I’ve written before about the importance of time. And how many people in my life are looking for time. Either time to get things done, or time with people they love, or time to travel. As we enter the season of being thankful, I thought I would focus on people who have shared their time with me. I am one lucky and thankful person. 1. Years ago, my friend Cathy sent me a note during the month …
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How To Prepare For Your Best Grant Application
Preparing for an Orange Effect Foundation grant application can feel intimidating, but it really doesn’t need to be. Clear information and transparency is the simple key. No one knows your child better than you and all of the documentation is fairly standard and accessible. Before you begin, and aside from basic information about you and your child, be prepared to …
How Do You Know?
I was having a conversation with a friend who saw what looked like a movie poster on Facebook for the movie Elf 2. Now this person was a huge fan of the first Elf movie, so of course, was excited that there may be a second. But then they awkwardly admitted that they have no idea if it’s true or not because it’s so easy to generate fake news and fake images these days. As they said that, they let …
Why Never Giving Up Matters
We just finished our third-quarter board meeting. If you’re unfamiliar with our process, we accept applications and meet on a quarterly basis. Prior to each meeting, our review team spends countless hours determining how to fund the requests we’ve received. They then present their recommendations to the full board for approval. This quarter, for example, we received 61 applications totaling …
The Power Of A Book
I love books. You’ll rarely see me without one. Books can do so many things. They can educate you, or take you to far away places, both real and imagined. They can help you open your heart, and they can rip your heart open. They can help you bond with other people who read the same book. They can help create great discussions for those same people who read books and maybe saw things differently …
19th Annual OEF Golf for Autism Sets Record for Giving
The 19th Annual Orange Effect Foundation Golf for Autism was one for the record books! On August 4th in Elyria, Ohio, friends, supporters, and golf enthusiasts gathered for a beautiful day on the course with one mission in mind...helping children with speech disorders get the therapy and technology they need to communicate. Thanks to the generosity of our golfers, sponsors, and donors, this …
What Should We Do For Our 20th Year?
I’ve always loved running events. From kids’ birthday parties to friends’ surprise parties. I enveloped it even more when we started our own company and had work-related events. I often describe to people that planning those big events was sort of like Christmas. It was so exciting when the day finally arrived. I always enjoyed seeing all the hard work come together and all the people finally …
What Has Changed In The Last 19 Years?
With our 19th Golf for Autism coming up, one of my jobs is to create the signs that we place in the tee boxes around the course so golfers know who is sponsoring the event. Over the years we have tried to make the signs informative with statistics about Autism and communication disorders. Around then, about 2005, one of the first signs we made said that approximately 1 in every 160 …
Autism Becomes Magical
I truly believe that there is too much content out there. I myself can easily get caught up in what I learned is called ‘doomscrolling’ where you just keep swiping as all kinds of information goes on the screen and you don’t even realize how much time has passed. Years ago this bothered me so much that our family instituted electronic free Saturdays. But I digress…. Every once in …
When Multiple Siblings Need Services
If you’re not familiar with our process here at The Orange Effect Foundation, we review applications four times a year. A deadline falls on the first of the month. For example, this quarter it’s August 1, and during the next 30 days, our Program Manager and Application Review Committee work vigorously to allocate the $25,000 that’s available for grants for that quarter. Since we began doing …
A Father’s Day Reflection: Finding Voice and Purpose
Father’s Day always makes me pause ... not just as a dad, but as someone who’s witnessed firsthand what it means to fight for a child’s future.When our oldest child was diagnosed on the autism spectrum, Pam and I faced the fear that every parent dreads: the unknown. Would our child speak? Connect? Play? We didn’t know. What we did know was that we’d do anything to help. That journey led us to …
Letting Go Is Tough
Recently, in my world, there have been a lot of conversations around tracking people using technology. It’s true that things like Find My iPhone have made it easy to see where someone is located. Some of these conversations involve friends who travel a lot and some involve elderly parents. But primarily the conversations revolve around kids. In my case, adult kids. For example, I have …
