Super Susie’s Special Birthday!
I’m delighted to introduce you to our good and kind friend Susannah Goddard, and to Tom’s loyal group of canoe-club friends from his University days.
On July 27th, approximately 20 adults and countless kids descended on a very big white house in the UK Lake District to celebrate Susie’s BIG 40th Birthday. It had taken weeks of careful planning on Susie’s part, but it was something of a tradition for her to plan a big get-together for her special birthdays, and one that everyone looked forward to enormously. Our family had travelled from Switzerland for the event, and we were excited to see our friends again, most of whom we hadn’t seen since before COVID shut down international travel. Since our last meeting, most of us had new children to introduce to one another, and everyone was looking forward to a great weekend of fun with family and friends.
In the few days leading up to our departure for the trip, Susie surprised us by contacting the group chat she’d been using to organise the event to say that she didn’t expect any gifts, but if anyone was willing she would be honoured to accept gift donations for the EI Cure Project instead. We were completely humbled by this kind offer, and even more so to be suddenly inundated with donation after donation from a group of people who had already donated at least once to our cause.
The whole weekend was incredibly special. The house that Susie had rented for the occasion was in such an idyllic location, with only a short walk through a field to get to Lake Coniston. Being a group of friends that originally connected through the Leeds University Canoe Club, it was entirely expected that everyone would end up in the lake, or at the very least in a canoe on the lake, at some point during the weekend.
After a day of doing local hikes and playing in the rather chilly lake, it was time to get on with the big party! Susie had arranged for a local caterer to make a feast for everyone, so we divided the kids and the adults and set to work on the very important business of eating until we only had enough space left for some cake!
We all had a wonderful weekend, and it was such a delight to get all our children together and watch them enjoy each others company without too many squabbles. When everyone was packed and ready to go, we all reflected on the fact that the next big birthdays for our group will be when we all start turning 50, and all our children will be in a completely different phase of life. We reassured each other that waiting until then to get together again would be foolish, and that really we should simply book the big white house in the lakes to do the very same thing again next year!
As we all went on our separate ways, the donations from the group continued to come in, and in total the group generously donated a super £920. We are so incredibly grateful to everyone for their kind donations, and to Susie for coming up with the idea, and for encouraging everyone to get involved in the EI Cure Project. Not only do we have more donations, but Susie’s generosity led to the EI Cure Project increasing our network of people willing to help. In writing this story, I hope to honour Susie and our friends for their kindness, but I also hope to inspire others in the EI community to encourage birthday gift donations for themselves as well. It’s such a simple idea, and means so much to us all to see those donations rolling in.
Thank you so much Susie, you truly are a super star xxx