The Little Buddha Arts Story

Over the summer, I received a promotional card from Google Adwords for $100.  I allowed it to expire and kicked myself for wasting it.  Then at the end of August, I lucked out and received another $100 promo that would expire at the end of September 2011.  Google was basically challenging me to find a way to use $100 of advertising dollars to make something happen.  I decided to accept the challenge.

One morning about a week after I received the $100, my son Jackson and I were working on an art project.  “Too bad we can’t sell our artwork,” I thought.  But what if we could?  What if there was another way to give value to our art?  Maybe if we sold our paintings to raise money for a purpose, people would be excited to own a piece of the story.

The best part would be that I would be teaching my son a wonderful lesson.  We could do something that we love together, and raise money to help other kids.  I spoke to some friends, artists, special needs therapists, teachers, and others who I thought would be interested, and the response was overwhelming.  Kevin J. Kelly of Get Broken Record (www.getbrokenrecord.com) immediately jumped on board along with Daytime Moon Creations (www.daytimemooncreations.org), The Peoples Improv Theater (www.ThePIT-NYC.com) and other artists, volunteers and sponsors.  The Little Buddha Arts Project had the support of accomplished artists as well as lots of kids who love to create and give.  This further defined the project and we knew our mission:

To promote the artwork of children and accomplished artists in a gallery that donates 50% of all proceeds to art, music, and theater programs for children with special needs.  

We accomplish our mission through the support of sponsors, volunteers and art donations.  We also host Art Days where children come together to create artwork from donated materials.

Please help us create something beautiful from our “Google Adwords $100 Challenge” and join us for our first Art Day at The Peoples Improv Theater (123 East 24^th Street, NYC) on October 2^nd from 10am-noon.  The following link takes you to our registration page: http://littlebuddha.eventbrite.com/

The proceeds of our kick-off Art Day will be used to assist the Daytime Moon Creations Fall program, which can be found at the following link: http://www.daytimemooncreations.org/current-programs

Please consider supporting The Little Buddha Arts Project by sending a donation or by sharing our story with others.

My Little Buddha

A Great Day!

Every night, I tuck my son into bed. We review the events of the day, and discuss what's on the calendar for tomorrow. Tonight, after talking about our activities, he looks at me with the most sincere little face, and says "It was a great day!"

Snoring

I snore. Over the past few years, my attempts to combat this flaw included quitting smoking, quitting drinking, and losing 40 pounds. OK, so I didn’t do these things specifically to stop snoring, but I figure they should help. I feel for the many spouses, partners and sleeping buddies out there who must deal with this affliction on a nightly basis.

My wife has her own bedtime issues that annoy me to pieces. Specifically, she likes to fall asleep with the television on, and I am a silence person. In an effort for peace, I wear a night eye mask and earplugs, which usually does the trick. The earplugs hurt my ears after a while, and my son usually comes into my room in the morning and puts them in my water glass, but it is a compromise.

I am out of the house three to four nights a week, so I get to bed around 3am. On the other nights, I do my best to get to bed early to catch up on sleep. Two nights ago was one of these nights. I went to bed at 10pm. For some reason, I couldn’t sleep well. Every time I drifted off just a little bit, I was startled awake. I couldn’t figure out for the life of me what was going on. I was exhausted, but without fail, I nodded off, and then popped back awake time and again.

I ripped off my eye mask and pulled out my earplugs. The clock read “Midnight.”

Tommy: “Can we please turn the TV off?!?”

Nicole: “No”

Tommy: “But I can’t sleep and it’s Midnight!”

Nicole: “I can’t sleep either”

Tommy: “Maybe it’s because the TV is on”

Nicole: “No, it is because you are snoring, and I have to kick you every ten minutes to shut you up”

This is the exact moment that Nicole almost got thrown out the window for the first time in her life.

Since I wake up with the baby 95% of the mornings, regardless of the day of the week, or work schedule, we have agreed that on nights when I snore, Nicole will wake me up only once, and I will sleep in the living room until Nicole falls asleep, and then I will return to bed. This way, I get to sleep a full night at least 3 nights a week, and Nicole never has to experience crashing through a glass window.