Birthday and Blood Drive 2013

We visited the pumpkin patch to celebrate Scarlett's birthday.  The whole family - Chris and me, my parents, sister and nephew all picked a pumpkin!  Scarlett and Caleb had a great time tromping through the hay and pumpkins.

Caleb helps push "Cuzzie" through the hay.

Grandma pulls the wagon

Chris encouraging the little ones to burn off some extra energy!

Scarlett doing trick moves in her walker.

Sadly, after a great time, as we paid for our pumpkins, Scarlett fell right on her face.  A bloody nose breaks up a party pretty quickly.  And, of course, she had a bruised, scabbed face for the blood drive and her school picture day!  At least her glasses survived this time.

That Friday, we got all set for our blood drive.  The Stanford Blood Center brought out their bloodmobile and an entire set up for inside the cafeteria at my school.  We set up a projector to show movies to help entertain kids, plus a popcorn machine, candy bar and hot dogs for everyone who came through.

The fantastic cake, thanks to my friend Jennifer, who has made all three of Scarlett's birthday cakes!

More cake?

 Unfortunately, Scarlett was nt having the best day, so she was absent for most of the event taking a nap at home with Grandma.  She did make an appearance for her cake, and to give smiles and hugs to everyone who was there.

Her barely-patient face, complete with scabby nose.

Tired mommy and daddy after a long day - and this was a while before we both donated blood!

 With everything happening with Scarlett this year, we were not able to do as much for the blood drive as we have in the past, but we still had a respectable 70 or so units donated.  it was a very long day (after I taught all day and Chris lead several classes through the school garden), but we are so proud of what we have been able to do over the last few years.

Thank you SO much to everyone who came out to donate, and to those who helped make it all happen: Tim and the Stanford Blood Center staff; Jennifer Kitajima (at the last minute!); my partner in kindergarten madness, Lindsay who gave up her classroom prep time to grab my camera and take the pictures!; Sandy and Alex, who came just to help (and thank goodness they were there!); my parents and sister for wrangling Scarlett all day; the Castellanos family who helped set up; and Barbara who came to rescue us as we were left to clean up by ourselves and couldn't fit it all in the car!

If you have never given blood, it is a very important thing that people must do to help other people.  Yes, it hurts a little, and yes, it takes a few minutes.  There is no replacement for human blood - people must give it to save other people's lives.  Scarlett is alive thanks to donors in our area who were kind enough to donate their A+ blood for an unknown person.  Not everyone can donate, which puts an even bigger responsibility on those of us who can.