A 30th Birthday to Benefit Sustainable Food Center

One month ago I made the decision to put together a benefit for Sustainable Food Center and I only gave myself three weeks to do it. While it was admittedly a stressful & challenging three weeks, I don't regret the decision for one minute. I had the help of some fantastic friends (Sara P., Andy, Melissa, Hollie, Sarah Cash - you are awesome). And I had the support of an entire community of people who are genuinely interested in our food future. I want to use this post to look back and appreciate all that came together in such a short time and provide some insight into some of the phenomenal things that came from it.

First of all, we raised $374 for Sustainable Food Center - a fantastic little chunk of change for a non-profit! Susan Leibrock, Community Relations Director from SFC, shared with me that just 5% of SFC's annual budget comes from private donations. Events like this soiree are critical to helping SFC generate funds through private donations.

The second amazing and unexpected thing I experienced while organizing this event was the involvement of people & the community. I have never seen such a tremendous outpouring of support - it was downright overwhelming. I sent cold-call emails to folks I'd never met before and they were happy, if not eager to support the cause. Paula from Paula's Texas Spirits was the perfect example. I emailed her to see if they would be willing to donate a small item to give away as a raffle prize. Paula responded with this:

How do you respond to that? Words could not express my delight over receiving this email. Of COURSE I wanted Paula to come mix some drinks! And that's exactly what she did - showed up on Sunday with a cooler in hand & mixes of some of the best cocktails our guests had ever tasted.

Through similar cold-call emails I received gift certifcates from Greenling.com, Wheatsville Co-op, Farmhouse Delivery, Boggy Creek Farm & Waterstone Aesthetics. Tito's vodka & Paula's Texas Spirits chipped in gift baskets to raffle off. Trey from U-Clique Studio agreed to come out and set up his hilariously fun photo-booth for the day (and was kind enough to put the "NSFW" photos in a secret, seperate account for us) and Jeff from Break it Down Austin brought out a compost bin. Throughout the day we loaded it up with corn-starch plates, compostable tableware & kitchen scraps. Amy from Independence Brewery chipped in a keg of delicious Austin Amber, and even Miscellaneous Rentals got in the action by giving us a sweet discount on rental tables & chairs for the day. One of the crowd favorites was by Diana of The Cake Lab, who brought by her famous carrot cake cupcakes that gave us visions of sweets all through the next week.

That all of these folks contributed at all was such a gift - but that they agreed to contribute on such short notice was a blessing. And then, of course, there were my friends & co-workers who came out to show their support. Whether you were there to party, to support SFC, or just to say happy birthday & support my cause: thank you for coming out and contributing to this event with your time, $ and cooking skills. This event could not and would not have happened without you - I am so grateful!

For more pictures from the event, check out Melissa Robledo's photographs: http://www.flickr.com/photos/cooperella/sets/72157622437122066/

And our photobooth pictures: http://ucliquestudio.blogspot.com/2009/09/mindys-birthday-bash-and-benefit-mixer.html