Share your Celebration!

As much as my kiddos love to open presents and wait patiently, scratch that…impatiently, for their birthday parties my mind goes straight to the “stuff”. I am not much of a sentimental person and I don’t like to store things for later so when piles of birthday presents enter our house my heart races a bit and my stomach whirls. Where in the world will be put all these toys!

When Box of Balloons first came to fruition, I was researching other non profits and came across Charity Water. Charity Water is on a huge mission to provide clean drinking water to all people on this earth. They raise money and have teams of people drilling wells and creating clean drinking water systems for people in developing countries. As I clicked around their website becoming more and more inspired on found “The Birthday Project” and instantly fell in love with it. Charity Water is encouraging people to share their celebration and donate money to be used for clean drinking water. This can be done instead of buying birthday gifts, in addition to birthday gifts or can take the place of a birthday party putting all the money towards clean water for people in need.

After reading all about this and watching some incredibly touching testimonies I knew Box of Balloons needed a similar project. That is when I started asking “what if” and the idea of Share your Celebration started. What if mommas shared their kiddos birthday celebrations encouraging guests to donate to Box of Balloons instead of filling their house with more and more toy? What if an adult shared their birthday celebration instead of spending money on drinks and fancy desserts? What if tweens did a “give back” birthday party theme and shared their celebration raising enough money to give birthday parties to multiple kids in need?

Over the course of a year these questions have turned to answers and many people have shared their celebration with Box of Balloons. We have been able to raise hundreds of dollars through this project and give many, many birthday celebrations to children in need. As a mom myself not only do I love the idea of giving back in honor of my child but I love having the opportunity to think of others instead of just themselves.