auction – Another MS Warrior

91 Sheffield update

I want to begin this blog post with a big thank you to everyone who has been in touch, wished me luck, and offered supportive words and hugs this week. It means such a lot to me and I am very grateful for the wonderful friends and family I have in my life.

My visit to the HSCT Clinic in Sheffield was interesting, mostly positive and very exhausting! I had a full neurological examination (involving being prodded with pins, hit with hammers and having tuning forks held on my joints!), a long discussion with a neurology registrar, meetings with Professor Sharrack (Neurology) and Professor Snowden (Haematology), a discussion with two haematology nurses and had bloods taken.

I am now waiting for an MRI scan (mid July) and a further appointment with the professors (mid August) for a final decision. I have found myself in the rather peculiar situation of hoping that this MRI scan will reveal new disease activity – my last three have, but the most recent was 13 months ago and the Professor is interested in the last 12 months.

The haematology nurses provided me with a lot information about the treatment and how this is managed in Sheffield. They have treated 60 MS patients there over the last few years, with the number treated each year gradually increasing. I was very impressed with the level of care and excellent treatment planning I heard about.

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I have a couple of fundraising updates to tell you about …

My beautiful niece and her friends ran a stall at their school and raised a fantastic £25!! Thank you Anna and friends xxx

A while ago, I took a box of unwanted bits and pieces to Maxwell’s Auction Room, hoping to raise a couple of hundred pounds. Today I received a cheque for £450! Such a lovely surprise! There are a few items still to sell (in a “collectors auction” in July) so hopefully more to follow. If you have any old rubbish in your loft, I’d really recommend taking it to the auction room.

Maxwell’s Auction Room

Maxwell’s is used on TV in Dickinson’s Real Deal and Cash in the Attic

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Obviously, with the timescale of things in Sheffield, I’m going to have to revise my plans around treatment in Russia and continuing to raise funds. I hope to let you know about that very soon. I have been discussing all decisions with my family throughout this journey and they have been a huge help and a source of really useful ideas and advice.

Thank you again for your ongoing support ❤️

68 Tickets, ticket, tickets!

The tickets for our fundraising event are finally ready!

I’d like to thank Dave Gilmore for designing and printing them and Niamh for cutting and perforating them.

Tickets are £10 each, children under 10 are free (please let us know if you are planning to bring children so we have an idea of numbers).

The evening will start at 6.30pm and will go on until midnight. We have a few live music acts lined up – dancing and singing along most welcome! There will be a bar, selling Swan Brewery beer and various other refreshments.

We have a few items that we plan to auction – this will begin online in a couple of weeks and end during the evening (more info to follow).

Raffle tickets are also now for sale.

We have had lots of amazing raffle prizes donated, with new items coming in all the time. Raffle tickets are 50p each.

If you have anything you could donate or know of any shops or services who may be willing to provide a voucher, we’d love to receive them …the more prizes we have, the more raffle tickets we’ll sell and the closer we’ll get to our fundraising target.

All business donors will be mentioned in this blog, on our social media pages and on the night.

If you would like to see more of Dave’s fabulous work (including the Manchester bee paper straw design) please see his website …

davegilmoredesign.com

You can find out more about Swan Brewery here …

swanbrewery.co.uk

If you would like to make a donation to our fundraising account, please do so here …

GoFundMe

Please spread the word!

Thank you again for all your support ?

35 Fundraising news

Well, a couple of days ago, this happened …

100 donations in one month!! Thank you so much each and every one of you xxx

The sponsorship money from the Manchester Half Marathon is still coming in so I don’t have a total for that just yet.

Connor, Alex and Gleaves have been out training on their mountain bikes today.

Having said that she’d never run again, Niamh, along with Callum, Jess and Jake, has signed up for the Wilmslow Festive 10K run on 25th November. She is still resting up to allow her hip injury to heal, then all 4 will be training in earnest!

We also have some other fundraisers coming together …

My Prosecco loving friend, Julie, is giving up booze for a whole month!

My niece Fiona has signed up for a 10K and my sister Glenda, for a sponsored Nordic walk event.

My sister in law, Gill is hosting a coffee morning next weekend, including yummy cakes (she is an excellent baker) and a raffle.

I’d like to hold some sort of cake related event too …I seem to have so many cake making friends! Maybe some sort of Bake Off or something along those lines? Or a good old fashioned cake sale? Or something Christmas related? If anyone has any ideas, please give me a shout.

We are still working on a possible sky dive and a long haired person is considering a drastic hair cut, in exchange for donations …watch this space for more information on that soon!

We are planning an evening event to take place in January. We have a fabulous venue and plans coming together for music, food, drink, a raffle and a silent auction.

So, this is my next request for help …

Do you have anything you could donate as a raffle prize or silent auction item?
Do you own a business and would be able to donate services, a beauty treatment, a meal or anything else we could raffle or auction?
Do you have any contacts at venues who could donate event tickets?
Do you have a connection to anyone famous who could donate items?
Do you have connections with anyone who could help with any of the above?

If you can help with any of the above, or you have any other ideas for fundraising, please give one of us a shout.

23 Fundraising update

Two weeks ago, we launched our fund raising page with the aim of raising £40,000 to fund HSCT treatment abroad.

www.gofundme.com/another-ms-warrior

Please could I ask you to think about whether you might know anyone who might be willing to help? Please share our fundraising page far and wide. I know of someone in my position who had their treatment paid for in full by a wealthy friend of a friend of a friend who saw the link on social media!

I am finding fundraising hard going – it really isn’t easy to ask people for money and at times, I have wanted to scrap the idea all together. I feel incredibly vulnerable and exposed having to be so public about my life. My children, close family and friends are being wonderfully supportive and are encouraging me to keep going. To put it bluntly, my only other option is to keep quiet and slowly decline into disability.

To boost our fundraising efforts, we have a number of events coming up:

1. Manchester Half Marathon, Sunday 14th October 2018

Connor, Niamh, Gleaves, Nick and Heather are training hard for this event and the blisters on Niamh’s feet are almost healed!

2. 58 Mile Peak District Mountain Bike Challenge, Saturday 27th October 2018

Alex, Connor and Gleaves are taking on this gruelling challenge

3. Tandem Sky Dive, date to follow

Callum is organising the opportunity for volunteers to take part in a tandem sky dive and hopefully raise some sponsorship money. We have a growing list of people

Who would like to do this (possibly including me!) …if you would like to be added to the list, please let me know. Cost will be around £200.

4. Evening Event, January 2019

This will be an evening of music food, games, raffle, auction and anything else we can think of! We have a fantastic venue in Prestbury and some great entertainment lined up, including The Red Shells and Beth and the Beats.

If you have anything that you could donate as a raffle prize or auction item, we would be very grateful.

There are further events and sponsored challenges in the pipeline, so watch out for those. We are also open to further ideas and suggestions.

If you’d like to sponsor any of the participants taking part in sponsored events, please donate to our GoFundMe page and mention them in your comment. You can also sponsor individuals by contacting them in person.

If you know of any businesses that may be willing to offer items or services as raffle prizes or auction items, please get in touch with one of us.

Thank you for all the amazing support …I really do appreciate it xx