Winners!

Thank you to everyone who donated to Sergei!! We raised $844.40 for him!   That's pretty great!  His account is now at $12,106.  That will surely help a family that chooses to adopt him.  Thank you, again for your generosity!!!

Here are the winners of my giveaway.  1st place gets first pick of the prizes, 2nd gets second pick, etc.   I'll contact those whom I can.  Please contact me and let me know your email address ( I'll notate below if I don't have your email. ). Sweetsergei@hotmail.com  Thanks, again!

1st Jamie P.

2nd Lori S.

3rd Jamie from blog comment ( I need your email)

4 Molly C.

5 Christine N

6 Lisa W. (I need your email)

7 Kathy S. from blog comment

8 Shirley M.

9 Julia N.

2012 Giveaway For Sergei

Hello again!!  As you can see, I haven't kept up with my poor little blog for an entire year!!  I thought that my annual fundraising Giveaway for Sergei is a good reason to dust off my blog and get it going again!!

Some of you may remember my attempts the past 2 Christmases to raise money for a little orphan with Down syndrome during Reece's Rainbow's Christmas Angel Tree fundraiser. He is called Sergei G. on the Reece's Rainbow Waiting Children page.
                                                                     Sergei G.

(His youngest picture- not sure of his age here)

(This is a current picture from Reece's Rainbow received on 11/23/10.)


You may also remember that you and I have helped raise over $11,000 for his adoption fund since 2010!!!! 
It is pretty sad that he is still waiting in an institution as another Christmas passes by and as his 7th birthday passed by in November.  However, we can work extra hard this season to get his adoption grant even larger.

First, before I get too carried away, let me give some background info for those of you hearing about Reece's Rainbow for the first time:

Reece's Rainbow is an organization that promotes the international adoption of children with Down syndrome (and other special needs) in a way that seems very unique to me. They create accounts for each of the children on their 'Waiting Children' pages and people can donate to a specific child. When a family comes forth to adopt a child, the money in that child's account is used for the adoption fees. If the adoption falls through for some reason, the money stays in the child's account so that another family can make use of the money! 

Here is some info that will SHOCK you! In Eastern European countries, right now, babies that are born with Ds are immediately put into orphanages. Their parents are told that their babies aren't capable of learning, loving or living a life and that they should be cordoned off from the rest of society. There are not options for Early Intervention therapy, doctor intervention or even schooling. Oftentimes the families of people with Down syndrome are shunned and find it difficult to find work and other necessities of life. Therefore these sweet sweet babies are abandoned to orphanages FILLED with all the other children that don't look 'perfect', that have some extra special chromosomes, or had a difficult start to life because their mama drank  and drank throughout the pregnancy.

When these babies become grown and old, no wait, when they turn 3-6 YEARS old (!!!) they are transferred to adult mental institutions. Insane asylums. Locked up. Left in their cribs. Thrown a bottle of food and possibly given a diaper change. Most of these medically fragile darlings die within the first year due to neglect and horrible living conditions.
While Chad and I hope to adopt one of these angels in the future, it is not our time yet. So the least I can do is shout out for Sergei and try to find him a family AND get some more money into his adoption fund!!!!!

It costs $25,000-$35,000 to adopt a child with Ds from an international orphanage/institution so I set a CRAZY goal for myself, and for you all, to see if we can add $5,000 to his current adoption fund of $11,261.60.  

That would put his grant at  $16,261.60!!!!!!!!!!


I am so excited to think you, my friends, can work together to give one boy a chance!!!!  A chance of finding a family to love him!  A chance to give a potential family a good financial head start toward the huge cost of international adoption. 

Oh, please help Sergei find a family!!!  Please tell your friends and family.  Please go to Reece's Rainbow's Angel Tree kids and gaze at all of these beauties with Down syndrome; gaze at their sweetness; their innocence.  Do any of them touch your heart?  Does Sergei touch your heart enough for you to repost on Facebook or to email my blog to your family?  To donate?

I truly hope so!!!!!

Now here are the GIVEAWAY details for all those people out there who like the idea of 'winning' a sweet Christmas present to either keep or give away, there's an added incentive in giving to sweet Sergei.

1st Prize is a brand new 16GB IPAD MINI!!!!

2nd Prize is a $50 gift card to anywhere (think Toys R Us, Best Buy, Amazon, etc)
 

Additional prizes include some very cool hand-knit items from the very talented Kait Brink.
Kait is a very talented artist and knitter and has donated a bunch of items to help Sergei!  Thanks Kait!!!
http://www.kaitbrink.com/fiber/

Baby sweater


washcloths or pot holders


"Hi" washcloth or potholder


"OK" washcloth or potholder


multicolored handwarmers/fingerless gloves


Green scarf with wooden button


Charcoal & Seafoam hand tote.


Stay tuned for additional items to be added!

Every donation of $5 will give you 1 entry into my giveaway. A donation of $40 will qualify you for 10 entries!  

$5 = 1 entry
$10= 2 entries
$40 = 10 entries
$45 = 11 entries
Bonus Entries: Anyone who donates has the added option to gain more entries by posting about this giveaway on their blog, Facebook, or Twitter. You will get an additional entry per post/FB/Twitter, per day, once a donation is received. Please comment here, on Facebook or email me (sweetsergei@hotmail.com) to tell me about your cross posts!

I will draw a winner on December 20th, 2012 via random.com and will post the results soon after.

Addition Info:

As for information on my fundraising for Sergei, all the money donated through the white Reece's Rainbow donation box(Online Paypal) goes directly to Sergei's adoption fund. I never come in contact with the money and

I need you to email or comment to let me know you've donated if you want entries into the Giveaway!!.   If you'd prefer to donate by writing a check, please make it out to Reece's Rainbow, put a notation that it's for Sergei G. on the Angel Tree, and mail it to:

Reece’s Rainbow
PO Box 4024
Gaithersburg, MD 20885

Thanks for helping Sergei!