Therapist, and the other through a co-worker of Dante's. Naturally we had to snap a few pictures of our families together. We're so grateful that our families got to come together in sharing something positive, despite where we all started from.
We're thrilled to have another successful event in the books and shift gears to finalizing care package items and getting them into the hands of families that need them. We look forward to keeping you all posted on new developments via our website and social media. Thank you for your support!