Do Good Day was an event sponsored by 77 Kids/American Eagle and TheMotherhood.com that we were privileged to participate in on July 14th, 2010.

Sorry for the delay in getting our update for Do Good Day posted. The last couple of days have been crazy to say the least.

On Wednesday, July 14th, we headed out of our driveway at about 8:40am to head to the city of Chicago to one of the four Ronald McDonald Houses (RMH) located in the city. I thought I was giving myself enough time to account for traffic and construction, which is happening everywhere it seems. However, I actually did not enter the RMH until 11:00am – a half hour after the scheduled time. It took me a half hour to find parking! Thankfully, a delivery truck freed up a parking spot a couple house down from the RMH. I also took the wrong way in so I had to call my GPS husband to get me to where I needed to be from Lakeshore Dr. The children oohhed and ahhhed over the sailboats and Lake Michigan – Note to self: It’s been a long time since we took the children into the city! We need to visit more often! Thankfully, my detour wasn’t what made me late because I arrived at the house at 10:25am. It was the parking. I didn’t allow extra time for parking! Note to self: If I ever drive in the city again, allow time for parking!

At the RMH, we baked thimble cookies and a cake for the families staying at the house. The children had fun baking, playing in the playroom, looking at books, as well as putting together about ten goodie bags for the families we met in the RMH. We couldn’t disturb the families in their rooms, but those we saw wandering in the halls we could give them the treat bags. We also wrote up encouraging notes to leave around the house, but guess what? We forgot to leave them!

After we clean up from our baking fun, RMH staff member, Abena, shared with us a bit of the history and purpose of the RMH and then she took us on a tour of the house. It was very interesting and our children enjoyed it.

Upon leaving the RMH shortly after 1:00pm, Abena took a photo of three of the five mom bloggers and their families in front of the RMH. Then we all headed our separate ways. We arrived back in our hometown to pass out our $77 at our local grocery store at about 2:30pm.

You wouldn’t believe how hard it is to give away a dollar but it was! We spent about an hour at the grocery store before giving up and heading elsewhere. By the end of that hour, my husband was with us to relieve me of being on my feet. Since people were not being very receptive of receiving a dollar my husband suggested going to Walgreens, which only has one door so the innocent folks of our town had no chance of avoiding us with nine people surrounding the doorway!;-) They were much less skeptical as the children shared about their trip to the Ronald McDonald House and more willing to take the money when they found out that it wasn’t the children’s money we were giving away.

In spite of the rejections, once the children gave away the dollars in their hands they came back for more. It was a very good experience for all of us. After all the good they did for Do Good Day and being real troopers in the heat (90 degrees!) we treated the children and ourselves to a frosty from Wendy’s!

Thank you 77 Kids and TheMotherhood.com for the opportunity to partner with you for Do Good Day!