Hello Awareness Beads supporters. First of all, thank you to every single person who reads this blog, follows us on Facebook, or supports us and our cause in any other way.
Jordan and I have been talking and have made a decision that will affect Awareness Beads and the way we operate in what we hope will be a positive way.
We have decided to make this organization temporarily primarily local.
In other words, we will be visiting children in hospitals that are near our homes and the surrounding areas and making beads with them there in person.
We will also be taking stuffed animals, blankets, pillows, and/or other goodies that will have a positive affect on a hospitalized child.
We will be doing this and not taking any more orders for mail for the time being. However, when we do begin to take orders again, we will still visit hospitals, making Awareness Beads bigger and more effective.
Details:
When Awareness Beads was started, we thought it was a great idea to be able to ship beads in the mail to families we followed and learned about, and also to supporters like us just wanting to make a difference. And it was. It was a wonderful idea, however, we have run into many challenges including beads getting lost in the mail, financial problems that caused us to have a delay in shipping beads due to the cost, and a lack of time due to work and school.
We want to make a difference and in a positive way, so after discussing it, we have decided not to mail beads for the time being. We intend to re-open Awareness Beads to everyone as it was when we launched the organization, but it is going to take us a little while to get into a position where we can do so.
As a co-founder, I feel that it is my responsibility to explain the changes a little bit further. I am in the process of moving from my parents' home to my new apartment to attend college. After I move, I am going to begin looking for a job in the city where I will be living. When I am settled and working, Awareness Beads will re-open to every person interested, just as it was in April. The reason for this temporary change is to give our organization the stability and capability to provide and please everyone in a timely manner, as we have failed to do so in the past.
When Awareness Beads is re-opened to the public in a few months, everything will be more organized. There will be a weekly schedule to control the amount of orders and the time to process and ship them, allowing every order to be delivered within two weeks of ordering. This will make our lives easier, and our supporters happier.
In the meantime, Awareness Beads will visit our local and surrounding hospitals as I mentioned before, and as we have already started with Wes Pak at CHKD in Norfolk.
We will continue to visit hospitals when we re-open to the public as well.
This is something that means a lot to us, and that we feel will benefit our organization.
Orders that have been taken before this date will be filled slowly but surely and every bead ordered before today will be delivered before Awareness Beads re-opens to the world. Rest assured that your beads will arrive, and please accept our apologies for the time.
Thank you again to all of our supporters for your interest, kindness, patience, and tolerance with us as we learned the ropes and now are making changes to make Awareness Beads the organization we originally wanted it to be.
Please stay tuned with this blog and our Facebook page, as we will continue to update on Awareness Beads status and we will post about our hospital visits.
Thank you for your cooperation,
Stormy and Jordan
