Donating Platelets and Plasma

 

Platelets only last for five days.  The need for donors is high.  Plasma can be collected at the same time as platelets.

These blood components are used to treat accident victims, organ and marrow transplant recipients, cancer and heart surgery patients and those with blood-related diseases like sickle cell anemia.

What can you do while you are hooked up to the machine?  I always watch a movie.  This time I watched Hugh Jackman in The Greatest Showman.  No long lines, no talking audience, no rustling treat bags, no slurping, and no big ticket price.

And best of all a warm blanket!

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Delivered! 100 Pots for Cancer Survivors.

What an amazing event!  Each survivor got a pin describing the length of their journey, here is my pin celebrating one year!

The students from Saints Peter and Paul Catholic School helped by decorating 99 pots for cancer survivors.  Each pot was signed by the child and also adorned with a live peace lily plant.

The pots sure made for festive table decorations and treasured favors for each cancer survivor to take home to remember the celebration.

Not a pot was left at the end of the day.  But wait, for those of you who can count I said 99 pots were decorated by the students.  What is the mystery surrounding the 100th pot?

No mystery, as the organizer of getting the pots painted I actually did one pot as a sample so we would have a dry one for the kids to pass around and look at.

I went on a hunt for my pot and was going to try to take MY POT home with me.  When I found the pot this lovely gentlemen was not going to give it up, not even in trade for a different pot!

I was happy to meet the recipient of my pot and get a picture taken with him.  He was happy to meet the artist who painted his pot.  We also shared a huge hug.

100 pots for the cancer survivors celebration delivered!

 

World Wide Knit In Public Day!

Guess what I did today?

Joined some interesting people to sit and knit in public in Olde Town Arvada square.  Sitting in the shade of huge trees and the light breeze made it very pleasant.

 

Made some great new friends who pick a different charity to knit for every few months.

and this guy?

getting ready for Beatles Night.   Several bands will be playing Beatles music in the square.  Free family fun.  He was painting the circles for a game called Twister from that era.  Green, orange and blue dots to follow.  This guy was thin and wirey, he’s going to be great at the game!

 

 

Thrift Store Rescue!

A small food bank run by a local church near me has an even smaller free library for the families and homeless people it serves.

No children’s books!?!  Gotta fix that!  Children need books to nourish their minds   For less than $15.00 these books will fill the lower shelf of the small library for those kids!

 

Practice Happiness!

Pins made and given by the children at Christmas Eve service.

Have a happy day!

Operation Christmas Child

 

Each year our little community at Simpson United Methodist Church fills shoe boxes with surprises for children in need of a smile.

Operation Christmas Child is a project of the international relief organization Samaritan’s Purse. Donations of shoe boxes filled with small toys, hygiene items, and school supplies for children who do not receive gifts, children affected by war, poverty, natural disaster, famine and disease; and to children living on Native American reservations in the U.S.

The program started in the United Kingdom in 1990 by Dave and Jill Cooke has expanded and since then has delivered gift-filled shoe boxes to over 135 million children in more than 150 countries and territories.

Some fun things I found this year?  A fluffy puppy purse with for some lucky girl (I wanted to keep it for myself and secretly named it Henry), and fold up back packs with about 30 different smiley face emoji decorations, purple for girls and blue for boys.

Denver woman who needed more than 30 gallons of blood meets the donors who saved her life

DENVER, CO – AUGUST 18: Joyce Gottesfeld, MD, center, hugs Cassidy Smith during a Bonfils Blood Center banquet at Seawell Ballroom in Denver Performing Arts Complex, August 18, 2016. Gottesfeld delivered Cassidy’s daughter, at Denver’s St. Joseph Hospital in 2012, and helped save her life. (Photo by RJ Sangosti/The Denver Post)

My first blood donation was a trip to a Bonfils Blood Center with my Dad and I never looked back.  Donating platelets and blood regularly for 40 years made me a pro and the staff at my center always warmly recognized me and knew little bits about my life.

This heart warming story is about a woman who received over 270 units of whole blood and blood products collected from more than 300 people.  A celebration was arranged so she could meet some of those wonderful donor.   Read her story here.

I was recently contacted by Bonfils who needed a donation of blood, I am somewhat rare at A+.  With a heavy heart I told them about my breast cancer diagnosis and that I would not be able to donate.  They asked me to keep in touch.

In honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, please consider donating blood or platelets to help those battling breast cancer.

I hope I am able to become cancer free long enough to donate again before I reach the age limit!