The Finish Line

Amazing, Amazing, Amazing. I honestly never thought we would be able to do it, but Rachel and I walked every single 60 kms of the walk. Not moving much today, just still enjoying the unbelievable feeling as we crossed the finish line yesterday. Yes things hurt, some areas more than others, would I do it again, most definitely. It is impossible to describe the feeling as you join over 4500 walkers all walking, limping, pushing wheelchairs for a cause that has struck so many families.

We met a lady who for 5 years now has pushed her friend who has cancer in a wheelchair. We met a young man who has done the walk 32 times in different cities, he has breast cancer and it has now moved into his lungs.

The volunteers were amazing. There were 2 men dressed up like Sponge Bob (best way to describe their outfits) who every 5 kms hopped out of their van set up their stereo and pumped out the best music as they danced us through their stop. Men and women on motorcycles who danced us across too many intersections to count. Some of them go from city to city volunteering weekends of their time for this cause. And alot of times they were the ones who pumped us up to get to the next stop. THANK YOU their enthusiasm was unbelievably contagious.

The Toronto neighbourhoods were unbelievable. There were families with cookies, muffins, chocolate, beer (yes beer), mimosas (yes champagne and OJ - Sunday morning). One family Sunday morning just about 2k into the walk had your choice of home made espresso, coffee, hot chocolate and homemade baked goods. People, sometimes one sometimes whole familes, just sitting on their porches or standing at the end of their driveways cheering us on our way. Everyone brought a smile to our lips and added a little spring to our step as we walked by.

And a big thank you to my family and friends for your support and encouragement. We couldn't have done it without you. It was an unbelievable journey.

Thank you to all members of Organized Chaos, what a great group of ladies to walk with, to do anything with. You are all awesome.

Cheers,
Lynne and Rachel
"Thank you for supporting our Journey"

3 More Sleeps

700 kms. That's how many kms I have walked since November. And now that I am only 3 more sleeps away I wish I had walked more. The last 3 weeks I have gotten panicky about everything. Don't cut your nails too short -which I did today !!!! A week ago I left the vacuum out in the middle of the hallway, went walking by (without my slippers on - I always wear slippers) and whack kicked the vacuum - thought I had broke 3 toes. I find now everytime I think about the walk I get emotional, maybe I should bring a little wagon full of kleenex boxes with me. O:)

Our team has reached it's goal of $20,000 and we would like to THANK EVERYONE who donated time, $$$'s, goods for sale, ideas and support. We couldn't do it without you our good friends, family and lots of strangers.

Thank you so much. I'll let you know how we survive. O:)

walk on and on and on and on

Raffle Winners

Thanks to everyone who has supported our drive to raise funds for the Princess Margaret Walk to End Women's Cancers. Most of us have now reached our $2000 goal and are breathing a sigh of relief as we start picking up our training for the big walk on September 11 and 12.

Here are our raffle winners:

First Prize - 4-some of golf at Kings Riding - Jay Fyfe
Second Prize - a basket of booze - Saskia Van der spiel
Golf Bag, Club, and Hat - Dave DeAngelis
Jergens Basket - Cathy Kent
Dr. Oetker Basket - Barbara Comand
Sirius Satellite Radio - Anna Marie Harris
Foodland Gift Certificate - Sean Kelly
M&M Gift Certificate - Louise Needler

Thanks again to everyone for your support

WOW - Tag Day Success

WOW - what a success from both a monetary and an emotional point of view. Rachel, Maureen and I raised $665 for the Walk to End Women's Cancers. woo hoo

The patrons of the Aurora Yonge St Liquor store were amazing. They gave so much today, yes dollars, but also stories and even tears. We were all shocked at how many women came up and told us that they were breast cancer survivors. A man gave us $20 and told us how his mom had just been given the all clear, they had discovered breast cancer in January. He had tears in his eyes, we had tears in our eyes. One women had both breasts removed and had recovered from breast cancer 3 times. One women talked to us for 20 minutes. They just wanted to tell their stories.

Goosebumps were breaking out on my arms all day at their stories, their generosity and their praise. It was likea big pep talk. I am so glad we are doing this.

Thank you and walk on

Tag Day - Aurora Yonge St Liquor Store

1972 - the last time I did a tag day in front of a liquor store. I was 17, our tag day supported Cystic Fibrosis. We had so much fun, there were about 10 of us and we took shifts. Needless to say we all wanted the 4 to 6 shift because we knew we could talk one of the old men (probably 50 years old) into buying us a bottle of wine as they ran in to get their rye for the night.

Tomorrow my 21 year old daughter and my sister-in-law (young at heart) and myself (definitely in the young at heart category as well) will tackle the liquor store here in Aurora.

Hopefully the residents of Aurora will be as generous to the Pink Ladies as the residents of Mimico and New Toronto were to us in 1972.

Walk on

Human Nature gets a boost

Thank you to the positive side of human nature. After our garage sale yesterday, we left the Gazelle (a cross country ski type of exercise equipment) and an ab roller out on the grass for the garbage. This morning there was a knock at the door from a young man asking if they were for sale. Rachel said they were yesterday at our garage sale, but now they were for the garbage and feel free to take them. Well he said he couldn't do that and gave her $20 for them.

There also was a very nice young lady yesterday who wanted the desk, but had no money left and no room in her car and asked if we would keep it for her and she would come back today for it. Well we honestly thought we would never see her again and lo and behold, she just called and is on her way over to pick the desk up. Another $20 for the garage sale and another boost for human nature.

btw - I slept 10 hours last night. After the walk I have a funny feeling I won't get out of bed for a week.

Walk on

Made $220 and now the cleanup begins

Garage sales, now I know why I stopped doing them, lol. People were outside waiting before I even had the garage doors open. There we were trying to set up and people were riffling through stuff and then dashing to their cars and off to the next place.

It's amazing, here we are doing a garage sale as a fundraiser, with balloons, fundraising thermometer, signs for the walk, and people are bartering with you for 25 cents.

And then you meet the lady whose 2 sisters have died from breast cancer and her other sister was operated on on Friday and she really just wanted a cup of coffee and someone to talk to.

Thanks to my good friend Mary Jo for lending her support and spending the morning with Rachel and I. Now I just have to hope that Denise is organizing a garage sale for Brampton I can drop my stuff off at. rofl

Walk on

2 days until the Garage Sale

2 days until our Walk Garage Sale, will we ever be ready. My garage looks like a disaster hit it, my house looks like a disaster hit it, my basement you can't even get down to. My grass needs cut, my dandelions need picked. How can a garage sale take up so much energy. Rachel worked on our signs yesterday and they are works of art. Signs are now posted around town -yeah!!!. Hopefully people will come and buy all this stuff. Friends have been dropping off stuff, you can tell we all have kids that have been moving in and out of houses, we really don't have that much stuff, so luckily with a little help from my friends there'll be enough to bring us closer to our goal.

Rachel yesterday went through her teen books, instead of putting them into the garage sale, we took them up to Starlight Books (a used book store) and they gave her $32 for about 12 books and put up a sign for us. So that gave us the positive energy to continue sorting.

Our garage sale goal we have set at $400 (a little high probably). Truthfully, we'll be happy with $100 and at least getting rid of the stuff.

So as we continue checking the weather network every hour, dusting things that haven't seen the light of day in 20 years, say a little prayer for a warm, sunny, successfuly day.

Walk on

Nothing better than a girls weekend to get you walking

4 fabulous days in the Finger Lakes helped me to get my km count up to 31 kms for this week. I walked on cliffs, by waterfalls, over golf courses, hiked 2 miles up a 1010 foot mountain (or at least it felt like a mountain) and then back down again. All I know is that if there are hills like that on THE WALK I am TOAST. Watkins Glen, Ithaca, and Geneva what a beautiful area of the Finger Lakes and we walked a lot of it. Thanks to my good friends Lindsey, MJ and Sharon for making the walks so enjoyable. We didn't even realize how much we were walking (other than the mountain) with all the picture taking and information signs to stop and read. One other good piece of information I picked up about walking is it is most definitely easier to do if you haven't drank a litre of red wine the night before. So no wine on September 11, yeah right. It's hard to picture the Wright's doing anything without a little glass of wine.

Raffle update - I have sent a copy of the ticket over to Maureen and Colleen to approve and verify, so far we have a 4some of golf at Kings Riding - value $500, a basket of booze - value $350, guinness golf bag - club - shirt - hat value $150 and some gift certificates of varying values. Tickets will be on sale on Monday all being well.

Next up is the flyer for our garage sale which is Saturday, April 24 here in Aurora. My friends have all been rooting around in the basements, garages and closets looking for things for me to sell. I told them I can't take their husbands golf clubs (as they will probably be golfing that day). Let's hope for some good weather.

Walk On

A Day of Rest

A much needed day of rest for my poor legs. Other than walking around Costco and around the house, my legs and hips were taking a break. Back to walking tomorrow.

Finally purchased new running shoes, my old ones were about 10 years old. WOW has the technology every changed, these are so comfortable.

I've managed this week to walk 31 kms up and down hills, through neighbourhoods, golf courses, trails, etc. Tried it with my new shoes today and they felt great. The other tip the Running Room gave me was drink lots of water, when you start to dehydrate the first place that loses the moisture is your joints. So drink, drink and drink. She assured me that as my system got used to the extra water I really wouldn't have to pee as much, we'll see, the next thing I'll be buying are depends.

Time to get going
It is now 25 weeks until THE WALK and we have to start raising funds and even more importantly start walking. Sometimes the best way to get motivated is to share with your team mates what you are doing and that is what this blog is all about.

Rachel and I are going to hold a garage sale up here in Aurora on April 17. Luckily for us a friend of ours MJ is emptying out her basement so her son and fiancee can move in and she has tons of stuff for us to put in our garage sale. So after Easter we'll start organizing and hopefully have a beautiful day and raise some funds for THE WALK.

btw - just in case anyone out in cyberspace reads this THE WALK is "The Walk to End Women's Cancer" on Sept 11 and 12 in Toronto. It used to be The Walk to End Breast Cancer.

The other thing that we are working on and hope to have ready to go for our garage sale is a raffle draw. I am working on tickets and finalizing prizes so if you have anything that you would like to put on our raffle, please let me know as soon as possible. So far we have:
1. 4some of golf at Kings Riding Golf Course in Aurora - value $600
2. A basket of booze from Maureen and Colleen - value $300
3. Gift certificates, hopefully Shoppers, Foodland

The more the merrier, so golf shirts, balls, hockey - baseball - raptor tickets, anything you can think of.

Talking to Maureen and Colleen on Saturday, we were thinking that if we all took a book or 2 of tickets and sold them, whoever sold the tickets could keep the money for their pool. There'll be 10 tickets in a book and we were thinking of selling them for $10 each or 3 for $20.So I guess I need to know if you have anything that could be part of the raffle and also if you would like a book or two or thee of tickets. And any comments re the ticket price, etc would be appreciated. I am planning on donating a ticket to everyone who has donated $50 or more to my fundraising as a way of saying thank you to them for supporting me.

Walking is not only good exercise for my body but it also has my brain buzzing with all these fundraising ideas, lol.

Walk On Team Chaos