Our first Buddy Walk (2018)

This past weekend, we attended our first Buddy Walk in Cincinnati.  Six months ago, I had never even heard of the Buddy Walk!  But we have been ushered into this whole new world of Down syndrome, and we're quickly learning all of the awesomeness that comes along with it.

The Buddy Walk is a short, one-mile walk for people with Down syndrome and their families and friends who support them.  It's a national event that happens each year to raise awareness of Down syndrome and raise donations for many Down syndrome-related things.  Each city in the United States hosts their own Buddy Walk, so we decided to sign up for both the Cincinnati Buddy Walk (my hometown) and the Columbus Buddy Walk (Tim's hometown).



Because Alice is only five months old and we've had a lot going on lately (moving, Lucy starting preschool, juggling two kids... but it's all good!), I didn't have much time to recruit people for the walk or do much to prepare for it.  I simply created our team - Wonderland Walkers - and sent one email to lots of friends and family, telling them what we're doing and that we would love their support - either via a donation to the local Down syndrome association (on Alice's behalf) or by participating in our walk.  I set a goal of $100 and thought we would get about 10 people to walk with us.

Well, you guys rock.  Within 10 minutes of sending my email, we had already greatly exceeded our goal and we already had more than 10 people signed up to walk with us.  I love you guys.

Fast forward to last weekend, and we ended up raising $2,695.00 for the Down Syndrome Association of Greater Cincinnati and having 38 people join our team and walk with us!



Because we raised so much money, Alice even got her own poster that hung along the route.



Having a child with Down syndrome has enriched our lives in so many amazing, unexpected ways.  This is just one of them.  We are so grateful to all of our amazing friends and family members who donated to our team and/or spent their (rainy) Saturday morning with us.  We love you all so much!



We still have the Columbus Buddy Walk coming up!  It'll be on Sunday, September 30 at 9:00 am at MAPFRE Stadium.  If you would like to donate to our team or walk with us, we would love to have you.  As of now, we have raised $500 for that Buddy Walk and we have 10 people on our team.  If you want to walk with us or donate to our team, just click here.

We are so grateful to everyone who has donated or signed up to walk on either or both of our teams.  We will be doing this again next year, and I know it's going to be even more successful then!

I had a couple people come up to me during the walk and say, "Look at all your support!  Alice one lucky little girl to have you!"  I said what I always say when people tell us this... "We're the lucky ones to have her."  It's true.


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