Touch Mother Earth Nonprofit

This is an urgent and deeply difficult letter to write. I truly feared I was going to lose my beloved husband, Dave Miller, to sudden kidney failure following the historic heatwave at our recent festival. Thankfully, he is now on the road to recovery, but as we nurse him back to health, we are realizing that his personal healing and the very survival of Touch Mother Earth Festivals and events are completely bound together.

Just one week before the festival, our old van died completely, leaving us stranded. Now, we face two immediate, intertwined challenges that we cannot overcome alone: we urgently need your help to raise $10,000 for a dependable replacement vehicle.

Your gift helps keep EarthVibes rolling—literally—and helps us navigate Dave’s recovery. After Dave’s sudden kidney failure, reliable transportation is no longer just about hauling sound gear, wellness supplies, and festival signs; it is also about getting him safely to the many medical appointments, follow-ups, and treatments he now faces. Our old van carried this work for years, but it is beyond repair, and we urgently need a dependable replacement so we can care for Dave, keep serving our community, and keep the music, workshops, and gatherings alive.

When you donate, you’re fueling more than a vehicle. You’re supporting an annual festival that brings people into the forest to reconnect with nature, deepen wellness, and build a caring, sustainable community.

We are reaching out to our beautiful community during one of the most difficult and heartbreaking trials we have ever faced. The weeks before our recent festival were a test of pure endurance. First, our vendor coordinator had to step down for medical reasons. Then, just one week before the gates were set to open, our reliable old van completely died.

Thanks to the immense kindness of our friend and vendor, Richie Olivera, we were able to borrow a van to transport our equipment; without him, the event would have stopped before it even started. But the challenges didn't stop there. As the festival began, an intense heatwave hit. The extreme weather forced a third of our scheduled volunteers to back out, leaving us severely short-handed in the blistering sun.

In the middle of that overwhelming pressure, our family crisis became terrifyingly real. After weeks of preparation and the dangerous heat, Dave’s body began to shut down, and he went into kidney failure. He was rushed to the hospital, where doctors began the urgent work of stabilizing him. While he is now beginning to recover, the scare changed everything in an instant, leaving me to manage the festival responsibilities while also facing the fear, decisions, and uncertainty of his medical emergency.

With Dave in crisis and our team stretched beyond its limits, every part of the festival became harder. Still, we could not walk away from the community that had shown up and was counting on us. Somehow, through fear, exhaustion, and the absence of our main vehicle, we pushed forward so every attendee who braved the heat could still feel the love, music, and spirit at the heart of our gathering.

The heart of our community remains incredibly strong, and the feedback we received was deeply moving. Attendees told us the festival was beautiful and inspiring, with many already committing to return next year from June 11–13. However, because the historic heatwave cut our attendance in half, we did not bring in the critical revenue needed to carry out our organization’s mission throughout the year.

Our vendors suffered, our budget was depleted, and the funds we desperately hoped to use as a down payment for a replacement vehicle evaporated. Dave and I work full-time for six to eight months each year to produce this festival completely without a salary, living on retirement income and supplemental drum gigs. The festival's income normally covers our essential operational expenses, such as insurance, website fees, festival materials, and transportation, leaving us with no safety net to handle a crisis of this scale.

We are genuinely turning to you, our community, for help. Our old van requires over $8,000 in repairs, making it entirely impractical to fix. We are seeking to raise $10,000 to purchase a dependable replacement van so we can get back on the road and continue our mission. This vehicle is the literal engine of our work: we need it to transport 25 to 40 drums to community workshops, senior centers, and libraries, manage our ongoing nonprofit materials, and build the foundation for next year's festival. We are deeply committed to our persistence to serve, but we cannot physically move forward without reliable transportation.

Every single donation, no matter the size, brings us one step closer to recovery and helps us keep Touch Mother Earth Non-Profit going. If you are unable to donate, sharing this fundraiser would mean so much. Your support helps us not only replace our vehicle but also continue serving the community through music, culture, and the festival we have poured our hearts into.

As a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, we are happy to provide receipts for tax purposes. Donations over $1000 will be treated as sponsors for EarthVibes Festival 2027 . We also have a campaign that will automatically give tax receipts .

From the very bottom of our hearts, thank you for reading, donating, sharing, praying, and holding us in your thoughts during this exhausting time. Your kindness is the fuel that gives us hope and keeps our community moving forward.