Journal

Friday October 1st First step book venue. I contacted Christ Lutheran Church to find out how to go about obtaining fellowship hall for the day. They confirmed that November 20th was free and e-mailed me forms to fill out that will have to be reviewed by the council. I started filling out the forms, but I still have a few details to work out before I can complete them. Obtaining permission to use a building for one night is a lot more work than I thought it would be. You have to be insured, you have to fill out papers, and have your plans reviewed by the church council before you get a definite on whether you can use the space. -1 hour Monday October 4th What’s a concert without performers? E-mail Madi Reynolds and the drummer of the band Path of Motion, James McCreavy, explaining my project and asked if they were able to perform. Found out Madi was able and willing to perform, for free. Yay! However, James already has plans for that day, so I guess without him his band cannot really perform. Oh well I will have to keep looking for another band. Not everyone is going to be free when you want them to be. -10 minutes

Need some gifts for all those who come out and support. I shopped for cheap stickers on zazzle.com to give out for free to all the attendees. Zazzle has a large variety of juvenile diabetes awareness stickers. It was fun looking at them all, but hard to choose which one I liked the best, so I decided to purchase to different kinds. One has a butterfly with a ribbon as its body and is pretty cute...http://www.zazzle.com/juvenile_diabetes_butterfly_3_sticker-217804107767560805. The other one has a quote on it...http://www.zazzle.com/juvenile_diabetes_how_strong_we_are_sticker-217442416209679015. They come 20 to a sheet, so ordered 60 of each sticker. They are supposed to come in four to seven days. Excited about the stickers, think people will enjoy them. - 2 hour Tuesday October 5th Need another performer. I found the rock band Renne through my mom’s boss. The lead singer is her son, who is a music major at Temple, so figure they should be pretty good. She is going to lend me a CD to listen to. Hopefully they will be able to come. 10 minutes E-mailed Madi to see if she was performing by herself or with others and how long she could play for. Have to figure out a time for the concert and how long each performer is going to play. - 5 minutes

I talked to a friend today who is a part of the sweethearts, to see if they could possibly perform. She sounded like she was willing to perform, hopefully they will be able to perform, if not if Renne can come than I can live without the sweethearts performing. ---5 minutes

Now to use the foundations logo, I need permission. I e-mailed Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International explaining my project and asked their permission to use their logo and if they had any brochures or papers that I could give out for free to promote their foundation. Do not think they will have a problem with me using their logo to raise money to be donated to their foundation. 5 minutes Wednesday October 6th T-shirts galore! I worked on designing t-shirts to be sold at the event to raise even more money for the foundation. Came up with a couple designs and asked people in my class/e-mailed some of my friends to see what they thought. I love designing shirts, so spent a while playing around with different designs. ooShirts.com has some really cool fonts and clipart you can use to design your shirts. I ended up deciding to go with a red t-shirt with a music note image from clipart, and the name of the event, all on the front of the shirt. Debated whether to put the music not image on the back of the shirt, but cheaper if everything on the front, so kept it on the front. I looked into how much it would cost for different amounts of shirts. Shirts tend to be expensive, but at this website I can get about sixty shirts for a little over $6.00 a shirt with my design. The company has good ratings and costumer reviews, so the shirts should be nice. Always wanted to design shirts for an event and have them made. It is really fun. Now I just have to figure out how many I should purchase and how much to sell them for at the event to make money to be donated to the foundation. I figure it is better to sell out than to have extras. Not sure how much people would being willing to pay for them. My friends in my class said they would buy them for around $15.00, since most of that would be going to the foundation. http://www.ooshirts.com/d/29092456 3 hours

Found out that District Chorus is the same day as my concert, so it was not definite if the sweethearts can perform or not, since some will be at district chorus. Decided not to have them perform because I needed to know who could perform now and did not have time to wait to find out if they could come. Kind of bummed they cannot perform, but it is part of the process. Hopefully Renne can perform for an hour and then if I just have them and Madi that should be good. 2 minutes Thursday October 7th Finally received an e-mail back from foundation, took them long enough, and they told me to e-mail the branch of the foundation closest to me, so I e-mailed the Philadelphia branch the same e-mail I sent the first time. Knew foundation had different branches, but did not know if I should e-mail the branch closest to me or the main foundations e-mail. Turns out I should have e-mailed the branch closest to me. Not a big deal though, just had to forward the e-mail. Hopefully they will get back to me sooner than the people I e-mailed the first time. --- 3 minutes

More gifts for attendees :-). Went out to my favorite craft store, Michaels, and bought grey ribbon, flower stickers, (to use the peddles to represent drops of blood on the ribbons) and safety pins to construct juvenile diabetes awareness ribbons to give out for free to those who attend. Who would of thought grey ribbon would be so hard to find, in the main ribbon aisle all they had was grey wire ribbon, which I did not want. However, luckily they have their Christmas stuff out already and the grey ribbon was thirty percent off. The rest of the materials were easy to find and pretty cheap. 1 hour

Friday October 8th Renne can perform! Yay, yay, yay! Got confirmation through phone that the band Renee could definitely perform and now I can breathe because I do not have to worry about who is performing anymore. They said they can perform for an hour and that they would need twenty minutes to set up and twenty minutes to break down their set. They are also willing to perform for free :-), which is really nice of them. Thrilled to have a band come, hopefully everyone will like their music.---10 minutes

Talked to Christ Lutheran Church to see if could use dumpsters, if they provided chairs and tables, and if could sell concessions and t-shirts to raise more money for the foundation. They said yes to all of those, but still have to hand in the permission papers and have them reviewed by the church council. Glad I do not have to worry about getting chairs and tables though that would have been a pain. 30 minutes

Permission to use logo…done! Got permission from Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International to use their logo, which they sent me a downloadable version of, and they said they could send me brochures. I e-mailed them my address to send the brochures to. Really excited they said yes. Another thing out of the way and just a few more things to do, or a lot. 10 minutes Saturday October 9th Now time to start getting ready to promote this concert. Want to wait until have official approval from church, but want to have things to hand out right after I do. I spent some time creating a rough draft for my concert flyers. Wanted it to be eye catching and pull people in, so created quite a few different flyers. I bugged my parents the whole time too, asking them which one the thought was the best. Originally wanted to print them on colored paper, but like them on white paper a lot too, so decided to print them on a bright blue and white paper. Now just need permission to use fellowship hall and to figure out if Madi is just performing by herself and I will be to print the flyers out and start spreading the word. 1 hour

Also came up with a time frame, finally. I decided to book fellowship hall from four in the afternoon until eleven at night. The doors will open at 6:20pm and the concert will start at seven. Did not put an end time because do not exactly know when it will be over, however if it starts at seven it should be over around ten. That gives us a little over two hours to set up for the concert and around an hour or more to clean up, hopefully that will be good. There is a lot of thinking involved in planning an event, but it is still kind of fun. --- 10 minutes

Constructed another 20 ribbons! It is becoming easier and easier to make the ribbons, can whip them out pretty fast now. I should not have a problem creating about one hundred of them before the concert. - 45 minutes Sunday October 10th Finally handed in permission papers to Christ Lutheran Church to be reviewed at the October 19th council meeting. Hopefully they will approve it, do not know what I am going to do if they do not. I am a member of the church and my friend’s dad is on the council so there should not be a problem with me using fellowship hall. Already confirmed that November 20th, was free, so should not have a problem with the space already being used. 5 minutes Asked one adult, a family friend, to help out at the concert. They said they would, so one volunteer down and a bunch more to go. 5 minutes Monday October 11th Got another adult volunteer to help out at the event and to donate 50 soft pretzels for the concession stand. Two adult volunteers down and some food for the concession stand. Makes me feel better that I have something even if it is only a little. Want to make sure I definitely have permission to use fellowship hall before I ask too many people to help out and donate food/beverages. --- 5 minutes Tuesday October 12th Found out Madi could perform for 30 to 45 minutes and she might have a friend accompanying her, but she has to get back to me on that. Glad to know how long she can perform for and hopefully she will get back to me soon, although I have to wait until the church gives me approval before I can promote the event too much anyway. --- 5 minutes Wednesday October 13th Stickers came! :-) Really excited to have another thing out of the way. They look really nice, hope people like them. Friday October 15th Went out and bought a musical stamp and red stamp pad to stamp people’s hands when they pay at the door, instead of giving them tickets. Since selling tickets at the door, figure why waste more paper/ink, so just decided going to just stamp people’s hands as they pay. 30 minutes Sunday October 17th Created 26 more ribbons! Feel accomplished by getting almost half of the ribbons created. I know they are just a small part of the event, but it feels good to have something almost done and out of the way.  1 hour  Tuesday October 19th Received one of Renne’s CD’s from my mom’s boss to check out what they sounded like, although already having them perform. Just thought I would make sure I liked their music. I listened to their whole CD and they are really good. I think people are going to enjoy their music, at least I hope they will. Found out their website, www.renneband.com, so I can put a link to it on the facebook page I am going to create for the event, so people can check out a few of their songs. Really excited to have them perform at my event now. --- 30 minutes

Claiming the use of Fellowship Hall at my church is proving to be a lot more difficult than I thought it would be. Wes Craig, the church council president, called me and told me that the day after the planned date of the concert they have a Stewardship lunch, so if I wanted to have my concert on the 20th of November I would have to set up the chairs and tables for the Stewardship lunch before I left that night. I told him I did not have a problem with that and he said he will have to said the request back to council to get it officially approved and then he will e-mail me a full confirmation within the next two days. He also wanted to know if there would be chaperones, so I informed him that there would be plenty of adult supervision. 20 minutes Wednesday October 20th Why is it so hard to get a yes? Wes Craig e-mailed me today and pretty much repeated what he had said last night. He also gave me some other dates to consider where I would not have to worry about setting up for the Stewardship lunch. However, one of those dates is the day of the High School play and the other is the day of the SATs, so neither of those dates are going to work. He told me to let him know what date works best for me and e-mail him back and then he will have to run it through council again. Had to e-mail him back and say, once again, that I do not mind setting up for the lunch the next day and the 20th of November is the only date that really works. Hopefully he can get it sent back to council and approved soon. I really need to know if I have the space for sure or not. Last night he made it sound like it was no problem. 15 minutes Friday October 22nd Permission to use church hall….done! Finally got the official approval from church council that I am allowed to use Fellowship Hall at Christ Lutheran Church on November 20th, took long enough. Happy that, that is out of the way and now I can get to promoting this event.--- 2 minutes

Thursday October 21st Met with my mentor, Mrs. Jaffe, today. Discussed my project and everything I needed to do, like getting permission from the church to use parish hall and start asking performers if they can perform. Also have to promote the event more and get the word out. Nice to have a mentor who is in the event planning business. She is very kind and insightful. ---30 minutes

Saturday October 23rd Created another 29 ribbons, that makes for 85 so far, do not know if I am going to need anymore, but making 100 for now. Getting faster at making ribbons, got a system down that is working pretty well. Should have 100 done in no time. --- 1 hour More promoting! Composed a facebook event page promoting my concert. Invited about 89 people from my friend list and made it a public page, so others who are not my friends can see it too. Hopefully this page gets the word out and people will be able to come. ---15 minutes Sunday October 24th Sent a message to some of my friends asking if they were able to volunteer and/or donate a food or beverage to be sold at the concert. Do not need too many volunteers, since have a lot of family members helping out. Also giving free admission to volunteers, which means less money for charity, so do not want too, too many volunteers. Need some donations for food and beverages though, do not want to spend too much on buying concessions. Hopefully people able to just bring a little something or make some sort of bake good. --- 5 minutes Tuesday October 26th Sent another e-mail to JDRF asking about the brochures they said they had, since have not heard back or received any brochures in the mail. Just let them know that I had e-mailed before and asked if I could still get the brochures and how to get them. Hopefully they respond soon. It is not an essential part to my project, but they would be nice to have to promote the foundation. --- 5 minutes



A bunch of my friends said they were willing to help out and donate food/beverages. Have one person bringing cans of Brisk ice tea, another making red whoopie pies, and another making cookies, and another making some sort of bake good, in addition to the 50 soft pretzels a family friend said they would donate earlier. Should not need too much more. I will buy water bottles and probably some soda and possibly some candy. That should be good, do not want too much food. However, I will not lose any money that would be going to the foundation since all the concessions are donated and will not need to be paid back. The more I sell, though, the more money I will raise for JDRF.

Gave flyers to my mom to take to work, so she could spread the word to her fellow teachers. The lead singer of Renne is the son of their boss, they should come out and support. My mom’s boss said she will copy the flyer and give them out to people she knows because she wants people to come see her son perform, so that should bring in more people. Thursday October 28th Went to the vice principal, Dr. McCarthy, to get my flyer approved to hang on bulletin boards around school. She said she would have to check with Mr. Puckett, the principal, to make sure it was okay since my project is being held outside of school. Had a feeling that was going to happen, but hopefully I will be allowed to promote my event in school, since it is for my senior thesis project. Keeping my fingers crossed :). --- 5 minutes

Went back to see Dr. McCarthy after D block to see if Mr. Puckett was okay with me hanging my flyer around school. Luckily it was approved and Dr. McCarthy signed it for me. Now will have to find time to go hang them up around school. She said I could hang them on any of the bulletin boards throughout the school. --- 2 minutes

Got bins to use as donation bins at the show. Having a Halloween party so bought pretzels and cheese balls, which come in bins, so I can use them for donation bins. I love things that have double purposes; it makes life so much easier :). --- 30 minutes Friday October 29th Still have not heard back from JDRF about brochures. Resent the e-mail I sent a couple of days ago. Hopefully they can get back to me and I can receive the brochures soon. If not it will not break my project, so not a huge deal if I do not end up receiving them. Will be disappointing, but It will not be the end of the world. --- 2 minutes Saturday October 30th Printed out more flyers on white paper to put in people’s doors. Printed about 50 of them. Seems like a lot, but I am sure almost all of them will be gone by the time done handing them out. --- 5 minutes Walked around my neighborhood and Hannah’s neighborhood with Hannah putting flyers for our events in doors. Just put them in the doors of people we know. Ended up giving about 50 flyers. It was pretty cold out and kind of creepy going up to people’s doors and putting flyers in their doors, although either Hannah or I knew the owners of the homes. Hopefully it will help spread the word and people will come to the show! Hope all this hard work will pay off in the end. --- 3 hours

Tuesday November 2nd Made 15 more ribbons! That makes 100 in all :). I think I made them faster than any other time I made ribbons. Really good at making ribbons now, hee hee. Glad to have them all made and out of the way, now can focus on other stuff that needs to get done. --- 20 minutes

More flyers! Copied more flyers with approved signature on them to hang in school. Now just have to find time to hang them around the school. I do not even know how many flyers I have given out or are going to give out by the time of the concert…sorry trees…I’ll recycle the flyers I take down after the concert. --- 2 minutes Thursday November 4th Flyers! Again. Finally hung up some flyers around school, after school today. Did not realize there was so many bulletin boards around the school and I did not have enough flyers for all the bulletin boards, so going to make some more copies tonight and hang some more around school tomorrow. My flyers are in color so I cannot copy them in school/ I would feel bad for using so much of the schools ink. Realized I have given out over 70 FLYERS since I made the flyers, that is crazy and still have more to give out. The event is getting close. I am crossing my fingers that I can get this thing done and be prepared to have the concert and have a lot of people show up and make a good amount of money to donate to JDRF. Starting to freak out a little bit….actually who am I kidding I have been freaking out since I started this project and I want to be an event planner…hmm…well at least I find all this freaking out and stressing kind of fun at times if that makes any sense. It will all be worth it in the end when I have a successful concert. --- 40 minutes

Printed out more FLYERS tonight! To hang around the school! (love you trees). Maybe if I put enough around people will actually take attention to them and read them and decide to come :). Well that is the plan anyway. Will put those up tomorrow and then should be pretty good with promoting this event…maybe. --- 2 minutes Saturday November 6th Went out and bought posters to write facts/statistics about juvenile diabetes to hang around the concert area to spread juvenile diabetes awareness. Do not want people to come to the concert and leave with no awareness of juvenile diabetes, want to take something away with them. Hope people actually take the time to read them. ---20 minutes

Only 2 weeks, just 2 weeks until my show! Don’t know if to be excited or really nervous. Sort of freaking out. Do not have too many big things to accomplish, but there are a lot of little things that still have to be done and have to make sure/remind people can still volunteer/donate the concessions they said they would. Sunday November 7th Created first factual poster :). Took longer than thought would, but really like how turned out. I enjoy creating posters. I try to make them as eye catching as I can, in a good way, while making it so you can still read it plain and clearly. Created one big and one small awareness ribbons out of the extra ribbon I had and put them on the poster. It added a little dimension to the poster and made it pop a little bit. Also made the first letter of the first word and the number in the fact out of red construction paper to make them pop and catch ones eye. I think it looks pretty cool. --- 1 hour Monday November 8th Created the second factual poster! The fact dealt with the number of children diagnosed with juvenile diabetes, so drew an outline of a child in a running position in the background. I outlined it in red and colored it in with red color pencil, while I made the words in black. The words still stand out and are easy to read, while the child adds to the poster without taking over. Kept this one pretty simple, do not want to overdo the posters too much. Having fun with the posters, though. It is one of the fun parts of this project that does not make me want to pull my hair out like some other things. ---45 minutes Tuesday November 9th Started creating the third factual poster. Decided to paint this one, to change it up from the last two and give it a different feeling. Going to take a little longer, but think will turn out nice. Making sure the words are neat and in a straight even line takes up a lot of time. I write it all out in pencil first and then go over it. Should finish it tomorrow and possibly start on the 4th poster. Want to have all six of the factual posters done by this Saturday, so I will have a week left to finish all the little things that need to be taken care of. --- 30 minutes Only 11 days until the concert!!! Cannot believe it is almost here. It felt like just yesterday I was thinking of what to do for this project. October flew by really fast and now so is November. Will be relieved when the hands on part of my project is done though, than I can focus more on the research part and not be stressing about what I have to get done for the concert. Wednesday November 11th Finished 3rd factual poster :-) Half way there, 3 more to go. After I painted the words, I decided it looked too boring, so I decided to SPLATTER PAINT, controlled splatter paint that is, it was fun! Luckily I did not get any paint on any of our dining room furniture, my mom would not have been too happy with me if I had. It looks pretty cool and you can still see the writing clearly, so it did not overtake the poster, just added to it. --- 30 minutes Saturday November 13th Posters galore! Started creating my fourth poster. Tired of the white background, so took a bunch of scraps of different colored red paper I had and glued them on to the poster. Like how turned out, gives the poster a little something and makes it less white. Then wrote the fact in pencil over the paper and started painting the words, but did not finish. I painted the words a light pink, so they would show up on the different colors of red paper. Hopefully will finish most of that up tomorrow and then will just have two more factual posters to create. In addition to them I have to create a poster for the t-shirts and one for the concession stand, along with signs to put up at the church leading people to fellowship hall. --- 30 minutes Sunday November 14th Shopping! Went out today and a got some things for my event. From bj’s got a little bit of water, but have a lot left over from the sticks and stones after party that was at my house on Friday night, so did not need to get that much water. Also bought diet coke, coke, and sprite for the concession stand, along with Swedish Fish and M&M’s. Went to dollar tree and picked up some red napkins and red tablecloths to make the tables look a little nicer. Think I have everything I need now, except balloons and ice which I will get on the day of the event. --- 2 hours

Almost finished my fourth poster, however decided to outline the pink block letters in white, so it looks a little neater. Now going to take a little longer, but should be able to finish it up tomorrow, maybe. --- 20 minutes.

Monday November 15th 5 DAYS!!!!!!! Aaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Almost there, sort of freaking out, have a lot little things to do like make signs, etc. Do not have much time to do anything especially with my school work and swimming. At least I will be done with this hands on project before swimming really gets into full swing.

Met with my mentor, Mrs. Jaffe, today and discussed what was left to get done. Pretty much just have to finish creating posters and then get a few things on the day of the show. Not too many big things left to do. She is really nice and supportive of my project. Makes me feel good that she, an event planner, think I am doing a good job pulling this benefit concert together. ---30 minutes

Finished fourth factual poster! 2 more to go! Outlined all the letters in white and tapped down all the paper more thoroughly. Looks pretty nice. Like that the background is red and not whtie. Now have to come up with ways to design the last two posters in a creative and eye catching way. ---15 minutes Tuesday November 16th



4 DAYS!!!!!!!!!! Bllllllaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!

Started and Finished 5th factual poster! That is a first, I actually got a poster done in one night. Made it a little simpler than some of the others, but still eye catching. Wrote the words in black and made boxes around them and colored the background all red. Like how turned out simple, yet eye catching. One more to go, which I hopefully will finish tomorrow or in the next two days, since I only have 4, yes that is 4 days left to get everything ready. 1 hour

Created and printed out arrow signs to put up in the church hallways, to lead people back to fellowship hall, since it is in the “basement” of the church and there are a lot of turns you have to make to get there. Made them simple, yet bold and black, so they are easy to see and follow. --- 5 minutes

Cleaned out buckets to use for donations and created a sign to put on the buckets. Made it colorful and bold to catch people’s attention. Do not think going to make much money from the donation bins, but its worth a shot. If people do not want to spend money on food or a t-shirt, but want to donate more money, besides the price of admission, they can put a little money in a donation bin --- 10 minutes

My freaking out level has increased a little bit, just a little. I only have F-O-U-R days until my concert! It is a little crazy. If feels like only yesterday I was coming up with an idea of what to do and then contacting my church and now the concert is almost here. Do not really have that much left to do, just a bunch of little things to make sure everything is ready to go for Saturday. Wednesday November 17th 3 DAYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Created 2 posters tonight, yes 2! Created my 6th and final factual poster! Like how turned out, kept it simple yet eye catching. Also created t-shirt sign. Drew a t-shirt in the background and colored it red. Then wrote the price on it and put Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International’s logo in the corner, so people would know who the proceeds were going to. One more poster to create for the concession stand and then I am done making posters! Yay :-) --- 1.5 hours Thursday November 18th  2 DAYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!Daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!  Went to the church today after school to pick up the key and figure out a few things. We were supposed to get a diagram for how the church wanted the place set up for their luncheon thing the next day, but no one gave it to us or the church secretary, so had to call up the people responsible for it. They told us how they wanted everything set up; it was a lot less tables and chairs than they had originally told me, which was not bad. The secretary took us down to the sound system to make sure the door was unlocked and there was a note that said to keep it unlocked, so we could get into it. The key they gave me only worked the outside door. We also left a note for them to keep the janitor’s closet open, so we could get in there too. --- 20 minutes  Friday November 19th 1 DAY!!!!!!!! Zaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Created food/drink poster! Did not outline everything in permanent marker because do not know exactly what everyone is bringing yet, so left some blank lines to write the food down as it comes. Not my best poster, but it is decent and fulfills the purpose of letting people know what everything costs. Have a feeling that we are going to have a lot of leftovers, but hopefully we will not have too much. At least the majority of the food is being donated. --- 20 minutes

In an interesting mood, kind of stressing out about how many people will actually come to the concert, but actually sort of and that is sort of calm about what I have to do to put the whole show together. Whoever comes, comes and hopefully we can make a decent amount of money. Saturday November 20th

Day of concert!!!!!!!!!! Hoo-rah!!!!!!!!!!! Really excited/freaking out about all the work I still have to do. Well it is not that much work it just feels like it. Went to Hannah’s CMT walk this morning, it was fun. While I was at that my mom went out and got ice and flowers for me. She got the flowers on her own whim, but they will look nice. Went out later and purchased balloons to put at the entrance to the church, so people know which door to go in, since it is the side door. For some reason the balloons did not last very long, and only a few were stayed inflated, which was kind of disappointing, but not the end of the world. ---15 minutes

Made a playlist on my iPod to play during the 40 minutes between doors opening and end of show. Went through not even all my music and just pick a bunch of fun songs, it was one of the enjoyable parts of this project. --- 5 minutes

Distributed some change throughout the three money boxes, so would have change to give people. Then started packing everything into boxes and loading up the car. Did not realize how much stuff I had to take, although the coolers took up a lot of room. Also had to bring a lot of little things like tape, poster putty, trash bags, Ziploc bags, etc. --- 20 minutes

On the way to the church to set up I stopped over at Mrs. Trueman’s to pick up some brownies, cookies, and chocolate covered marshmallows she had made. They all looked delicious. She had to back for something the next day, so she made extra and gave them to me, it was really nice of her. ---10 minutes

Got to the church around 4pm and carried everything into the church, with my parents help. A couple tables were already set up, so just used those and put red plastic table clothes on them. My dad set up all the chairs, while my mom put flowers in vases. I hung up all my posters around the room and cleared off the stage, which had some various objects on it. My Uncle, Aunt, and Cousin showed up about an hour and a half later than us and helped with a few things. My Uncle figured out how to work the PA system, while my Aunt and cousin put Mrs. Trueman’s baked goods in Ziploc bags. Mostly everything was set up by quarter of 6. Put up signs with arrows to lead people to the room, they are pretty obvious, so no one should have a problem finding the room. They will probably just be able to follow the noise of people talking or music playing. Took a lot less time than I thought it would to get everything set up and ready. Played with the lights and figured out what switches went to everything, kept most of the lights off, except the stage lights and a few in the back. My friends who were volunteering started showing up about 6ish and we just hung around and chatted for a while. Did not take much time to tell them what was going on and selling shirts, concessions, and tickets is not that complicated, so they did not really need any instruction. ---3 hours



Benefit concert went well, wished there was a few more people who came, but overall it was really run and the bands were amazing. Madi brought her friend Ryan to assist her and they were really talented and good. Renne was absolutely amazing, everyone seemed to really like them and a lot of people even bought a copy of their CD after the show. They were really nice and down to earth. Their music is a type that appeals to almost anyone of any age. We had a lot of baked goods left over, since Hannah brought some of her leftovers from the walk and a lot of people donated food. Mary Helen made these really good lemon cheesecake things that everyone seemed to love and Mrs. Uehling made red whoopie pies, which were also a big hit. We gave a bunch of food to the performers and friends. Also have a lot of t-shirts leftover, which I will probably try to sell to friends who were not able to make the concert. It seems like there was a lot going on tonight and a lot of people were busy. Everyone helped clean up, which was nice. I actually did not have to do that much except take the posters down and help carry some things out to the car. I was very thankful that everyone helped out; it was really nice of all of them. In the end really happy with how everything turned out and would do it all over again if I had too. The freaking out and stress was all worth it. --- 4 hours



Saturday December 18 Finally donated $1000 to Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International today! Officially done my hands on project. Yay! Feels good to be done, just have to work on my presentation now and organizing everything to present it. Senior thesis is almost over, cannot believe we are almost half way through senior year, but will be glad to have my graduation project done.

__ Reflection __ My hands on project was to organize a benefit concert to raise money for Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International. It was held on November 20th 2010 at Parish hall in Christ Lutheran Church. Madi Reynolds and Ryan Fitzpatrick were the opening act and they were followed by a band named Renne. There were food/refreshments for the crowd, along with personally designed t-shirts for sale. Many friends and family members donated concessions and helped out at the event. Two friends sat right outside the entrance to the hall and collected admission and stamped hands with a music note stamp. Doors for the show opened at 6:20pm and it started at 7:00pm and lasted to about (9:30pm). Friends and family also helped set up for the event and clean up for the event. I created posters with juvenile diabetes facts to be hung around Parish hall, to inform the crowd. To obtain the use of the hall I had to go through the church and fill out papers and receive a key from them for the night of the show. We were also responsible for making sure we left the hall looking the way we found it and clean.

My goals for the project were to raise at least $500 dollars, have at least 50 people attend, besides the volunteers, and have at least to performances. To achieve these goals I had to first secure the location of the church. Then I had to secure at least to performances. I asked Madi at school and she got her friend Ryan to help her out. I had also planned on the band Path of Motion performing, but they were not available that night, so I had to find another band. I found Renne, through my mom’s boss, since her son is the lead vocals/keyboardist of the band. After I had those plans set I needed to promote the concert. I created flyers and handed them out to all my friends and posted some around school. I also created a public facebook page for the event inviting many people and allowing others to see the event. Flyers were also put in doors around my neighborhood. I achieved most of my goals, except the number of attendees. There were about 30 attendees who were not volunteers and about 40 people in total at the event. The day of the show turned out not to be the best night to have it, since a lot of people had prior plans. However, a decent number of people showed up. From the event I managed to raise $650 dollars and my extended family donated another $350 to go to Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation International.

While organizing this event I did research of juvenile diabetes, which helped me with my research projects on juvenile diabetes. I learned about all the side effects and what diabetics must go through every day. I also acquired knowledge on what research projects are being conducted to find a cure for juvenile diabetes. These treatments included pancreas and kidney transplants, islet cell transplant, nanoparticle vaccine, and embryonic stem cell research. I learned the benefits and negatives of these treatments, which helped grasp how hard it is to find a cure and how researchers are on their way to finding a cure for this disease. Finding a cure is not an easy task and researchers have been trying to find a cure for years.

Through this project I learned that planning a charity event, even an event in general, takes numerous hours, flexibility, persistence, and patience. Just because you want a certain amount of people there and specific performers does not mean they will be able to do it when you need them. I learned that while I can be patient certain things sometimes, there are times when I do not have any patience. An example of this was when I waiting to hear back from the foundation with permission to use their logo and possibly obtain brochures from them. Also when going through trying to get permission from the church and having to wait to hear from the council. The waiting is agonizing, but you just have to be patient and deal with the outcome when it happens. There are always little things that need to be thought of and dealt with when organizing an event. There also needs to be communication between you and those you are working with. You have to communicate with the performers, so they know when they need to be there and how long they are going to perform. You also have to communicate with all your volunteers and family members who are helping out. Through organizing this concert I learned how organized I could be and what I can pull together when I set my mind to it. I also learned that holding a charity event is not just about raising thousands of dollars; you can raise a decent amount of money and still help the foundation. Any little amount of money is another step closer to finding a cure for juvenile diabetes. From this experience I will take with me the realization of how intricate planning an event is and transfer everything I learned to a possible career in event planning later down the road. I realized how much I do enjoy planning events, even with all the stress they cause. While I would have liked a few more people to come, I enjoyed planning the event and was proud of myself that I pulled it together, which in the end is all that really matters. This project was a great learning experience and put event planning in perspective for me.