3 FUNDRAISERS AND A FUNERAL

Charity is my drug of choice. Wine is a close second. So I guess it’s not a coincidence that Mending Kids decided to honor me at a winery.

It was the 3rd fund-raiser in 3 weeks. You could go broke fund-raising. My husband says my volunteering costs him money. True. But I do believe in saving the world. Even if it’s only one glass of wine at a time.

The first fund-raiser was honoring Sydney McDonald. She’s been a host Mom for Mending Kids 13 times! Good grief. I did it twice with Sandra and you never heard the end of it. Sidney’s a Saint. Some High School kids pulled together the most fun fund-raiser. They had a band and announced that Michael McDonald was joining them. We were all pretty excited to see the Doobie Brother…only it turned out to be Sydney’s husband Michael McDonald. Not as good…but good.

The big celeb in the room was Larry David. We had to tell all the guys (including my husband who couldn’t pick Lindsay Lohan out of a line up) to curb their enthusiasm. For some reason the guys were more excited to see Larry than any Victoria Secret model.

Bobby Kennedy Jr spoke at the event. Spoke about the life and death of his Dad. Spoke about the long train ride to bring his father’s body home. The train went from from NY to DC, so that he could be buried with his brother JFK. The trip should have taken 2 hours. It took 7. They stopped for the hundreds of thousands of people who lined the tracks to wave good-bye to Bobby.

The next week was the Malibu Flip Flop Ball. It benefits Special Education. We all wore flip-flops (OK sadly I didn’t and I was sorry when my feet hurt). We danced for hours to Boogie Knights. My girlfriend was bidding on tickets to the Teen Choice Awards. Little did she know her husband was across the crowded room bidding against her. But they raised a lot of money for the kids.

In the mist of all this fun… David and I went to a memorial. A Celebration of Life for a wonderful man and photographer named Andy Weintraub. Andy worked at KCAL and CBS. He was deeply loved. It was lovely to see his friends gather to tell the legendary Andy stories.

Saturday was the Mending Kids fund-raiser honoring me. I was honored, humbled and a bit awkward. When I had to speak I (almost) didn’t have the words. I thanked my Mom for always dragging me to volunteer as a child. I talked about Sandra and cried. Talked about how she got car sick everywhere. She threw up on Rodeo Drive, once at CNN. She threw up in all the best places. I laughed. Then cried.

I spoke about my trips to Africa (and cried.) Talked about all the kids that might have died without our medical teams. And about the baby in the orphanage who grabbed my hair with her one arm. She only had one arm. But she has been adopted by a Doctor who plans to give her a prothetic arm so she can grab her new Mommy’s hair with both arms.

After my weepy speech there was a fashion show by Beryll. Some of the models were kids we have gone on mission with. They carried pictures of children Mending Kids has saved.

More tears.

And after all that I finally got a glass of wine (you don’t want to drink before you speak). The winery is right by the Bachelor house in Malibu. It’s called Triunfo Creek Vineyard and it is one of the loveliest places to spend a day.

See there are perks to saving the world…one glasss of wine at a time.

My family was there and so many friends. As much as I do enjoy the whole TV thing…I can’t imagine anything more lovely than being honored for helping children.

Especially at a winery…