TOPIC: Fred's Mary's Hands Auction Oct 21st - Nov 1st

11/5 update
We're up to $5,288 in bids!

Mike - thank you for info on what the binders have sold for recently. It looks like one went for $80 including some wooden tokens (but not the bag of holding). Best guess for value is around $100?

I'll do spotlights tomorrow. Keep bidding!

Fred

A quick Mary's Hands update...
In prior years, we're finished growing in early to mid September. This year we've extended the season well into November through row covers, etc... Because of the hard frost last week the last of the tomatoes and cucumbers are done and we are down to Shard, Kale, Spinach, Lettuce, and we hope the Brassicas (broccoli, cabbage, and Brussel sprouts) survive long enough to be harvested at the end of the month. It feels good to still be helping but we've gone from 200-300 pounds of produce per week down to about 30-50 pounds.

Meanwhile, in the first week of SNAP cuts, these communities are getting crushed by losing SNAP and simultaneously seeing food costs continue to increase. For the first time, we are stepping outside of our primary mission of providing high quality organic produce into just helping to provide whatever we can for these communities. Starting on Nov 6th, we are working with the 4 communities we serve (then to as many others as we can add) to purchase and distribute basic staples in addition to our normal crops. It doesn't sound like much but losing $200-$400/month per family in food assistance isn't something low income communities can absorb.

We'll use the first $4,500 raised in this auction to pay for seeds, amendments, and everything needed for adding new crops (mainly berries but we're looking to plant more fruit trees as well.) Originally, we planned to use any proceeds beyond the $4,500 to improve systems to allow us to extend the "edge seasons" in the early spring and early winter to include more crops that normally wouldn't survive then. We still plan to do that but will look for fundraising on that separately early next year.

Everything past the first $4,500 from this auction we are planning to put towards helping these communities in emergency food assistance for November. Isabelle and I are starting with a $2,500 spend (not from the auction) on basic staples tonight. We'll prioritize the communities we normally work with but go beyond that to help as much of the low income neighborhoods that we can.

We don't intend to change the mission of Mary's Hands but felt it was necessary to react while we could. Hopefully, that funding will get fully restored soon and we'll go back to just farming. In the meantime, it means a few very tough weeks for those families where we can make a difference.

I just wanted to make bidders aware that we're shifting where any monies raised will go beyond the first $4,500.

Fred

Fred, thanks for doing so much to help so many people!

OK - Big update. We crossed $5,500 in bids. This opens up the next batch of milestone items. Additionally, we had some items donated to the auction. The following are new additions available for bidding effective today:
Small Favor From Grunnel Scroll
Totem of Heroism
50K in Gold Bars lot (two 25K bars)
Bead of Asgard
Bifrost Charm
+3 Throwing Hammer of Smiting
Spirit Pet: Gargoyle

Wow! I'll do updates in the morning. Thank you again to the generous donors as well as thanks to our favorite goblin, Grunnel for the scroll addition!

The community response has been amazing. I am proud to be part of this group.

Last night, we added more than $1,500 in bids and had some direct donations made by community members outside of the auction.

Current total bids: $7,191!
Please double check your bids, with all the information, it is possible I mixed lines up but did my best to double check everything.

Sorry for the short update - the auction is fun but, with an afternoon off work, I have farm work to do

Fred

Current bid total: $7,941 - just amazing!

A few items were generously donated that have been added to the auction:
Mark of the Tenet #3
Ring of the Circle 3
Ring of the Circle 4
Ring of the Circle 5

I'm also adding a second 50K gold bar lot that is available for bidding.

We have had a couple bidders get their employers to do matching donations. If applicable, look into it as a way to double your impact.

Tomorrow's update will include some images of what we've been delivering this week in addition to produce along with some good news on increasing the impacts of fundraising through Colorado Gives.

Thank you again for making it possible to expand how we are helping. We have set aside just shy of $5,000 in bids and donations along with $2,500 we initially seeded. By Monday afternoon, we'll have delivered an additional $2,000 in food with another $4,000 scheduled over the next 15 days. This directly impacts more than 100 low income families along with a low income apartment complex for elders serving a few dozen elders. We're pacing for possibly being able to help them have something special for thanksgiving dinners as well.

More to come tomorrow!

Fred

Bids updated. Bid total so far: $7.992.50

A generous donor just donated a Mark of the 2nd Tenet that has been added to the auction for immediate bidding!

Fred

Auction updates: Bidding has slowed during the VTD's. We're still a hair shy of $8,000.

Why do donations through Coloradogives?
We route donations through Coloradogives.org to qualify for partial matching funds. Essentially, a pool of matching funds of $1M-$2M is set aside for all the non-profits in Colorado who participate. Of the total dollars raised, they match it proportionately to the amount given to each organization (ie if someone raised 10% of the total, they'd get 10% of the matching fund.) Hopefully, it will be a couple thousand dollars in additional funds raised. When we ran the auction later in the year or in January, it was too late to qualify to match. Now, anything raised between Nov 1 and Dec 9th qualifies.

Attached is an image of what the additional money beyond seed monies are buying and distributing. Our cool room for vegetables isn't cold enough to store meat and milk but we do have a refrigerator in the barn. This is just 2 deliveries representing 2 communities (one site with families, the second is apartments for elders/elder couples.) It will help about 100-120 people for 1 week. We are doing 3 deliveries once per week (2 to communities of low income families and 1 to an elders community) and will continue to do so into late November.

We're adding what crops we have left but, being late in the season, means mostly shard, kale, and some lettuce. We'll be able to add Brussel sprouts, beets, and cabbage in about 2 weeks. After that, we shut everything down until February then starts begin for next year.

When I did the delivery this morning to the elder community, there were already 10-15 elders waiting an hour before food would be sorted and available (normally it would be 1-2 people and they'd be just hanging out in the community room doing other things rather than people waiting with grocery bags in hand.) They were overjoyed that we brought eggs, ground beef, cheese, and our veggies. They were more surprised to see it wasn't expiring food they would normally see from grocery store donations. We make it a point to go before everything is distributed to the families/elders - they don't owe us thanks and it is important that we help people maintain their dignity in difficult times.

We are at $8,114.50 in current bids!
There are a lot of great deals where the bids are half or less than secondary market prices:
Path of Enlightenment Fragment 1 - current high bid is $105 - less than 1/5th the secondary market prices ($650+)
Totem of Heroism - current high bid is $205 - less than 1/3rd the secondary market prices ($650+)
Bead of Asgard - current high bid is $100 - About 1/4 the secondary market prices ($395+)
Bifrost Charm - current high bid is $200 - About 1/2 secondary market (if you can find one)($400+)
Death Knight Armor - Current high bid is $31 - About 1/4 secondary market ($120+)
Mark of the Second Tenet - Current high bid is $36 - Less than 1/2 secondary market ($80+)
Mark of the Third Tenet - current high bid is $36 - About 1/3 secondary market ($100+)
Rings of the 3rd - 5th circle bids current high bids of less than $1 and no bid on the 4th ring - secondary market for 3 and 5 are $100+ and around $40 for the 4th
Light Blue lot with whetstone, eldritch runestone, and more current high bid is $40 - less than half the secondary market ($100+)
Huge rare lot of 32 tokens (complete ghost and folio sets and appreciation tokens) - current high bid is $42 - less than half the secondary market ($100+)
Spirit pets Homunculus and Gargoyle current high bids of $100 - about half secondary market ($200+)

Quite a few other good deals as well and remember the donations go to help an important cause!

Fred

11/12 Update: We're up to $8,549 in bids! With the auction wrapping up in less than 48 hours now, I'll move to updating at least twice per day then every couple hours when we hit 24 hours left.

We are doing our forth delivery this month of staples in addition to produce we've grown. We've delivered just over $2,000 in non-produce items so far with another $3K-$4K scheduled. The image of a filled refrigerator a few posts ago is what we put together twice per week (with meats rotating each week.)

In terms of produce, Kale and Chard are both producing (maybe another 2-3 weeks of those) but our Chinese Cabbage and Brussel Sprouts are starting to be harvested! Beets should be ready by Thanksgiving as well. We have a couple other crops that might make it to harvest if the weather cooperates.

-Fred

End of day update for 11/12: We are at $8,637 in total bids!
A generous donor added an unusual item - a hardcover of the True Dungeon Player's Handbook (images below.)

Fred

Fred K wrote: End of day update for 11/12: We are at $8,637 in total bids!
A generous donor added an unusual item - a hardcover of the True Dungeon Player's Handbook (images below.)

Fred

That's really cool, Fred! I didn't even know that existed.