My Raffle To Raise Funds for Chinese Child Adoption

by Lisa Evans
(Bloomington, IN, USA)

Back in August of 2004 my husband and I made the decision to adopt a Chinese girl. We are unable to have children of our own due to infertility problems so our only option was to adopt. Since female babies are treated so terribly in China we decided to adopt one from that country.

The only problem was that we were low on funds. In order to adopt the baby we had planned we needed more money than what we had. It then came to our attention that we could do some sort of fundraiser to raise the money.

It took many hours of research and thinking in order to find the right means. It was decided that we would hold a raffle in order to obtain the money to adopt our precious baby girl.

We decided that we would raffle off a very expensive home entertainment center. The estimated value of the center was about $5000. We were hoping that we would come out profitable so that we could raise the money we needed.

Our friends and family helped get the word out about the raffle. They helped us pass out flyers and put posters around town. They did this for weeks in order to insure we would be successful in what we were attempting. One small business owner even offered to cover the cost of the home entertainment system! It was a very generous thing for him to do and we were very thankful to this man.

Several weeks after our initial plan to hold a raffle it was finally time to do it. We held the raffle at the local park. We waited several minutes and became utterly shocked over how many people were beginning to show up. I kid you not, there were thousands of people at the park that day and they all bought a tickets which were priced at $10!!! I was so happy that I was crying. I could see people smiling.

After the end of the day one lucky lady won the entertainment system and one lucky couple obtained the chance they needed in order to achieve their dream. We earned over $15,000 that day and had no expenses due to that kind business owner.

Today, we have the little girl we so longed to adopt. She just started school and is as cute as can be. I feel very lucky to have had the opportunity that I had! Every day I remember the generosity that was put in front of me.