Keep Believing Event Pictures

Thank You!

Thank you to all of the planners, organizers, attendees, decorators, venue providers, chefs, cleaners, auctioneers, those that donated, tournament arrangers, card players, poster makers, slide show makers, music providers, picture takers, babysitters, beer drinkers, and anyone else having any hand in the Keep Believing Event. I would say it was wildly successful. Aside from the money raised for Angie, Gavin, and Grant, it was a night of hanging out with family, visiting with old and new friends, laughing hysterically, and celebrating into the wee hours of the night.

I will be posting pictures here in the following days. If anyone has pictures they would like to share, please email them to me at vbahstork@aol.com.

One Week To Go!

Just one week until the big event! If you didn't make reservations don't worry - everyone is welcome.

Keep Believing Celebration

Please come help us celebrate the extraordinary life of an extraordinary man. And a celebration it will be, with great food (BBQ pork steaks, baked beans, roasted potatoes, chicken fettuccine, pasta house salad and brownies), great drinks (kegs, specialty beers, and setups), great music (Brian's playlist) and a night of cards and hanging out with friends and family - just as Brian loved.

There will be a silent auction, with some of the items up for bid including a Boat/Dinner Trip for 6, a Week's Lodging at Lake of the Ozarks, Diamond Box Cardinal Tickets, Mizzou Football Tickets, and an Autographed Ramone's CD.


Click on the above image to enlarge.

If you need hotel accommodations, arrangements have been made for reduced rates here.

We have also made arrangements for babysitters at the celebration.

If you want to see who is joining in the celebration, check the RSVP List in the right hand margin of the blog. See you at the event!

Hotel Accomodations for Keep Believing Event

A block of rooms has been set aside at the Sheraton Westport Chalet for the weekend of the event. The blocked room rate is $79/night + tax. Make your reservations ASAP as space is limited. For reservations call 314-434-5010 or toll free at 800-822-3535. Reference the “Keep Believing Event." The hotel is located a short 2.3 miles from the event location. The hotel information is as follows:

Sheraton Westport Chalet
191 Westport Plaza, St. Louis, Missouri, 63146

Click here for driving directions to the event from the hotel.

Keep Believing Event: Celebrating the Life of Brian

The Planners of the Keep Believing Event want to stress that the event is meant to be a Celebration of the Life of Brian. Please come help us celebrate the extraordinary life of an extraordinary man.

Click on the above image to enlarge. Please note that the age limit has been clarified on the flyer to apply to the card tournaments; all ages are welcome to attend the event. When you RSVP to hudpup@yahoo.com, please indicate how many will be attending and the type of admission for each (general, poker or euchre). If you have donated to the Keep Believing Fund previously, please be aware that past donations will be applied to the General Admission Fee. See the RSVP list in the right-hand margin for a list of attendees.

Hotel Arrangements for Keep Believing Event

For those traveling to St. Louis from out of town, we are working on hotel arrangements near the event and hope to have details posted on this blog by April 5.

Keep Believing Event

Click the image to enlarge.

See the Keep Believing Event RSVP List in the right hand margin for weekly updates on attendees that have RSVP'd to hudpup@yahoo.com.

Some Posts About Brian and Angie

Brian lost his battle with cancer on March 17 at 12:45 am. Many of Angie's blog friends are posting and directing people to the Keep Believing Fund blog. I thought some of you might be interested in reading these posts, so I'll try to put them here as I find them. The first one is Angie's post.

http://aboneill.blogspot.com/2009/03/1245-am-on-march-17-2009-brian-oneill.html

http://3boysundermyroof.blogspot.com/2009/03/saying-goodbye.html

http://jugglinglife.typepad.com/juggling_life/2009/03/sending-my-condolences-and-hopefully-yours-too.html

http://beth-amomslife.blogspot.com/2009/03/keep-believing.html

http://confessionsofasnowflake.blogspot.com/2009/03/keep-believing.html

http://lovingoursimplelife.blogspot.com/2009/03/i-dont-have-words.html

http://annoyinglyboring.com/brian-oneill

http://whoputmeinchargeofthesepeople.blogspot.com/2009/03/today.html

http://www.freespirithaven.com/2009/03/gather-around-sister.html

http://lovingoursimplelife.blogspot.com/2009/03/perspective.html

http://elizabethmthompson.typepad.com/faithandgrief/2009/03/virtual-grief.html

http://www.smoochiefrog.com/my_weblog/2009/03/speechless.html

http://mysecondjournal.wordpress.com/2009/03/18/home/

http://www.tiredmama.com/tiredmamacom/2009/03/humbled.html

http://freshfixins.blogspot.com/2009/03/pray-for-angie.html

Keep Believing Fund

Welcome to the Keep Believing Fund.

If you are here it is because you are a believer.

You are a believer in Brian O’Neill, whose luminous spirit, infectious hopefulness, unwavering faith and inspirational approach to life reminds us all how life on this Earth is meant to be lived.

You are a believer in Angie O’Neill, who started her blog, Keep Believing, several years ago to keep friends and family apprised of Brian’s health. As his cancer went into remission, her blog opened up and gave us an often hilarious, always touching glimpse into the lives of the O’Neill’s. If you know Angie through her blog, you know of her faith, love, humor, strength, helpfulness, hopefulness, realism and humanity. Multiply those qualities you glean from her blog by 10 and you have the real, in-person Angie. That is to say she is one of a kind.

Angie has developed quite a support group through her blog and I know that many of her readers have expressed a desire to help. There isn’t much help one can offer from a great distance, but what we can do is offer her some unconditional financial support. And when I say unconditional I mean it. I don’t expect Angie to track each one of us down and offer us thanks. And what she chooses to do with the money is entirely up to her. Take it from me, though – I know Angie and your donation will not go unnoticed or unappreciated and it will not be used frivolously or without meaningful purpose.

If you would like to make a donation, big or small, there is a PayPal account set up for this purpose. The handy little “ChipIn” widget is linked directly to PayPal which will link to a trust that Angie is setting up for the future of her family. Click on the button in the sidebar and PayPal will take it from there. You don’t have to have a PayPal account to make a donation.

If you feel like you want to reach out to some of your readers, you can get the code of the ChipIn widget at the link below. Or you can direct them here. This blog will not change much, its purpose being mainly a direct route to the trust. I know that the Internet can be a powerful tool, good or bad, and we would like to use that power here to do some good for someone who needs it and would do the same for anyone else. All we can offer in return is profound gratitude.

http://www.chipin.com/mywidgets/id/354fb459385e89ee

With Profound Gratitude

I want to give special thanks to Nap Warden for the outstanding design of the Keep Believing Fund blog. The Keep Believing Fund blog deserved a look that was heartening and inspirational, and now it has that look. Nap Warden is a blog friend of Angie’s and offered her design talents as soon as she heard of the Fund. She also created the button that is now being posted on hundreds of blogs and being linked back to the Fund blog site. If you feel like giving her a thanks, and learning more about this generous lady, you can visit her blog at The Chronicles of a SAHM.

I also want to give a special thanks to LaskiGal, who helped coordinate the Keep Believing Fund makeover and spearheaded getting the word out to so many blogs. I feel uplifted when browsing around on the Internet and I see that button on so many sites. If you want to give her a thanks for her help, and learn more about this bighearted lady, you can visit her blog at From The Cheap Seats.

These ladies represent the type of selfless giving that the lives of Angie and Brian have stirred. Angie and Brian may balk at that, but evidence would prove otherwise.

Donations

Please note that your donations will not show up instantaneously on the ChipIn graph. But they do show up eventually.

You can go to the Keep Believing ChipIn web page for a real time graph until I get the kinks worked out.