Tomorrow is Shave Day!

Tomorrow (Saturday, March 7th at 6:30pm), the Striving for More team, which is now nine participants strong, is having their head shaved to raise money for Childhood Cancer Research during the St. Baldrick's Foundation Event at Napper Tandy's Pub in downtown Raleigh.

It is very exciting for me because our team is currently in second place behind a team of more than 70 kids from Magellan Charter School and I am pretty sure we won't catch up to them. (Who wants to? Little boys and girls shaving their heads - how great is that!).

However, I am currently the second place individual fund raiser and I am a very close second. Right now, I am less than $400 from being the top fund raiser in an event of more than 250 shavees. The interesting thing is that I am not typically a competitive person. However, I see a huge opportunity for Striving for More to get a big PR push if I do win as the first place winner. I am doing everything I can to get the biggest PR push regardless. I purchased 30 Striving for More t-shirts and I distributed them this week hoping that most of our supporters who are attending will be wear them to the event. I hope to get my new business cards in the mail today and hand out stacks to the people wearing t-shirts so they can hand them to anyone who asks about Striving for More. My generous web developer is working hard to try to get the web site into an initial state that is ready for some visitors even though he has a full time job and a full time life of his own. The pressure is mounting.

The Striving4More Team is being featured on the home page of the St. Baldrick's site in the 'head'lines section which you can see on the home page but it cycles through several different stories. I have also been approached by some PR/media people as well (nothing too big at this point, but I can see the surge starting to swell).

There are people coming to me asking to be part of the board. Exciting people. The type of people we need on the board... coming to me... not me hunting them... stalking them... begging them... it is all starting to change and it is very exciting for me.

From the first day I made this decision, it was clear to me that this is the path God chose for me. It is very exciting that other people are starting to see that now too.

So if I could ask you today, please...

1. Pray for the Striving For More team and that the event goes well tomorrow. Pray that many people see our t-shirts and ask about Striving for More and that general awareness is raised within our community. Pray start thinking about the issue that we have in this community and elsewhere and are moved by it. So moved that they talk about it at the dinner table and tell their friends. Pray that we start a groundswell of public awareness.
2. Pray for the success of the event as a whole. It is an amazing event and a fantastic cause. Raising money to help childhood cancer research is important. The National Cancer Institute's federal budget was $4.6 billion. Of that money, pediatric cancers combined received less than 3%.
   
3. If you have thought about donating to support my shave and have not, please consider it in these last hours. Even if it is only $5. It may put me over the edge to be the winner of the event and bring some really positive PR to Striving for More which will lead to bigger and better things down the road. Just click here and then click on my head!

Thanks so much to everyone, for everything!