Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

This is the money that I raised from my fundraiser. A lot of the bills are ones, but that's quite an impressive stack, isn't it?

Today was another day and another chance to be flabbergasted by the kindness and generosity of everyone at the dog show. Not once, but TWICE, people wrote checks to LLS to pay for small items, handed them to me, and walked away. In each instance, the amount on the check was orders of magnitude more than what they were ostensibly paying for. I offered both of them fistfuls of raffle tickets, but neither one of them took me up on it. To the fabulous parties in question, I salute you and your classy MAGNIFICENT low-key generosity. Thank you!

We drew for the 50/50 raffle first. The lucky winner got $80 in cash!

Next, we drew for the eight raffle prizes. I actually got to pull the winning tickets, which I thoroughly enjoyed. The winners all seemed delighted with their prizes and I got many compliments on the cool stuff. The purple double jump attracted the most attention, and strangely enough, Jean, the woman from Three Jacks Bakery whose table I shared all weekend, won the jump!

Today's fun run also lived up to its name. We had about 40 dogs running again. We had one dog who took one tunnel and then decided that attacking his owner's feet was much more fun than running through tunnels. There was another dog who actually backed up through a tunnel with his head still facing his handler that had us howling with laughter. We also had someone who had never competed before turn in a beautiful run to make the finals! My friend Steve's dog Shelby turned in excellent runs in both the first round and the finals to win the whole shebang with a smokin' time of 25.70!

And then I staggered home to count up all the money. I am thrilled beyond words to say that our two-day total from all sources EXCEPT the photographer's and the dog treat vendor's contributions is...


(Isn't this exciting?)




(Are you holding your breath?)




(Are you starting to get annoyed with me? Okay, I'll tell you...)






ONE THOUSAND SIX HUNDRED THIRTEEN DOLLARS AND NINETEEN CENTS!!!! ($1,613.19)



I am swaying on my feet so I desperately need to go to bed, but I just feel so much awe and gratitude and wonder and euphoria that I might actually burst of happiness if I weren't so exhausted. Thank you so much to every single one of you who bought raffle tickets, signed up for the fun run, helped sell 50/50 raffle tickets (Niki!), made and/or donated raffle prizes (Steve, Betsy, Tynya, Kathy), agreed to donate a portion of your proceeds (PawPrintsLife, Three Jacks Dog Bakery), and told other people about the event (Jan, Megan, and several others). My heartfelt thanks also go out to our wonderful Fun Run judge Jan Niblock and Swarm president Shane McConnell for letting me do this thing in the first place.

I apologize if I'm forgetting anyone. I can barely type at this point. You are all fantastic human beings, and I am so grateful for your enthusiastic support.

I'll try to be a bit more coherent tomorrow.