Adventures in Paradise: More progress ...

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From Shanti's Mom:

Wow! What do I say? The response for hand knit hats has been amazing ... even got a few crocheted hats as well. I can't tell you how beautiful all of these amazing hats are. So here's a picture ... this is what 523 hats look like all in one place.

And my knitting studio looks like this: then there's my office (that's River checking out all the goodies) ... And that doesn't count the load of stuff I am going to pick up tomorrow from friends in Santa Cruz. One more trip to Costco for the non-perishable foodstuffs and we will be ready for the packing frenzy on Wednesday afternoon. Some of the local knitters are coming over to help with that, along with neighbors and some kids from the local middle school who are getting community service hours for their time.

We almost have enough hats to outfit two entire destroyers ... and that is wonderful. Thirteen more came in today. Thirty two more and we can do it, and I know more are coming. If not, there will be more than enough for a smaller ship ... like maybe a cruiser. How cool is that?

Last night I went through over 300 letters from kids in OH, NJ and CA who wrote wonderful letters to the sailors, some kids drew the most imaginitive pictures and all wanted to know what it's like to be on a ship. It warmed my heart. I hope some of the sailors will respond to these letters.

I found out yesterday that DHL, who sponsored one of my ex-husband's race cars, is going to be picking up all the boxes at my house on Friday and will deliver them to NJ at not cost ... so all the $$ I have will go to goodies and not postage. From there Shanti's dad will have them flown into Bahrain. It's all coming together. The generosity of everyone has been overwhelming.

I can't thank y'all enough for your love and generosity. Along with the hats came mountains of other goodies and I quickly learned to check the bags and boxes because there was a little cash floating around in some of them. All told, there was almost $1500 in cash donations ... WOW!

Thank you, thank you, thank you!