Benefit Gala

by Karla
(Tampa, Florida, USA)

On our quest to adopt a baby girl from China, we needed more than $10,000. Since I only had $6,000, my goal for the fundraising was the remaining balance of $4,000. The only community I had was the Lutheran community. They were generous enough to host a fundraising banquet for my endeavor.

The fundraiser was basically handled by the church. They had an active mission there in Vietnam anyway, so were eager to make it a dual event: for my family's adoption of Xiang as well as for the youth education programs that were already in place.

There was a family atmosphere at the banquet. Seniors and children were admitted for $10 while adults were $50. Every penny went to these two causes, which made everyone feel far more secure about the donation process. We met and exceeded our goal of $4,000, but we donated the extra $1,100 to the mission trip that shared the overall funds from the charity event.

If my family could change anything about the fundraising efforts, we would branch out from one church to many churches. We should have also researched more about grants for individuals and Vietnamese cultural expectations concerning payment in goods as well as cash.