Wednesday night the Chick-fil-A in Olathe hosted a small fundraiser for Rolling Ridge Elementary benefiting Jadon’s Hope Foundation. Well… small is what we thought it might be. We are quickly learning that with these amazing new friends from Rolling Ridge – nothing is small!
Because of cold and flu season we are still not taking The BUG out of doors. However, his amazing teacher took a laptop and we Skyped in (that’s Ms. Lentz holding Jadon in the pictures below.) Jadon could see and hear the events at the restaurant and watch the contestants compete in the chicken eating contest and frozen t-shirt contest. Skyping also meant that everyone could come over and say hi to Jadon. Needless to say he was incredibly excited and soaking up the moment!
That’s The BUG on the computer screen, right in the middle of the action
When someone would come up and say “Hi”, Jadon became through the roof excited and began vocalizing louder than we have heard since his trach surgery in July. For the past month, Jadon hasn’t made any sound and only recently started vocalizing again. Parents, I know it may sound inviting to have your child be silent, but trust me, complete, not a sound silent is no fun at all. When his classmates would come on the screen, Jadon would get really loud and he had a great time cheering on the contestant participants. Mad props go out to Rashaud Johnson for winning the nugget eating contest and to Michelle Williams for winning the frozen t-shirt contest.
It was very emotional to see such a large turnout. Kristin said she got misty eyed walking in seeing how many cars were in the parking lot and going through the drive-through and seeing the number of people in the restaurant. She said every table was occupied and people were even standing up- overwhelming for sure!! And to see all the kids there – wow! There is nothing better than kids helping kids.
We won’t know the total donation from the night for a couple more days but there was $150 in the donation bucket alone. One of the cashiers said it was a very good night. We will have to wait and see, but I think it is safe to say that SMA awareness was spread and money was raised to increase the fight. Thank you, thank you , thank you.
Jadon's Hope Blog 