How I learned... to put the FUN in Fundraising.... and channel my inner hillbilly

Sweet Potatoe Sal here... befor I git kot jackin Sally's blog, I wunna tel ya'all bout my Hillbilly Olimpiks yesturdai, wher we razed $600 fer the Salvation Army and C.A.R.E.

See, Sal's ofiss has razed $200K fer char-ty, haff a which kame from soshul partees they throwd. Peeple bot thair tikets last November at a Chili Feed at Lyon Real Estate in Fair Oaks, then she got me, Sweet Potatoe Sal, ta kum up with some gamin and food fer the partee. It wuz at Ancil Hoffman Park in Carmichael - peeple hed ta ware thair Sunday best, as yul see in this muvin pitchur below.

thar seems ta be some problem with this new fangeled movee stuff. Sumtimes it's thare, sometimes not.... jest like my sens a humor with teknacul difikultys. I'm workin on it... be patent, and ya'll kum bek, y'hear?

Awr gamin wuz fun... PBR beer kan relay, toelit trottin, 3 leggit hippity hop, and cherree pit spittin. Downhome Dennis roold on the pit spittin. A Washurs turnamit wuz the hi-lite. Clayster roold thet won. Thay wuz all bedder at pitchin them washurs after drinkin Junebug Julie's Pond Scum Punch, ah'l tell yu.

OK... Sally here. I sent Sweet Potatoe Sal packing. She hi-jacks my blog WAY too often. She's back in the spud patch now.

Here's how we raise so much money for our charities. We've held our lunchtime Chili Feed and Auction in our Lyon office parking lot for over 10 years. All the agents bring chili, salads, desserts and such. We charge $5 to get in, and usually have 250 - 300 people come. Do the math on that. Total, we'll raise $20,000 - $33,000 in that 3 hour period. To date we've raised around $200K!

Our big bucks come from our auction, but half of that comes from our social events. Different agents will volunteer to host an event. We've had poker parties, video scavenger hunts, talent shows, Irish parties, gourmet dinners, pirate parties, and even a Cinco De Silk Road party on May 5th. Everyone came dressed as a gypsy/goat herder/sheik/sultan/belly dancer etc. It was wild. My party this year was my Hillbilly Olympics.

The way it works.... The donor pre-selects the theme, date, time, location and # of attendees. We make a sign up sheet. At the auction, the last table to close is the social event table. You sign up for a ticket to the party (usually $15 - $45 apiece). That way the guest list will be a self-selected group who wants to come to your party. If more people want to come than there are spots for, the price goes up.

We usually make $9,000 - $12,000 on the parties alone. (My pirate party had 40 people pay $45 apiece. That's $1800 on one party alone. Course, then I had to pay to put it on!)

The best part is that our family of agents has a rocking social life throught the upcoming year. Our event is always in November, then the parties start in January usually, contiinuing right up til the following October. Next week I'm attending a Martini party. The Oktoberfest is still a ways off. A day on a houseboat is planned for this summer... with jet skiis and all. Two weeks ago was the Irish Fest.

Whew... how do we have time to sell homes with all that socializing????

How I Learned to...Channel my Inner Hillbilly

There is a contest in a networking group I'm in to celebrate spring... "Write your best stuff using "Spring Fresh" in the title". Hmmm... flowers, butterflies, baby bunnies.... didn't float my boat. So here's my submission......

SPRING FRESH, by Sweet Potata Sal.....

It was a foggy nite in Frog Bottom Holler. I was cleaning my nails by the fire with my buck nife, (makin my toes mitely cold), griping about mama's mouseleg pie.... "Mawmaw, ya'll didn't make enuf agin."

"Sweet Potata Sal" said Mawmaw.... "Get the stink out of yer britches, an git a move on honey chile.. go mekk yerself useful." (I felt the ghost of Jed Clampet in the room... but I digress...)

So I grabbed up my huntin gun, Miss Rowdybuck, woke up 'ol Geezergirl (who wuz lickin her... well never you mind), and headed off into the nite, looking fer sompun fer dinner.

We got two miles from home, when ‘ol Geezergirl spotted a ‘coon. "OOOWWWLLLLLLL...." And she wuz off on the chase. Over hill, under dale, thru the crik, down the gulley, past old lady Washman's londry hangin on the line..... (I only grabbed one pair of unnerware... I was due fer a change... it HAD been a year)

"I'm comin, Geezergirl.....folla that ‘coon.

Geezy's howlin seemed to stay put fur a minute. Had she treed the coon? As I got near, I could see it... little ringtailed stripes hiding on a limb... eyes as big as a harvest moon. Shakin jest a tad.... OK a lot.

As I stood there ponderin how to get that raccoon out of the tree, Geezy spun around in her eggsitmunt, and knocked me flat on the ground... well not ON the ground, cuz ther was a spring coming out of the ground - rite there... and I was IN it. "Geez, now what do I do?".. (as if Geezy could talk... sometimes I'm dummer then a fence post!)

I must uh broke my head or sumptin... cause I was seeing two coons up in that tree, cept when I closed 1 eye. I think I wuz up the crik without a paddel, if ya know what I mean!

"Geezy...ya gotta go git help, girl." If that didn't work, I didn't know what to do, cause I was broke-headed in the spring, fresh outta idears.....

"Run, Geezy, Run"


Flickr fotos by Velo Steve, and Molagen... must be coon hunters!

Hell Yeah!... Sally's Foreclosure Song... YEOWWW!

Times are tough... people are losing their jobs, their credit scores and their homes to foreclosure. But this guy gets even. (This is not a typical Wednesday office meeting for Lyon Real Estate, Fair Oaks office, but we do have fun! YEOWWWWWWW!!!!) (And thanks Montgomery Gentry, for not suing me for butchering the great tune of your song, with my cheap rendition!)

So seriously... this was for a talent show, which was a fundraiser for the Salvation Army. Lyon Fair Oaks has been the top money contributer to the Sacramento Association of Realtor (SAR) CanTree, raising over $160K for the needy at Christmas time. This talent show, hosted by the Hostess Honeys (Marg Graf, Patti Nelson, Lyn Gras, Kathy Chigbrow and Mary London, all of Lyon Real Estate), raised over $2,000 in one night of fun, frolick.... and embarassment for some.

This is the song I wrote fpr the talent show, but this version turned out a little better than my live version... so here you have it. File this under: Work Hard, Play Hard.... or Life is Either a Daring Adventure or it's Nothing.... Hell Yeah!

Walk Through Wackiness...A Hershey Hotstreak

"If the chocolate sauce won't squirt, try this..", said Ryan (FNTPTS - fake name to protect the stupid). With that, he held the bottle and spun his arm like a propeller, in giant circles... the pressure of the chocolate sauce building.

It worked the last time he tried it with ketsup. It squeezed right up to the neck of the bottle, and BINGO.. his hot dog was adorned. No muss, no fuss. Easy peazy....

...but not this time. It was the night before my buyer's final walk-through. The new carpet was spotless, and the stiple texture of the acoustic ceiling was pristine.

The black goo had settled into the bottle for way too long. With a few more rotations, it was sure to break free. Then SPLOOOOOOOSH! The chocolate stream gave way in an impressive explosion. A solid brown stripe was implanted in an orbital pattern from ceiling - to wall- to floor - to ceiling again. A Hershey Hotstreak. And the buyers were coming tomorrow. So much for the pristine acoustic ceiling.

The sellers frantically went into action ... detailing the ceiling, shampooing the carpet, and sweeping out the doghouse where Ryan would spend the next few nights! Miraculously by walk-through time the next day you couldn't tell. You honestly couldn't! We closed escrow a few days later. No worse for wear and tear, to quote Mick and the boys.

Funny thing, however. Just a few months ago the buyers called me to help them buy a rental. I couldn't help but ask, "Ruby.... Have you ever had any problems in your family room with spots or anything?" Then I told her the story. "Ah... that does explain the single drop of brown "paint" we found on the ceiling one time - but couldn't figure out where it came from.... Figured it must have been a heck of a party once."