Love and Our Logo - Part 2
Now, a little about the love that went into our logo and what it all means. We also want to give a special shout out to our friend Laura Copeland for designing it!
"And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love." 1Corinthians 13:13
HEART: The heart in our logo signifies the kind of love I spoke of yesterday in "Part 1 of Love and Our Logo" -- there is a reason the HEART is the biggest element of the logo. Everything we do, everything you do #ForTheSakeOfBlake, stems from love. It shows the HEART behind the FIGHT. It means that cure or no cure, we'll love her deeply, strongly, intensely. The heart means we CARE. It shows how much you, our TEAM, cares about helping us to help her. It's the core, it's essential.
TEAM BLAKE: TEAM is defined as simply a group of people who work together. TEAM is something bigger than oneself - it creates synergy, accomplishes something greater than any one man can do on his own. It's community -- coming together for a common goal. It allows each person to focus on their individual talents, and rely on other's where they find shortcomings in themselves. The BLAKE part? Well, this is obvious. We are fighting because we love Blake --
She needs us if she's gonna have a fighting chance. She can't fight this on her own, she needs warriors on the ground and warriors in prayer. We've declared an outright war on Rett - and you can't go into war without an army, nor are we going in without God. If you're reading this, you've probably enlisted in some way, shape or form. If everyone gives of themselves, even just a little, imagine how far that can go to help Blake and other Rett girls out there in their fight too. TEAM - Together Everyone Achieves More, am I right?! The support we've gained in the last couple weeks has been overwhelming. We are so encouraged. You've told us you are ready to help us FIGHT. So FIGHT we will. Go Team, Go!
FIGHTING RETT FROM CARE TO CURE: We've declared war, and we are fighting that war every day, every hour, every second. Sometimes we sleep, but we never stop fighting. There is a division of Rett research dedicated to something called "Neurorehabilitation". Definition from Wikipedia:
Neurorehabilitation is a collection processes that are case specific which focus on aiding a person's recovery, or help that individual to live a more normal, active, and independent life. The quality of life of a person can be greatly affected by a brain or spinal cord injury, or a medical condition which affects the mobility, cognitive functions, or other physical or psychological processes that have been affected by changes in the nervous system. The goal of neurorehabilitation is to combat those changes and improve quality of life by various therapies.
While researchers and scientists work toward a cure, we gotta keep our Rett girls in tip-top shape, to the best of their ability and ours. We keep Blake learning, we keep her body strong, we use various therapy techniques each day, we don't stop talking to her, teaching her, challenging her mind, body, spirit. Lord willing, if a cure comes, her mind and body must be ready to receive it. The CARE portion of the fight is just as important as the CURE. One definition of CARE is "things that are done to keep something in good condition." Every day we work to keep Blake in good condition. It's part of the fight -- it takes a lot of work, a lot of heart, a lot of love, a lot of different people -- These are our Team Blake MVPs.
The ultimate goal of all of our efforts is a CURE of course. It's possible folks -- they've done it in a lab. Now they have just got to figure out how to translate that to humans. A lofty task, but they've shown it's at least possible. And of course we believe that all things are possible with God (Matthew 19:26). CARE may be as far as we get. But every day we take work to support Rett girls and support and fund the research, is one day closer we get to a CURE. In our minds, it's not really a matter of "if", it's a matter of "when". I'm well aware, that we may not be direct beneficiaries of the CURE -- but our efforts will not go unrewarded. We'll push the cause forward as much as we can, because one day there will be another little girl like Blake who will see her Rett reversed. She'll look up at her mom and dad, and they'll hear her say, "I love you." -- Just thinking about the joy that family could experience from our efforts and those who have gone before us gives me chills. We are fighting because we want to be part of that legacy -- no matter where we fall along the continuum of the CURE. God picked us "For such a time as this", so we'll accept that and pick up the fight right here. We are making our mark -- we are at least fighting in the right direction, and always #ForTheSakeOfBlake.
HAND: The hand in our logo has several meanings. It is a symbol of Rett and its challenges but it's also a symbol of the help supplied through able hands. Spiritually it's a symbol of the hands we have raised to Him through it all . Blake has lost most purposeful use of her hands-- though she works hard every day to keep the skill she has to build on her abilities. Our hands become her hands as we work to help her in daily tasks and as we "put up our dukes" to fight for the cure. There is a story in the bible of Moses holding his hands up to the Lord as the Israelites were in battle against the Amelekites (Exodus 17). As long Moses' hands were raised, Israel prevailed, when they were down, the Amelekites prevailed. But Moses' strength waned as the battle persisted, so Aaron and Hur found a stone for him to sit on, and they supported his hands in a raised position, one on one side and one on the other so his hands stayed steady. This is what you guys do for us. When we get tired, you hold up our hands. When we do not know what else to pray, you pray for us. You're holding our hands up in this battle. Our hands will stay raised to Him through it all, no matter what comes our way.
Lastly, it signifies a high five! One of the things Blake can do is give high fives. Every time you do something in her honor, I want you to picture her giving you a high five.
BUTTERFLY: We chose a butterfly to represent the cure and transformation we hope to see in Blake. She is locked in a struggle right now -- a bit of a cocoon if you will -- and we are in it with her. We are working so hard because want to see her fly and we want to see ALL the beauty she has to offer . Butterflies symbolize change, transformation, freedom. We would love nothing more than for her to discover this world in a new form with a newfound independence. The butterfly is a symbol of our constant hope to see her wholly healed. She already radiates so much beauty, we can only imagine what it would look like if she was able to take off with wings of independence this side of heaven.
But, transformation can happen in a multitude of ways. If it's not physical, it'll be spiritual. He's begun a good work in her...one we don't always understand, but we are sure that one day it will be brought to completion (Phil 1:6) for His glory. "He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away...'I am making everything new!'" (Rev 21:4-5) A Butterfly always emerges far more beautiful and powerful than before...a new creation.
We want to give a special thanks to Laura Copeland for designing our logo. She donated her time, experience, and mad graphic design skills to create a symbol for our team and our purpose. She listened to our vision and all-over-the-place ideas, and sent this back in a matter of days. After a few tweaks we had our design and from there it inspired the look of our whole website.
She turned our ideas into an identity -- Laura, thanks for using your God-given talents and abilities to help make Team Blake so pretty! This week you get the award for Team Blake MVP. We heart you!
