A Very GiGi's Weekend!

We just had a great weekend of events planned for GiGi's Playhouse! GiGi's Playhouse founder (and GiGi's mom), Nancy Gianni, had planned to come to town so she could attend all of our events and have brunch with the board on Saturday. Unfortunately, she was unable to attend. A Gigi's Playhouse family in Chicago suffered a great loss when their sweet little Eli caught a virus that he just could not fight. Nancy stayed behind to attend his services.

Nancy did, however, host a conference call with the board members on Saturday morning. We SO needed this! She did a great job of getting us really fired up! Trying to fundraise for an organization that is not yet established in your area can be overwhelming and honestly, we were starting to lose a little steam. But Nancy got us all amped up again and REALLY set the tone for our weekend!

Saturday night, we had an event at Sips n Strokes in Nashville. Sips n Strokes is an art studio where local artists guide you through each step of re-creating a painting. 

 They provide all the painting supplies, you provide your favorite beverage. Thankfully, you don't need any painting skills or experience!

Sips n Strokes gave GiGi's Playhouse a portion of the proceeds from that night. The studio holds 60 people and we were told that we sold out the studio and then some! There were 65 painters that night! About one third of the group was there because of GiGi's Playhouse and the rest were just there for a fun girls night out. It was a great way to have fun and spread the word about GiGi's Playhouse.

We really had a GREAT time! A big thank you to Sips n Strokes for hosting this event for us!

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On Sunday evening Ginger Jones from Jones Speech and Language Pathology hosted a fundraising event for GiGi's at Monkey Joes in Cool Springs/Brentwood. Monkey Joes is an indoor inflatable play center. Jones SLP rented out two party rooms and we collected admission for each child over the age of two. We had pizza and cookies for the families, and a silent auction table set up.

This was a great chance to meet other families who have children with Down syndrome and to spread the word about GiGi's Playhouse!

Everyone had a great time and the event was a huge success! A special THANK YOU to Ginger Jones and Jones Speech and Language Pathology for sponsoring this event!