Friday, August 5, 2011

Open invitation to bloggers

This is a copy of the email we sent off to the bloggers we remembered of the top of our heads, and is now an open invitation to anyone interested in joining Team Pink Eye.
Hello!

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this message. We are writing to you today to ask you to participate in the Susan G. Komen Passionately Pink for the Cure Team Pink Eye Project.

What we are asking for you to do is post a pink EOTD, FOTD or NOTD on a selected Friday in October, Breast Cancer Awareness Month. It can be anything you'd like as long as it is predominately pink. We ask that the post link back to our team on the Susan B Komen site in an effort to raise money and awareness as well as our blog which will have links to all the participants.

We started this project for several reasons. We wanted to give back to the community and do everything we could to help stop this horrible disease from claiming more lives. Did you know that more than 190,000 women in the U.S. will be diagnosed with breast cancer this year, and more than 40,000 will die? One-third of women in the U.S. today (23 million women) are not receiving regular recommended screening due to lack of access, education or awareness. These numbers are staggering, but with your help maybe we can lower them.

Susan G Komen funds awareness and early detection programs. Breast cancer is survivable 98% of the time when detected early, but women need education and access to these screenings in order to survive. Our goal right now is to raise at least $1000.00 throughout the month of October to ensure they get it. All we ask is that you donate a bit of your time and skill to help.

Depending on the level of participants we will group bloggers together to post looks one Friday in October (different blogs each week) and links both to the team fundraising site and our blog which will have links to all the participants. This will not only help raise awareness and funds, but also drive traffic to the participants respective sites. We are also looking in to possible participation from indie businesses to donate prizes for giveaways to be hosted on some of the participating blogs. That idea is still in the planning stages so if you do choose to participate we will let you know if your blog has been chosen via random.org to host a giveaway. We would handle the entry count and drawing for this so there is no extra work for you. We already have a commitment from OHWTO to donate a portion of the proceeds from all sales of any 'Pink Lady' scented products in the month of October to the project.

On a personal note I (Frances) chose Susan G Komen not only because it is a great cause, but also because it is a very personal one for me. My grandmother on my fathers side, Frances, died from brain cancer, which had metastasized from her breast. I never had the pleasure of meeting her. My cousin Nina died from breast cancer shortly after giving birth to her daughter. She had previously beat the disease once but refused treatment with the recurrence so as not to affect her unborn child. She was 23. Recently my mother beat stage 3B breast cancer. She did not do regular screenings because there was not a history of breast cancer in the family and only went to the doctor when a portion of her breast became hot to the touch. By the time she sought treatment the tumor was the size of a baseball. She was given very little hope of surviving as the cancer was very aggressive. She went through months of treatment and tests to make sure it had not spread to her lymph nodes, bones, or brain. Chemotherapy, radiation, and shots costing $400.00 each (with insurance coverage) followed. After a double mastectomy my mother did recover, though the chance of recurrence is very high. Early detection might have resulted in a less invasive procedure and definitely less of a chance that it had spread. These were incredibly painful times for my family and I wanted to do something to ensure that no other family has to experience that horror and loss.

We want to thank you again for taking the time to read about the Team Pink Eye Project and hope that you will participate. The link for our team page at Susan G Komen and our blog is below and we look forward to hearing from you. Please respond at your earliest convenience to TeamPinkEye@gmail.com

Thank you again,
Frances Danger and Rebecca Storevik
Team Pink Eye Project Page at Susan G Komen

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Overwhelmed.

We are so incredibly overwhelmed at the amount of support we've gotten, the people who have contacted us, or replied to our emails to join us on Team Pink Eye. It's incredibly thrilling to realize how many incredible people there are out there, willing to help. You can see all their names in our sidebar, and we urge you to look at all their blogs, and read them. They are amazing bloggers, both as people, and as beauty-experts.

You can also see the shops that have agreed to sponsor us thus far on the right, below the bloggers name, which is a growing list of wonderful companies that have agreed to help us. If you're a blogger, and we haven't reached out for you, please email us at teampinkeye@gmail.com, and we will get back to you as soon as possible (probably in less than 24 hours), and the same goes if you are an indie shop who wants to sponsor us, either through a giveaway on one of the participating blogs, by percentage of sales, or some other way.

Again, thank you much for your support, it means the world to us.

Team Pink Eye

Monday, August 1, 2011

Team Pink Eye Wants You!

Welcome to the Team Pink Eye Passionately Pink for the Cure Blog!
Throughout the month of October we will be turning some of our favorite beauty bloggers Passionately Pink. Every Friday in October groups of bloggers will post their pink looks to help raise money in an effort to spread breast cancer awareness. We would also be interested in company participation for giveaways or to donate proceeds for sales of pink items from the month of October. If you'd like to participate please send us an email at TeamPinkEye.

If you'd like to donate please click this link then choose the button in the upper left that says 'Donate to Frances'. These donations will go directly to the Susan G Komen Foundation. Remember, every little bit helps! If donating isn't in the cards we ask that you take few moments to learn about self examination. They are very easy to do and can be done in minutes.

We will update as the project moves forward.

We want to thank you for visiting the Team Pink Eye Project and also (hopefully) for your participation. Together we can help save untold numbers of women from this horrible disease and look gorgeous while doing it.

Frances Danger and Rebecca Storevik