"How are we going to pay for this?"

Hi everyone!  March wanted me to write about some of fundraising we have done for this trip so here goes!

First we started writing letters for family and friends. Our letter campaign includes an awesome brochure made by Mr. March himself. It’s full of info about the trip and even shows a map of the trail we will be walking. Each brochure has a picture of each of us and a small bio about us and how we feel about the trip. We also send a small letter with each brochure asking for donations.  If we don't get a donation they still have information on the trip and how to follow us on the blog.

Auna cleaning the oven.....sitting on a toilet

We are all trying to raise as much money as we can in our individual ways, too,  so when Mr. March was telling me that his brother is moving out of his house and needs a little cleaning and fixing up I gladly volunteered to help out. Once we reach his house I realize it wasn’t a complete disaster I felt a little relieved. At first he gave me the option to sand the bottom trim in a bedroom, or to scrub the oven.  I was there to EARN some money so I was going to do the hard work so I scrubbed the oven.  I realized that it takes just a few seconds to drop food on the bottom of the oven but a good ten minutes to scrub that little bit off. Soon my yellow gloves have been turned brown with oven filth!  My arms were sore from scrubbing it so much. After about an hour and a half, I finished cleaning the inside of the oven but I forgot I also had to clean the outside of the oven.  It all went well and I had a lot of help from a six year old named Callie.  She loves to help.  Later on I cleaned the fridge and painted the cracks in the ceiling. it was a very productive day.  We also recently went out to the new house and cleared a huge field of Scotch Broom.  Thank you for the work!

I have also been tutoring every week and Deija and I have been known to devote time out of our week to work at the Matthew Knight Arena during games and events, which pays $25 a person for just simply wiping up someone’s ketchup, relish, etc. and picking up straw wrappers and making sure things are in stock for a few hours.   We even worked a monster truck rally where we sold way overpriced cotton candy hats and snow cones for an entire weekend.  Thanks to all of the kids who volunteered their time to help us out!

Deija having trouble with the syrup:)

Notice the syrup completely missing the ice!

Thanks, Darian!

Thanks, Eli (Eli was a member of the Bike Boys 

that made the Lewis and Clark Journey summer 2010)

I have also been tutoring every week and Deija and I have been known to devote time out of our week to work at the Matthew Knight Arena during games and events, which pays $25 a person for just simply wiping up someone’s ketchup, relish, etc. and picking up straw wrappers and making sure things are in stock for a few hours.   We even worked a monster truck rally where we sold way overpriced cotton candy hats and snow cones for an entire weekend.  Thanks to all of the kids who volunteered their time to help us out!

Whenever Mr. March has his students watch movies in class we bake multiple goodies like brownies, cookies and ask the students for "donations."  I have had some people come and ask me to bake them a pie and such, I would be pleased to do that for any of you.  They're delicious!

Some of the gear has been donated.  Specifically, the donorschoose.org site helped us get our backpacks donated. Mr. March made a page for us and everyone in our community and even people we have never met spoke too, they all donated to our cause which gave us around $600.00 for all of our backpacks.

We are still always willing to receive donations or if you want a pie, or any sort of odd job i’m sure we could work something out! If you have a bunch of empty soda cans or bottles, we would take them off your hands. Deija and I have a  goal of $2500.00 and so that would mean $5.00 per mile. 

Thank you so much to everyone who has donated so far.  Every dollar brings us one step closer.  Email us if you want to get involved!

---Auna