04/15/2021
Sanna Lavallee
PRE-ORDERS ARE OPEN
April is not only a month to celebrate family and new beginnings, it also represents organ and tissue donation throughout Ontario.
For this April I have created a fresh floral bouquet with a beautiful mixture of white and green flowers. Each bouquet is complimented with a golden butterfly to pay tribute to my childhood friend Kayla.
Bouquets will be available for sale from now (March 19th) to April 19th 2021. Each bouquet is hand tied with love for $40.00 with 50% of profits going to the Cambridge Memorial Hospital’s Diagnostic Services Caring Program, which helps improve the needs and care of recipients before and after transplant. Bouquets will be delivered contact free to homes within Cambridge, Kitchener/Waterloo, Guelph and Brantford, as well as the surrounding small towns at no additional cost on Sunday April 25th.
To place an order please contact me through email at [email protected] or through social media platforms (Facebook and Instagram) with the following required information.
Name:
Phone Number:
Is the bouquet for yourself or a gift for someone else?
If for yourself, The address for delivery:
A gift to someone, Recipient’s name:
Recipient’s phone number:
Recipient’s address:
Card message:
Payment is received through E-transfer.
Below is the inspiration behind the bouquet.
I have a strong connection to organ donation; I haven’t personally needed a transplant myself, but have been there when the people I loved dearly needed one.
Kayla Baker started a marathon while waiting for her double lung transplant and brought awareness to the City of Cambridge through her campaign of New Lungs for Kayla. She was my best friend and I miss her with every bit of my being. A few years ago, my grandfather received a kidney transplant that gave us the opportunity to create more family memories. Two years ago, my family grieved the loss of my baby cousin, for reasons unknown her liver began to fail, and she needed a transplant within hours of her arrival to Toronto Sick kids. Thankfully, my aunt who received a liver transplant, has recovered well and is staying safe during this time. These are the people and my reasons as to why I have created this bouquet.
It honours their stories and celebrates their lives lived. My hope is that I can spread awareness about organ donation to the people in my community. I want to bring love and hope to anyone who may need it. Organ and tissue donations are not often talked about or seen, but they are here in our community and more common than one thinks.
Currently in Ontario there is over 1,600 people waiting for an organ transplant. This is their only option of treatment and it’s said that every three days someone will pass from not getting the gift of life. 90% of Ontarians support organ donation but only 35% have registered. It takes only two minutes to register online and you can potentially save up to 8 lives after you pass (Beadonor.ca 2021). There is no limit or restriction for someone to become a donor; it is about being compatible and giving someone the chance they didn’t have before, to live a life filled with memories and moments that make one another smile.
I have chosen to help the Cambridge Memorial Hospital’s Diagnostic Services Caring Program as they are continuously purchasing and maintaining equipment that will help patients get answers to the symptoms they may be experiencing. For transplant surgeries there is only a small group of doctors in a few cities (London, Hamilton and Toronto), where these surgeries can take place. That being said, when recipients recover and are sent home, they still need to make frequent trips to consult with doctors and continue tests to ensure their body is recovering properly. For most, this means that they need to book time off work, plan for the expenses of the travel to and from these locations. This is not always an easy task for people and they often rely on others to help them get there. Cambridge Memorial Hospital has improved their program to help take care of patients before and after transplant. They will take care of them prior to their surgery to ensure they remain healthy and ready for operation. They have also brought in the proper equipment to be able to do the tests after transplant and pass along the results to the surgeons and doctors in their city of surgery.
I hope to bring some beauty to people this April by spreading love through flowers, hope through registration and help to Cambridge Memorial Hospital.
Please share this post with friends and family, let them know you love them and even though we cannot hold them tight right now, we can hold them in our hearts, through our words and actions.
Register to be a donor
https://www.ontario.ca/page/organ-and-tissue-donor-registration?utm_source=so&utm_medium=keyword&utm_campaign=original
Read more on the Diagnostic services caring program
https://cmhfoundation.ca/programs/
I fell in love with floristry while in high school and have been lucky enough to make a career of it!
