Topic: TOYATHON 2002!!! |
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Mae"Wichita"
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Started on: 12/7/2002 7:36:37 PM
Thought I would finally give you the details. I'm thawed out, but not rested yet. It was very different this year. Chris got his wish, 8 inches of snow and I don't think the high ever got above 31. Over at www.kzsn.com there is some pictures posted by Rick Edwards. I'm going to update the toyathon site tonight or in the morning. Just downloaded 200 pictures taken. I got to kick off the toyathon this year. It was very special. The first toy went in for Marla O'Nelio. She passed away a year ago of Cancer. Her husband is the store manager of the Wal-Mart we were at. She was a very special person. Chely Wright put the toy in. Then it was offical. Team Chely brought 1,500 toys and the fans that came to Wichita bought more while they were here. I think at the end they probably had about 2,000. We had 112 toys. That is with the 60 dollars added in. Chely did here little "WE WON< WE WON" dance and then laughed. We talked about it and the real winner of the challenge is the kids. She and Chris had a little friendly chat. TOP SECRET!! LOL She wouldn't tell me what was said. It finally stopped snowing in the afternoon. It was beautiful, but it came at the wrong time. They could only sweep the snow out of the way on the roof. Can't use the shovel, might put a hole. So basically they had to stand in snow. On the ground we could shovel, plus the salt and traffic pretty much cleaned the sidewalks and parking lot off. I got to go up on the roof this time. WOOHOO! We had a scissor-lift to take everyone to the roof. There was a few boo~boos taking place. Erin went to take Chely's flower out to her before she left and ended up on the ground bumping her head. Chely felt really bad. Chely went over to the tent and hit her head on a pipe that was sticking out and down she went, Rick Edwards did the same thing minutes after Chely told him to be careful. Two others hit their heads on it. Dan burnt a whole in his coveralls. Thought he smelled something, it was his backside on fire. He had jeans on underneath. Chely's sister and 2 children came to be with her and ended up sick. Her sister Jeny and niece Amelia got a stomach bug. They did come see us Thrusday morning. Everyone is better now, only a couple of bruised foreheads and egos. Wednesday night we left about 1am to sleep a couple of hours. We got back about 6:30am. We finally got to see the sun. It was still cold. NO MORE SNOW! I became friends with Chely's road manager. I made sure the table was ready for her autograph sessions. She did about 5 of them in the 2 days. She didn't like being on the roof for long periods of time. She loved being in the middle of everything. One time we were ending a session so I wrote on a flyer "CHELY WILL BE HERE 10am Thrusday", instead of Chely I wrote CHER! Chely laughed and said "If it was Cher that would bring in alot more people than I would". We were getting alittle worried about noon when the people stopped coming. We were about 11,000 toys forever. Chely had to leave by 2pm. Check out time at the hotel was 3pm and her flight was about 5:30pm. 3pm came and Chely said no she wasn't leaving until Dan comes down. We finally packed her up about 3:30pm hugged her and sent her away. At 4:30pm Terry Newman of Papa John's Pizza came with 3 trucks of toys. They counted the toys and it came to 1,800 toys. Guess what? We were still 500 toys short. Dan wanted so much to come off the roof before Chely's plane left. At 5:oopm Pat O'Nelio the store manager came over to talk to Terry Newman. They wanted to talk to Dan. I took my headset off. Terry was listening with on ear piece, Pat with the other. I'm standing in the middle of 2 very important businessman discussing toys. Pat started by saying "I will give 100 toys, What do you have Terry?" Terry matched his bid. Then they got quiet. Terry wispered to Pat "How about we go shopping for 500 toys?" So that is how the toyathon ended. Chely was called and told she broke the record by 2 1/2 minutes, plus 1,032 more toys were raised. We tore everything down, cleaned up and called it another year done. For those of you from last year ~Pleasant Valley Middle School that brought all the toys last year brought 2,000 toys this year. Last year they brought 1,200 toys. They won a plaque for being the school that brought the most toys, and they will get a pizza party. I could tell so many stories, but I won't bore you. For all the Cagleheads~ thank you for your support. I will challenge you to do a fund raiser or just help out in your own areas next year. Oh and the concert last night was a blast. Rebecca Lyn Howard lost her voice so she wasn't there. Ty, Steve and Kevin were wonderful and very entertaining. It was great seeing Salsa, Linda and Erica these passed days. Sorry I kept running away. I'm done now. Have a great weekend!!
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Meghan
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Posted on: 12/7/2002 8:53:11 PM
WOW!!!
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Salsamaker
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Posted on: 12/8/2002 12:09:45 AM
AWESOME BREAK DOWN OF THE EVENT MISS MAE!!!! SO SORRY I COULDN'T BE THERE ANY LONGER THAN I WAS. I TOLD THE HUBBY NEXT YEAR I MAY HAVE TO DO LIKE YOU AND OFFER MY HELP THROUGH THE WHOLE EVENT! THAT WENT OVER WELL. LOL I ONLY PRAY THERE IS NO SNOW NEXT YEAR. MAN WHAT A TRIP WE HAD TRYING TO GET TO YOU GUYS!
THE CONCERT WAS AWESOME, MY FIRST GUITAR PULL. TY WAS IN RARE FORM LAST NIGHT, PROVIDING ALL THE COMEDY. LOL IT WAS A GREAT TIME! THANKS TO ALL WHO HELPED IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM. NEXT WEEK I WILL GO HELP SORT AND BOX FOR DISTRIBUTION WHICH HAPPENS NEXT FRI AND SAT.
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Caglefan4ever
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Posted on: 12/8/2002 9:11:01 AM
Hey Mae!
Can't wait to see your pics! Thanks so much for getting me that picture of Dan. My sister will just LOVE it!
The concert was terrific! The only thing that could have made it better is if Rebecca could have made it---and Chris was up there too!
I'm in with Salsa--I'd love to help you guys out more next year. As soon as you know the exact dates--I'll clear my schedule!
I enjoyed seeing you, Erin and Salsa. (Salsa, I hope the pictures turned out--they shouldn't be too bad since you had a flash and they were from the front row!)
Warm Caglehugs!
***Linda
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Mae"Wichita"
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Posted on: 12/8/2002 6:50:39 PM
Ok I have spent the day updating the toy-a-thon site. I still have some pictures to post, plus the concert pictures. Hope you enjoy them. www.geocities.com/kzsn/t4t.html
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