Favorite Wish Mapping

MiriamR's Favorite Wishes

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Money to pay off our debt and one dinner out.

Money to pay off our debt and one dinner out.

  • By: MiriamR
  • Amount: $3,100
  • Views: 367
  • Wish Points: 68.20

Moving so I can go to grad school to become a librarian has made us rack up the credit card bills. Now it's a week until our 7th anniversary and we'd like to be credit card debt free and have just a little extra to go out for a really good dinner.

This won't even touch all the college (and now grad school debt) we have, but it will get rid of our immediate need, and let us actually start saving our hard earned money instead of sending it all off to bills as soon as we get it.

Please vote for me and know that you're helping someone who gets kids excited about reading and helps adults find important information. Thanks!

The ability to frame two pieces of art.

The ability to frame two pieces of art.

  • By: MiriamR
  • Amount: $160
  • Views: 449
  • Wish Points: 111.95

I have money to pay my bills, but not for nice things. Two months ago some friends gifted me with two pieces of their art and I want to be able to frame them so that they don't get ruined. I would buy cheap frames from goodwill, like I do with most of my art, except for two things:
1) I want archival materials so that these artworks don't deteriorate before their time.
2) They are irregular sizes - pre-built frames (even archival quality ones) will not accomodate them.

I've scoped out framing stores in my neighborhood, and I found the one with the best prices - independantly run by a very nice woman who has given me the promise of 15% off too. With her cheapest frames, acid-free matting, acid-free backing, and UV protective glass, each frame will cost about $80 after the discount and taxes.

I want to be able to display this art on my walls, but I'm afraid to do anything other than have it lying flat on a shelf until it's properly framed.

(The image is of an older piece of art by one of the artists. It's very different than the new art, which are paintings, but I don't have pictures of those.)

Thanks!
And please support lower-cost wishes! More people can win at the same time with them.

Art supplies for jail birds.

Art supplies for jail birds.

  • By: MiriamR
  • Amount: $80
  • Views: 555
  • Wish Points: 143.10

Art is therapuetic and it should be mandatory for people in jail to have access to art supplies!

I recently learned that one of my old friends is in jail due to some stupidness when he was younger (he only just got sentenced last year for things he did over 6 years ago). He's serving 2 years, and is supposed to be in a decent prison with a library, pencils, markers, and other things to dull the boredom. Due to overcrowding in the Wisconsin jail system though, he's spent the last 8 months being bumped around from jail to jail, and has landed in a holding-jail in Green Bay. Jails, unlike prisons, do not have libraries or art supplies. He is doomed to spend an indefinate amount of time with little more than a golf-sized stubby pencil, and the occasional book that floats through.

I looked into the rules at his jail, and while I cannot send him any art supplies directly, I can send the jail a donation of paper and colored pencils. So, I would like to send a lot of colored pencils to the jail so that he and his fellow inmates can draw. I figure that if I only sent one box, they would be used up too quickly to be much good to anyone, so I want to send a lot.

Here is a link for the jail and it's rules about what can be sent:
[ link ]

Please consider donating to this, or another jail too.

Thanks!

Two Tickets to Burning Man to see an old friend!

Two Tickets to Burning Man to see an old friend!

  • By: MiriamR
  • Amount: $500
  • Views: 1166
  • Wish Points: 355.23

I've moved a lot and I attended 6 different elementary schools. Kids are not the best pen pals, and email didn't exist then, so I didn't keep in touch with many people from my childhood. But I did manage to keep in touch with my best friend from 4th grade, Delia. We have lived on opposite sides of the country since 4th grade though and we've only seen each other 3 times in the past 18 years -- the last time was 5 years ago.

We want to get together to catch up and reconnect and what better place is there to do it than camping in the desert of Nevada at a week long art festival? I've been to Burning Man 4 times (I even wrote my master's thesis on the gift economy!), so I know what it takes to survive the event. I haven't been able to attend in a few years for financial reasons though. Delia has never been at all!

Tickets are at the $250 level now, and I'd like to purchase a ticket for each of us before the price goes up again. Please help us have a vacation and hang out with each other while we contribute to a great art community.

To learn about Burning Man:
[ link ]

The picture shows me last time I was at burning man, slicing up a watermelon to beat the heat.