mia, 3.5 months old

If you keep up with us here then you know that our sweet little girl, Mia, had a rough start to her young life. Being born 16 weeks early (at 24 weeks gestation) and weighing a little over 1 pound, her chances of survival were less than slim. She was so critical that her only hope was to be transferred to a hospital 40 miles away. She fought for 132 days in the NICU at the Children’s Hospital at Scott & White Hospital in Temple, Texas before she came home. Shortly after we had her home, she returned to Scott and White PICU for another 2 weeks.

We owe everything to all of the staff at Scott & White for putting their hearts and souls into saving our daughter. If they where not there Mia would have never made it to the Children’s Hospital in Dallas over 100 miles away. Not only did they save her but they became apart of our family and helped Tim and I through every step of a very difficult journey. Two years have past and Mia is a healthy, happy and rambunctious little girl! Now Scott & White is beginning their own journey to provide a brand new state of the art and the only free standing Children’s Hospital in the central Texas area and they need our help.

From now until January 31st, the Pepsi Refresh Project is giving away millions to great ideas that will better the world and you guessed it, Scott & White’s strive to build a “World Class Children’s Hospital to Save Lives” is on their list. All we have to do is get enough people to  vote for this and Pepsi will give the new Children’s Hospital at Scott & White $250,000 to build state of the art operating rooms and purchase surgical equipment! Please remember this hospital is being built mostly by the kind donations from the community and generous donors. So, whatever you may be doing today, please don’t forget about the thousands of Central Texas children and families who will be afflicted this year by illness and injury and need the expert care of this amazing hospital!

You can VOTE THREE WAYS every day until JANUARY 31,2010:

1. Cast your online votes at: http://www.refresheverything.com/childrenshospital – for “A world-class Children’s Hospital that will save lives.”

2. DOUBLE YOUR VOTES by voting again via Facebook:  http://vote.refr.es/scottwhite.fb

3. TRIPLE YOUR VOTES by texting 104716 to Pepsi (73774)

4. And those of you with an iphone can actually quadruple your votes by downloading the free iphone app from the link above.

FROM ONE FAMILY WHO KNOWS THE IMPORTANCE OF A GREAT CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL, THANK YOU!

For more information about the new Children’s Hospital at Scott & White, please visit: http://www.sw.org
And for more information about voting for this great idea, please visit: http://pepsi.sw.org