Dinner With the Diving Lady

You have probably noticed that we have promoted the preservation of the Diving Lady.  We were one of the first to tell you about her demise last October and ironically already had shirts in production when she fell down.  Now, almost a year later, the Diving Lady is making her comeback.

Last night Marily and I had a wonderful evening dining with the Diving Lady.  We were happy to be part of the fundraiser and enjoyed meeting some very impressive Mesa residents.  We loved meeting Larry and Ken who have painstakingly worked to restore the Diving Lady to her former glory (and quite possibly beyond).  We met City of Mesa council members and had time to chat again with Peter Sterling, the President of the Mesa Chamber of Commerce and his wife Megan who is the editor of Gateway to the East Valley Magazine.  They have followed our blog since moving here and they always seem to make us feel so good about the work we have done.  It was a great night to be surrounded by people who truly want to see Mesa thrive and survive.

Speaking of work, the reason Marily and I were at the fundraiser was to first, present the Mesa Preservation Foundation with a check and second, to sell more Diving Lady shirts.  We were pleased to present the foundation with 2 checks, totaling $350.  We wish we could have added some zeros to that figure, but we worked hard, dedicated many many many hours to it, and are happy that we played our part in preserving a piece of Mesa history.  Hopefully our kids will be proud of us.  

Some of you may wonder about the finances behind I Heart Mesa.  (Or is that just me that is always a curious person?)  Marily and I have not made any personal financial gains through our work on I Heart Mesa.  Any money from ads or shirt sales has gone directly back into our goal of building a better community through blogging.  I guess I say this because I would not want anyone to think that we are excited to share events, businesses and places to go because we are paid to say those things.  We love Mesa, we love Arizona and we have a goal to get people to have that same love.  I once said that it would be fun to make enough money from I Heart Mesa to pay for myself to get a pedicure.  Well, three years into this work and I am yet to get my pedicure, but, hopefully with our donation to the Diving Lady fund, it helped pay for hers.

This is Larry Graham who is rebuilding the Diving Lady in his shop and his co-worker Ken.  We were chatting for a little bit before I realized who he was.  It was almost like meeting a celebrity.  He is such a nice guy and I think we just might need to stop by his shop and give our readers a little photo tour.

This September is our 3rd birthday at I Heart Mesa.  We appreciate all our readers from the last 3 years.  We love any comments, e-mails sharing events, or just the random hello at the store, even if I don't have any make-up on.  The people who enjoy our work is our payment.  We hope we can continue to grow and reach new heights and our goals for the next 3 years.  And most importantly, we hope we can continue to inspire more people to live here with a little more heart.