Flower Design Events 'Beat Night' to help with Life's Heart Stopping Moments

Each year together with our amazing FD Team & our wonderful friends we choose a local Charity to support, it has to be something we all agree on, something we all feel passionate about, this years selection was an absolute no brainer, when we nearly lost one of our closest friends...

Our beautiful friend the fabulous, beautiful and super fit Elaine Spector suffered a sudden cardiac arrest whilst cycling the Manchester to Blackpool Bike Race way back in July

Graham Jones aka 'Super Hero' a North West Blood Biker and one of the race marshalls, arrived to find our Elaine on the floor surrounded by folks who'd called for an ambulance (a 45 minute wait was expected) he quickly realised that Elaine was agonal breathing (the heart is no longer circulating oxygenated blood) and that death was imminent. Unbelievably, Graham had an external defribillator in his pannier and immediately began defribillating and CPR in effect saving her life!!!

There's so much more to this miraculous story which we heard told by Graham & Elaine in their own words at our 'Beat Night' on 7th November at FD HQ, they were both overcome with emotion at the retelling of the trauma.

Elaine felt there was a lot to learn from her experience, not least what an absolute miracle it was that Graham was passing at just the right time with just the exact set of skills (& defribillator) to save her life, 'the stars were aligned' as Elaine says!!!

So whilst in hospital we all had a mutual 'Light Bulb' moment, a plan was hatched, for this years Flower Design Annual Charity Fund Raiser. We would train people how to do CPR & use a Defibrillator whilst raising money for the great folks at Northwest Blood Bikes Lancashire & Lakes an entirely charitably funded organisation, here's a link to our FD Just Giving Page if you'd like to donate.

Where to begin??? Another 'stars aligning' moment, I mentioned to our great friends and neighbours Pete & Keith aka 'Keystone Heart Throb' from REAX, that for this years charity night we'd be needing to borrow their unit to store our stuff (for the 3rd or 4th year running but whose counting?). I knew they trained people to work in confined spaces etc but had know idea of their full training programme, so I asked them if they could recommend anyone to do the training, little did I know Pete specialises in a 'Heart Start' course, would you believe it??? so with absolutely no persuasion at all he offered the full use of the REAX training room and their training team Keith & Yvonne, we also had the lovely Liz Millington providing some extra help with the hands on training. We honestly could not have imagined how effective Pete's aka 'The Original Keystone Heart Throb' training was, at the start of the session 78 people all said they would not attempt CPR if someone collapsed in front of them, by the end all 78 said they would and they would be prepared to use a defibrillator!!! RESULT!!!!!

  Each year I try to get 'things done' for our Charity push without asking people, I always feel ridiculously blessed that we have so many wonderful friends who quite simply offer their services, without them our charitable endeavours would never ever get off the ground and believe me when I say these people work tirelessly and they really are the very best of humanity and I would not even attempt this stuff without their ongoing support so massive thank you's to all!!!!

Our own family who put up with so much they help us to 'join the dots' and make sense of our ideas Rebecca for your brilliance at proof reading and in-sight into event organisation & Olivia for your artistry and clear headedness thank you!! Our Flower Design family Shirl & Vicky are amazing at getting us 'Event ready', we worked out that together we have been doing these annual Charity events for 28 years, thank you from the bottom of our hearts, our besties from Bite Club Shannon & Peter are the very best of best friends thank you, they served a heart warming Chicken Broth before the training and the most delicious 'Red' (green) Thai Curry after the training, thank you to the beautiful Keleigh Spector from Kell's Kitchen UK she made the most scrumptious Chocolate Chip Cookies, the ever present and always exceptional DJ Gary Mills entertained us all with tunes with a 120 beats per minute which is the tempo of CPR (love that attention to detail) our gratitude to you is boundless, newish kids on the block for our charity work Christian Allen  he has taken all of these wonderful images and Daniel from Marriage in Motion has created a film which we will be sharing very soon, thank you to them, our lovely friend Laura from Bash offered to collaborate with the venue decor creating a wonderful atmosphere with her neon Heart and heart balloons, thank you, Chris from Liberty Motorcycles added to the evening with some stupendous scooters and motorcycles also providing the best raffle prize of night 'A Night with Chris on a seriously fast Motor Bike' it was so popular he has agreed to provide 3 lovely ladies with a thrill to remember, ginormous thank you's. 

We had a plethora of raffle prizes including exquisite designer jewellery from Peter Jackson the Jewellers, Bed & Breakfast at The Grand Grassmere which was won by the hero of the hour Blood Biker Graham Jones, Tickets for the Cinderella Panto at Preston Guild Hall & Tickets to Woofers Comedy Night, a Portrait Session with Christian Allen, Balloon Decoration from Bash, Nefarious Hair voucher, Day Passes to Ribby Hall & Personal Trainer sessions with John Bland to name but a few, we are so grateful to everyone who just brought things in for us it was so generous of you all.

Massive thank you's to everyone for supporting us, so far we have raised £2000 for the Blood Bikers and are well on our way to providing a Defibrillator in Elaine's husband Jeffrey's name.

 The Biggest thank you of all though has to go to Graham Jones our Super Hero for making this evening possible by saving our beautiful Elaine Spector for us all to love for a whole lot longer xxxxxxxxxx