I was planning on posting my normal weekly update on James last night, but I decided to put it on hold for another week. There were a couple of really big things that happened over the last two days that I need to share. Stacy and I are completely blown away and speechless. James can’t speak, but I’m pretty sure if he could, he would be speechless, too.
Over the weekend we received not one, but two random acts of kindness. Actually, I think these acts go beyond kindness, so I am calling them random acts of awesomeness.
The first one came in the mail on Saturday. It was a very touching letter along with a check.
In case you have a hard time reading it, this is what the letter says:
Dear <redacted> Family,
We hope that you are having a great holiday season. My cousins and I talked to our kids about James, and told them that he might need our help. We know that equipment and medical bills for James could be a lot to handle. The <redacted>, <redacted>, and <redacted> kids, along with <redacted> all agree that James deserves to have an awesome Christmas. So my cousins and I decided that instead of buying gifts for each others’ kids that we would like the <redacted> Family to have the money. Please consider this a gift and use it for whatever you would like. If this means paying bills so Mom and Dan have some relief, buying presents, or using the money for vacation – it will make us happy. Know that we’re thinking about you and hope that this gift will help you out a little during the holiday season. We will continue to pray for James’ health and for only good things to come your way.
With Love,
<redacted> & <redacted>
The <redacted> Family
The <redacted> Family
The <redacted> Family
Can you believe that? Instead of buying gifts for the kids, they pooled the money together and sent it to us. It’s just unbelievable that they would do this for us. And we only know one of those families, so most of those people we have never met.
The second random act of awesomeness happened yesterday afternoon. There is a pizza place in town that we order from all the time. So much so that they’ve come to know us. They even follow James on Facebook. Yesterday they posted a picture on their Facebook page of a thank you card they received, along with the story behind the card, which I will copy and paste below.
Random Acts of Kindness at Frato’s Pizza. #PayItForward Please share this post so more people on Facebook can read it and join in.
A few months ago, a nice family parked in our “restaurant parking only” area and asked permission (since they were not dining with us) if they could park there while moving some furniture to their truck from the nearby Thrift Shop. That was very courteous of them and we went a step further and helped them move the furniture. We didn’t expect anything more than a Thank You, which we received. Very kind Family indeed.
Fast forward to today, we receive a nice Christmas Card (see picture) and money inside it for the kind deed of helping them move furniture. We can’t, in good conscience, accept this money. Instead of pocketing this money, we want to pay their kind deed forward TIMES 5. It was greatly appreciated and we hope to pass it along to someone else that can use it during the Holiday/Christmas Season. We would like you to help us PayItForward!
The money itself was paid to a very nice Family that could use it to help their son, James. Check out Fans of James
Now, we will also donate 4 x 18” 1-topping Pizza’s, one at a time.
To receive one of these Gourmet Pizza’s, we want you to join in the Holiday/Christmas Spirit. Tell us how you will use these Pizza’s to PayItForward and keep the trend moving. Hopefully this small gesture can grow into helping more and more.
Tell us in the comment section of this post how you will PayItForward with the FREE Pizza and Frato’s will donate to 4 of them.
If you want to see the Facebook post, along with any comments that may have been left on it, it can be found here:
https://www.facebook.com/FratosPizza/photos/a.191442554223003/691290697571517/
We really don’t know what to say about any of this. Like I said, we are all speechless. They say that it’s better to give than to receive, but I’ll be honest, receiving these gifts feels pretty damn good! We are extremely blessed!
Let’s see if it truly is better to give. How about if we continue to #PayItForward? All of us. It doesn’t have to be anything big. It can be just a small gesture. Something to put a smile on someone’s face. Let’s spread some holiday cheer. What do you say?
