As most of you know, November through to March is the season of utter chaos for the MacDonald family and all involved. Around this time I am carrying around Preparation H for under my eyes and ingesting an unhealthy amount of caffeine and sugar. Every year the charities (Make-A-Wish and Stollery) become more involved offering more resources to help us out. A project coordinator (Tyler) took the place of my good friend Nadine in 2009, and this November my young friend and long time volunteer (Nicki) has taken the reins from Tyler. So here we go.....

A little blast from the past for those who did not bear witness to the years when Gord stayed awake night after night reloading our tiny printer to create hundreds of pledge packages, hosting "stuff the package" parties, and "lets gather round the living room to count 300,000.00" parties. His head glowed funny colours due to his prosthesis (cell phone) stuck to his face.

Back then (until 2007) our only support system was friends and family and a many dedicated volunteers that came out to help at our event. Admittedly, many that attended the event often stayed to help out of shear pity for our mad scramble to deal with the mayhem. Thank the Lord for those kind souls, many of them have stayed and become captains and longstanding volunteers.

Back in October (halloween day) 2002, Kali experienced her 3rd bout of hair loss. Our daughter was still undergoing the last bit of her treatment so this was difficult to kick off an event like this, but it had to be done (hence the name - St.Valentine's Day Hair Massacre). Gord was prompted to hold a headhshave in her honour at Canada Post and so it began. Our home phone and cell rang off the hook, every year thereafter phone conversations, meetings and presentations became all consuming. Twitching began in the fall, settled in the spring, summer meant ahhhhhh..... and then the twitching began again. More coffee, more sugar, definitely more cookies - even more twitching.

Did I mention how I got roped into shaving 4 times, or even running this event? It's called divine intervention. Once a person starts the motion and makes a commitment it's a done deal.

8 years later, here we are and I am writing a blog about it.

I took over in the fall of 2006, for the planning of our "Guinness Attempt" at West Edmonton Mall. Gord was all consumed with running the United Way campaign, so I dropped my last term of school (Doctor of Naturopathy) my clients and scrambled to manage what was already in motion. Yikes!

I think of how far this event has come, how much we have learned about the fundraising world, and working with so many different types of people. From "Mom and Pop Shop" to an event that has spread to Ontario and has national news coverage.

This is my blast from the past.

Have a great weekend!