Thursday, March 24, 2011

2010 Follow-Up

Its that time, time to get the fundraising letter out! As I was looking through my email, I noticed that I have yet to send one out for the 2011 walk. I signed up in November, what have I been doing? When I write my fundraising email, I use one of the examples in the participant center and make it my own, by adding my story, a little extra color and pictures. I try to make it stand out as much as possible, since this is my main source of fundraising. 

A quick fundraising tip I heard last night at a Get Started Meeting; this walker mails out letters to her friends and family. She includes an addressed return envelope with a stamp. Included with her letter is a pink tea bag with a saying attached something like: Take a moment, have a cup of tea and think about breast cancer and what we are doing to end it. She got my attention!

I might be doing this in reverse order, but while I am working on my 2011 fundraising letter (which I will post!), I found my re-cap/thank you email from the 2010 walk. Reading this brought back so many great memories from last year and really got me excited for 2011 and to be walking with a couple newbies!



Friends, Family, my wonderful Supporters,


I am still in shock that the 3-day walk was just one month ago. Our fundraising was a great success.  I raised over $2,600, and my team raised over $11,000 for the cure!  A big thank you goes to all of you, because YOU made this happen!

I bet some of you are wondering how the walk went. We started our journey at Lake Lainer Islands, with the Halloween lights turned on just for us.  All of the employees of Lake Lainer even cheered us on while wearing pink shirts! We walked all day, and around mile 15, I had a surprise:
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Our families, my Grandfather, and my Great Aunt came by to cheer us on!  It was a great boost to get us all to the end of our 24 mile first day!

On Saturday morning, we woke up to chilly temperatures, but the cold didn't stop us.  If we weren't campers before the walk, we became campers that weekend.  We had pink tents to sleep in, and there is nothing like sleeping in a pink tent to change your outlook on camping!  We walked all over north Gwinnett, and I had another surprise motivator.
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Anne was a great supporter for us all, and kept up with us all day. It seemed like every stop, we had Anne was there.  It was especially nice, because the temperatures were climbing.  I didn't think that we'd be walking in 80 degree weather, but we did, and with these temperatures came blisters.  By the end of day 2 we all felt great, but physically we were slowing down.

On Day 3 we had a great tour of Atlanta with amazing supporters all along the way!  Early on, I was honored to walk with a man, Frank, who was walking for his mother in law and his wife.  Frank's mother in law lost her battle with breast cancer a year before.  Frank, didn't exactly know what he was getting into when he signed up for the walk, but he was amazed by the power of pink.  While we were walking, he told me that he'd already signed up for the 2011 walk! Can't wait to see him again next year!

I have to say, I had several blisters, and on day 3, there were a couple points where I didn't think I would make it. Several times, I looked at my pack and thought of all the wonderful women I was walking in honor and memory of and pressed on.  When we rounded the corner from the capital and saw Turner Field, each of us were greeted by our family members who walked the final mile.  We were walking so fast that some people were having trouble keeping up with our pace! Right before we walked into Turner Field, one of the wonderful women that we were walking for stood there with flowers for all four of us!
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Because of your generosity, the 2,400 Atlanta walkers raised 6.1 million dollars for the CURE! Overall, in 2010, Susan G. Komen for the Cure raised over 76 million dollars. Again, this is all because of each of YOU!

I hope that you will all support me again in 2011. Every step gets us closer to the CURE! Thanks again for your support, It means more than you will ever know!

Love,
Crystal Canady Elster

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