Yesterday Jack realized that his favorite car, a #20 Ed Carpenter yellow IndyCar, was missing. This resulted in a frantic search by all members of the family. We went through every car bucket, toy drawer, pile of junk, nook and cranny in the house looking...to no avail. Knowing that our Target store, where we bought the original, was out of these cars, I turned to Twitter.
As many of you know, I follow quite a few IndyCar racing folks on Twitter and some of them follow me. So, I posted a message to Vision Racing, as they are the team that Ed Carpenter races for. I told them how upset Jack was and asked if they knew where I could get a new #20 car. This morning Vision Racing posted my message on their Twitter account and asked if anyone knew where I could get a replacement car. Apparently Jack's desire for his #20 was just what the Twitter-folk needed today! People started offering suggestions (one person offered a signed Ed Carpenter hat) and eventually the folks in the front office at Izod IndyCar tweeted that they had a car for Jack. All I had to do was go pick it up!
So, after nap time, I took the kids over to 16th Street and picked up the car at the front desk of the corporate offices of Izod IndyCar. The guy who arranged it even popped out to say hello. Jack's face lit up when he saw "his" yellow car. The whole way home he was so excited and just kept saying "my yellow race car back!"
Needless to say, I'm very grateful to the great racing community for their rush to help my little racing fan. When the guy who does the blog on the IndyCar website contacted me, I pointed out that (even though I'm a HUGE Colts fan) it isn't like the NFL community would come rushing to my rescue if my son lost his Peyton Manning jersey. It was very fun to see everyone's enthusiasm for helping out!
Jack has not let go of the car since we got it this afternoon. He is thrilled. I posted a picture of him with his car on Twitter for everyone to see and last I checked 245 people had clicked over to see Jack's picture. I guess we had over 200 people following our saga on Twitter!
I even got a Tweet from Ed Carpenter, himself, telling me to say "hi" to his young fan and that he was very happy it all worked out.
I'm posting the pictures below! Enjoy! And become an IndyCar fan if you aren't already!!
7 comments:
that is awesome! and i love the pictures :)
I loved reading your story and can't tell you how great it is to hear such good things about the ra@ing community. I have a signed Ed shirt and hat nd would love to get these to your son. I just need his size. Not sure if you live in Indy but if so I can leave them at the race shop or drop them off at your home. Keep cheering for Ed and hopefully we can get some wins for your son next year!
Heather Carpenter
That little guy is so funny ... so much personality in a little red-topped package! Thanks for sharing this great story!
Heather-
That is so sweet! Jack would get such a kick out of that. He is a size 2T. We are here in Indy, so we could swing by the race shop sometime. Just let me know! Thank you SO much!!
P.S. Your kids are adorable!
Megan, That is such a cute story! Don't you love how social media like Twitter and Facebook open up interactions like this? What an awesome response by the racing community. Those pictures of Jack are so precious. This is a story you'll be telling for years! ~Manda Newlin
Megan,
I will have Ed bring the shirt to the race shop tomorrow. It may be a little big, as the sizes they make don't fit the kids all that well, but he can grow into it! It will be at the front desk. I think that they are only in the shop on Monday through Thursday. Thanks so much for the comment on our kids and have a great Thanksgiving!
Heather
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