Whether you are family, a friend, or even a distant friend, thank you so much for taking the time to read this. I'm so grateful something inspired you to click this link, and I pray that my words below can bring some light your way, and to others.

Many of us have no idea what it's like to be truly thirsty. We have plenty of water to drink, and usually it's just a matter of self discipline ("have I had enough to drink today?"). My answer is usually NO, and I go inhale a tall glass of ice cold water.

I was shocked to learn statistics around the limited access to clean water around the world, and how much of a luxury it is here. I've admittedly taken it for granted my whole life, often leaving my clean water running for too long before showering (and many other wasteful habits).

My heart broke to learn that every day, about 1,400 children die from diseases caused by unsafe water and poor sanitation. I couldn't quite wrap my head around it, so I put it in other terms. If you stare at your watch and picture a child passing away every second, you'd have to sit there for about 23 minutes to get to this number.

I wiped the tears from my eyes at church when I learned there are simple solutions like drilled wells, spring protections and BioSand filters that help provide clean water to communities around the world.

I started this fundraising campaign to help charity: water build these types of projects around the world, and you can help make a difference.

Truly any donation will help, and 100% of the money will be used to build clean water projects. When they’re complete, charity: water will send us photos and GPS coordinates so we can see the exact community we helped.

Once again, thank you so much from the bottom of my heart for taking some time to read this. It brightened my birthday more than you know.