I won’t utilize this space too often for personal things, but this is one I am passionate about and it gives our readers a chance to win some pretty cool things.

Let me give a bit of a back story, however.

On August 17, 2007, my father lost his battle with lung cancer. It was a painful time in my life and for those of you who have lost loved ones, I’m sure you can relate. Not a day goes by where I don’t miss him or think about him. It was the second time he battled cancer and he just didn’t have it in him to beat it a second time.

Since then, I’ve been highly involved in our local Relay for Life.

Each year we have a small team (usually fewer than 10 people) who do our best to raise money for the cause. We usually manage to have upward of $2,000 raised for our team, which is solid for a small group. Some bigger teams don’t get to that level.

I’d like to keep up that trend.

Besides hoping the disc golf community may be interested in helping, I also want to make sure I maximize the people having the chance to win these items. I’ve even thrown in a bit more — just for the Rattling Chains readers.

Basically, the two things already up for raffle are a hand-quilted throw and a pillow, with the top quilted. Both are done by my mother, who is an amazing quilter. Believe me when I say this — if you win either of these, they are of high quality and truly beautiful pieces.

The top prize — the lap quilt — is really striking. It will be quite warm, too. It measures 61 inches by 46 inches, so basically five feet by four feet, give or take an inch or two. It might not cover a bed, but it’s worth having on the couch!

The pillow is a lap pillow of sorts. It’s not huge, but it’s really nice and comfy.

But this is a disc golf site, right?

So of course there will be some discs involved here. And these are only going to be available to those who donate from this site (I’ll explain how I can decipher that below). The discs are a Relay for Life fundraiser disc (we did these a few years ago). It’s a glow Aviar. The second is a DGA Breaker, one that was given away at the March O’ St. Pat’s Madness in New Brunswick, N.J., on March 17. That’s the first tournament Rattling Chains was involved in, so our logo is one of the ones on the disc.

It’ll work like this — if someone who donates from Rattling Chains wins one of the other prizes, he or she will also get their choice of the discs. Same goes with second place. If nobody from Rattling Chains wins the top two prizes, I will hold separate drawings for only the people who donated from this site for the discs. Please note that people can’t win more than one prize.

How it works

I will use Random.org and the generator on there to pick a winner. There will likely be a lot of entries as a couple of members are in on this as well. That way, we draw as many as possible as the goal, obviously, is to raise as much money as possible.

For those in the United States, for every $5 you donate, you get an entry. For those in Canada, you get an entry for every $5, but we require a minimum donation of $20 because we’ll have to put more out of pocket to ship the item. For those not in the U.S. or Canada, you can still win. However, we’ll require the minimum $20 donation (which is four entries) and you’ll also be required to pay for the shipping (which can be sent directly to me via PayPal or regular mail).

(Side note for international donors through Rattling Chains — if you win only a disc, I will handle the shipping). 

So doing the math, it’s simple. Donate $5, get an entry. Donate $100, get 20 entries. You get it, right?

Our local relay this year runs from 6 p.m. April 26 to 9 a.m. April 27. I’ll let the contest run through noon (EST) April 28.

Don’t wait until the last second, though! If that happens, I’ve found people forget. And with this, every dollar counts when fundraising!

Any Donations

The way you donate to me doesn’t matter.

You can just donate to me, or you can purchase luminaries in honor or in memory of somebody. If you do this, please let me know and who the person is and I will attempt to get a photo of the lit luminary for you. I can’t make promises because of how many there will be, but I usually do several laps looking at every single one and I will try and track each one down.

I thank you in advance for helping with this fundraiser.

You can donate by going to my personal Relay for Life page.

When you donate, put RC at the end of your name. That will allow me to decipher the difference between you and others donating. This will also put you in the drawing for the RC-only prizes.

Fine print

Not that there really is any, but a couple of things.

Anybody can win, outside of those ON the team. Family members, friends, non-friends, aliens — whatever. I can’t discriminate when it comes to this as many people donate to the cause, usually. But this will be a completely random draw.

Donate and have a chance. But members of the team can’t win.

Somebody can’t win both (quilt and pillow) prizes. I will draw for the quilt first. Whoever wins that is not eligible for the pillow. Fair is fair. Those entering via Rattling Chains can win one of the main prizes AND a disc as detailed above. However, they wouldn’t be eligible to win a second disc.

I think that’s it.

Now go donate and have a chance to win!

P.J. Harmer is the founder and executive editor for Rattling Chains. E-mail him at: pj@rattlingchains.com.

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