Lessons from a Boxtroll Contest

My little family is humbled and overjoyed at the outpouring of love and help we received in our simple "Boxtroll" competition. We learned many powerful and personal lessons about the selfless sacrifice of others and the overwhelming feeling that comes from a supporting team. THANK YOU.

We cherish you. We were reminded with each message and each "like" and each vote that we have a greater work to do in loving and serving individuals. With that said, I have to share about one individual in this competition who has touched my life FOREVER.

Her name is Jamila Hull. And she made this:


Isn't her painting amazing! And I love her dog Pittie Ninny.

But most of all.

I love her.

Following a very sleep-deprived week for both of us...and after a final vote tally count...I did what any facebooker would do...I looked her up!

And here is what I found. (please read if you want to cry and be inspired forever)

In her words, and I quote:

"1,563 people took the time out of their day to vote for me in a contest I entered called “Think Inside the Box” hosted by Amazon.com and inspired by the Laika film “The Boxtrolls”. Voting ended this morning at 1am, and I came in second place with ONE-THOUSAND-FIVE-HUNDRED-SIXTY-THREE votes. Let me say that again: 1 , 5 6 3 PEOPLE VOTED. FOR. ME. I can’t believe how quickly this community came together to help me get votes! And I use the word ‘community’ loosely here, because people voted for me from EVERYWHERE! Thank you immensely for inviting people to check out my entry and to love on my precious pittie, Ninny.

You are the most beautiful, positive, diverse, supportive, and caring group of people. Of those 1,563 people there are some, dear friends, that rallied for me with everything you had! I know this because it would be midnight and I would see the numbers jump up 50 votes, and I knew that I hadn’t done it. It was really exciting to watch how quickly votes would jump as you all shared my link with your friends and family. It’s humbling to see how connected we all are, be that as it may in this digital age through Facebook. Thank you for help shaking votes out of your friends, families, and respective cities. And to all of you here in our Las Cruces, thank you for showing me what hometown love really means.

To my poets, woodworkers, photographers, geologists, engineers, politicians, school teachers, physical trainers, nurse practitioners, medical professionals, physicists, writers, painters, graphic-designers, comedians, novelists, revolutionaries, activists, djs, farmers, lawyers, art history professors, journalists, law enforcement officers, bakers, chefs, internet-whizzes, conservators, translators, sculptors, waitresses, tattoo artists, yogis, pilots, airline hostesses, actors, chemists, crafters, social-workers, helicopter-riding-gas-pipeline-inspectors, radio hosts, guitar-makers, singers, breast-cancer survivors, students, organizers, complete and total strangers, movers, shakers, fellow dog-lovers, and all of you good people: THANK YOU.

The biggest victory one could hope for is learning what wonderful friends and family they have in this world.

A big thank you to Amazon.com for allowing me to participate in this fun contest. And a HUGE congratulations to Elise M. Peterson of South Weber, Utah who took 1st place! Check out how she sculpted, painted and put together incredibly cute costumes for her little girl and husband, here: http://creatingmakesushappy.blogspot.com/2014/10/box-troll-costume-contest.html?m=1

And lastly, can we just make the #LasCrucesLovehashtag a thing for when we’re trying to help out someone from our community? That’d be rad. "

Isn't she amazing! You should all go and "like" her Jellywell Art page right now!

After reading this touching post on her wall...I noticed a new message in my own inbox...from Jamila.

"CONGRATULATIONS ELISE!

I was also in the running for The Boxtrolls “Think Inside the Box” Contest. I just wanted to congratulate you on taking first and doing such an incredible job this week! I kept checking in on your progress over the last few days and kept trying to be mad that you were beating me, but I couldn’t because of how lovely your support system was, how great your costumes were, and how much I think you deserve this! I genuinely hope the prize money can help your family and little ones out! You’re a really talented artist and had a really great entry. I had a fun week (sleepless, but fun) trying to catch up to y’all! Man you guys know how to rock a vote! Again, CONGRATS!

All the best from New Mexico,

Jamila Hull

(ps. the painted eyes on “Daddy’s little Boxtroll” were SO CUTE! Awesome job!)"

And that is why I love her.

Don't you?

Feel free to comment on the blog on what lessons we can learn from her. I have about a thousand.