Duvall’s 7th annual local RAK Week marched from January to March this year and the weather was perfect.  Not a single snowflake fell the entire week. (The week after was another story.)

So many wonderful things took place during Duvall’s Local Random Acts of Kindness Week, March 4th-10th.

RAK Week got a huge kick-off this year at the Kindness Workshop held at Stillwater Elementary, the brainchild of the principal, Jack Madigan. Jack was deeply impacted by the events at Sandy Hook Elementary and wanted to do a Kindness Workshop, to honor the students and teachers whose lives were cut short. So many people came together to make the workshop a success. It was so successful, in fact, that it may become an annual event.

Each year Duvall’s RAK Week grows bigger and bigger. This year a huge banner hung over Main Street in Duvall to promote RAK Week. The banner was purchased using donations from Cascade Valley Designs, Duvall Family Drugs, DuVall’s Dazzling Designs and Christi Irwin of Irwin Realty.

Also new this year are Kindness Clubs in almost every school in the Riverview School District.  A big thank you to Kerri Gould for all of her efforts with the clubs and for being one of the original founders of the RAK Club at Cedarcrest.

Some of my favorite highlights of RAK Week were:

The Eagle Rock Kindness Club and the Kindness Club at Cedarcrest met together and worked on kindness artwork and shared RAK stories.

Happy Honking Friday! A group of about 20 kids and adults stood in downtown Duvall with bright yellow balloons and signs that read “Honk If You Love Local Businesses!” The response was amazing! For an hour and a half, horns honked and we waved and screamed and smiled. Two local business owners were so impressed that they bought all of us ice-cream cones.

Giving out chocolate kisses to business owners, at meetings, to RAK students and to friends.

Listening to the Eagle Rock Elementary students singing kindness songs at the Random Acts of Kindness meeting.

Hearing stories about kind acts, especially at coffee places where one after another, people were buying coffee for each other.

Going out to lunch with the Cedarcrest Random Acts of Kindness Club students at Ixtapa and randomly buying lunch for someone at another table.

There are always so many people to thank after RAK Week.

This year there are too many to list so I want to do a couple of Kindness “Shout Outs.”

Thank you to Leanne Christensen, a longtime local resident of Duvall who is in the process of moving out of state.

Leanne has been a huge help in spreading kindness in Duvall for many, many years.

Thank you to Miss Sarah and Mr. Luke for the amazing kindness songs you taught the kids at Eagle Rock. What a wonderful way to spread kindness.

Thank you Liz at Duvall’s True Value for making the Kindness Corner SO beautiful with bright yellow daffodils blooming everywhere. Thank you to Paul, Randy and Colby for seven years of support.

For the past four years, Duvall has included Carnation, Monroe and Woodinville to join us during our local RAK Week.

If there is anyone who would like to be the contact/point person for Carnation, Monroe or Woodinville, please contact me through the Random Acts of Kindness website.

RAK Week has been over for several weeks now but the hope is that RAKs will continue to take place throughout the year.  I personally have witnessed a couple of awesome RAKs take place in the past couple of days.

At Oasis Nails in Duvall, gentlemen paid for a manicure for a complete stranger because she was celebrating her retirement. I have also witnessed, on several occasions, a local Duvall resident, Helen, who for the past several weeks has been picking up roadside garbage all over and around Duvall.  She has even been picking up trash on Novelty Hill. Thank you Helen.

www.rakduvall is currently supporting two local families in need. One is the Bender family. Mark Bender was recently paralyzed in a surfing accident and we are raising money to support Mark, his wife Sarah and their four young boys.

We are also supporting Mia, a beautiful two-year-old who was born with port wine stains covering almost half of her body.

Please visit www.rakduvall.com and show your support.

Hi friends! So here is my request: As you know we are in Colorado at Craig Hospital in Englewood, CO. The boys and I are in need of temporary housing. It would be for about 2-3 months. If you know of anyone in the southern Denver area that might be willing to house us, please let me know. We can rent an empty house or live in a basement. Whoever says yes, has to be good with 4 rambunctious boys. . .so there it is. That’s what we need. Go to it. . . (Posted by Sarah Bender)

Happy Honking Friday! We stood in downtown Duvall with bright yellow signs that said…Honk If You Love Local Businesses!! The response was amazing! For an hour and a half, horns honked and we waved and screamed and smiled. Two local business owners were so impressed that they bought all seventeen of us ice-cream cones!

Mixing an Elementary Random Acts of Kindness Club with a High School Random Acts of Kindness Club! We had an awesome time sharing kindness stories and drawing pictures about kindness!!!

Giving out chocolate kisses to business owners, at meetings, and to friends!

Listening to kids singing Kindness songs at the Random Acts of Kindness meeting at a local elementary school!

Hearing stories about kind acts, especially at coffee places where one after another, people were buying coffee for each other.

Going out to lunch with the Random Acts of Kindness Club students and randomly buying lunch for someone at another table!