Willy Wonka Movie Night Fundraiser

Whew. We did it! Another successful movie night under our belt.

Earlier tonight, Books For Less hosted a "Movie Under the Stars" event to benefit our mission trip to India. They showed Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory and nearly 100 people were there. Yeah!


The movie was free, but we did have a concession stand. Also, as an incentive, we played along with the Willy Wonka theme and sold Hershey Bars with tickets taped to the back. Three tickets were the "golden tickets" and came with a prize.

I've never seen such a mad rush for chocolate in my life!

Overall, we made $213 to go towards the mission trip. Fantastic!

A big thank-you to Buddy & Cherie for lending their space, the Rhys Family & the Parker girls for working the concession stand and for setting up, all the Cornerstone guys who helped tear down the "theater" after the movie, and especially everyone who attended and made the night a success.

Don't forget that next month we're showing Jurassic Park. Mark it on your calendar.

Until then, here are some pictures from tonight's event:

Abbie, Allie, Tuesday, Madelynne, & Kaity working the concession stand

Everyone's waiting in line hoping to get a chocolate bar with a golden ticket!


A A view of the audience


Tuesday with her golden ticket: An Ipod Shuffle

Marky with his golden ticket. He won a pinata filled with candy!

Natalie won a movie basket with DVD's, candy, and drinks with her golden ticket!

$1 Parking Lot Book Sale Fundraiser

Cherie and Emily are one of the mother-daughter teams that will be going with us to India in January.

Cherie and her husband, Buddy, own and operate the local bookstore in our town - Books For Less. They have been instrumental in helping us fund raise for our trip. Not only have they been emotionally supportive, but they have graciously allowed the use of their parking lot for our monthly movie nights.

Thank you!!

Last Saturday, they decided to clear out some of their excess stock by holding a $1 Book Sale in their parking lot. All the proceeds will go towards Emily's portion of the trip.

They made $147!!! That's a lot of books!

This was a great idea and we hope that they continue to do it at least once a month until we leave in January. Not only will it be a great way for Emily to raise money, but it also gives us an opportunity to buy some fabulous books at a great price.

Here are some pictures from the event:

Katelynn & Emily

View from the parking lot

Garage Sale Pictures

Nathan, Nyah, and Naomi had a blast killing time with the plasma cars

Nandini tests out the baby swing to make sure it's still working...

The toy section

Hmmmm... leave it to Eli to find all the dinosaurs in the sale

The men's section

Cherie manning the register

Julie setting up the books and videos

A small portion of the clothes for sale

No event is complete without a popcorn machine!

Garage Sale Success!

We had an amazing garage sale this past weekend. We made $1042!! We stored all of our leftovers and plan to have another one in the Fall. There are also a few items that we took out to put on Craigslist and Ebay later this week. We're hoping that our grand total will equal at least $1350 - which is the cost of one roundtrip ticket from Dallas to Chennai.

God is good!

Here's our advice for garage sales.... plan plenty of time to set it up! We started on Monday and worked all through Thursday evening just to get it ready. We held the sale on Friday and Saturday from 8 - 4.

We found that it's a great idea to have a popcorn machine and ice cold drinks for sale. The popcorn was a donation only and the drinks sold for 50 cents a piece. Clothes were marked from 25 cents to $1.00 and jeans were $2 - but we came down on the price on the second day of the sale.

We also discovered that men are always looking for tools and that women love costume jewelry. We set our good jewelry up at the front at the register to catch everyone's eye as they walked in.

Helium ballons on the door and road signs are also a sure way to attract customers.

We have plenty of pictures to post later on in the day.

A big thank you to Cornerstone Church for letting us hold the sale inside the building. Also thank you to everyone who donated items and your time to help us have a successful fundraiser!

Extra big thanks go to Cherie, Donna, Tristan, and Leslie for spending their entire week up at the church. And thanks to their husbands for letting them come up (and for watching the kids!). Also, thank you to Kenya and Julie for working the sale on Friday - and Kaylee for working the sale on Saturday. (Kaylee, now that we know you can make popcorn, we're specifically requesting you for each event! :-)

Also, thank you to the Crosses, the Newmans, the Holts, the Blacks, and the Smiths for coming up on Thursday night after Lifegroup to help us put out the last items we needed before the sale begin on Friday. And Gina and Melissa, we sure appreciated your help setting up during the week.

We also can't forget the men! We couldn't have taken down the sale without the help of Jeff, Mark R, Noah, John, and Mark G.

I know that we're forgetting some names, so please excuse us if we've forgotten anyone.

Don't forget that Emily and Tuesday will be holding a fundraiser at Books-For-Less on Saturday, June 13th. It will be a $1 book and popcorn sale in the parking lot. All funds raised will go towards the purchase of their individual tickets.

Our next movie night is Friday, June 19th. We'll be showing Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Prizes will be given to the three people who discover a golden ticket in their chocolate bar. So brings lots of change with you to load up at our concession stand!

Again, one last big thank-you to everyone who is helping to make our fundraisers a great success. We still have plenty more to do, so please don't hesitate to contact us if you have any ideas.

Hope you all have a great week! Pictures will be posted later today.

New Craft Fair Total

We sold an extra $36 dollars in pillowcases. This brings the total to $190.50 - with $35 still going into the general pool.