Reno Area Hug Your Kids Press Releases

Hug Your Kids Night at the Aces (not part of Artown) - July 20, 2009

Hug photos Click here
Color Reno event flyer with Reno photos Click here

For more information, contact Michelle Nichols, founder National Hug Your Kids Day (775) 303-8201 cell or hugs@hugyourkidstoday.com

Reno, NV -- What do you get when you cross baseball, hugs and familes? Hug Your Kids Night at the Aces! It is part of National Hug Your Kids Day, which is Monday, July 20 this year. The event, sponsored by Model Dairy, will start at 5:45 p.m.in front of the new Aces ballpark, with free Model Dairy ice cream, the Hug High cheerleaders, and at least two special guests - the new Washoe County School District superintendent Dr. Heath Morrison, and Drew Simpson. The event will conclude around 6:30 p.m. with "The Biggest Little Hug" - a photo of all the parents hugging their children. Families can then purchase tickets to see more Hug Your Kids fun during the Aces game, or walk to Wingfield Park to see the free play "Babe," about a talking pig.

Dr. Morrison, the father of 4th- and 7th-grade children of his own, was scheduled to fly out of Reno the afternoon of the event but when he heard about Hug Your Kids Night, he changed his travel plans so he could meet and speak to hundreds of WCSD families. Drew Simpson is the former Reno HIgh School star pitcher, who fell down a flight of stairs in 2008 and suffered a severe brain injury. The doctors weren't sure he would survive the night, but a year later, he is back to baseball and he will throw out the first pitch of the Aces game. He and his parents, Janet and Scott Simpson, will share their thoughts on what it means to them to be able to hug their loved ones.

"Hugging your kids is a privilege," says Michelle Nichols, of Reno, Nevada, the founder of the holiday. In 2008, she left her prestigious position as the sales columnist for BusinessWeek.com to start the event in honor of her son Mark, who she lost suddenly ten years earlier when he was 8 1/2 years old. "The doctors thought he just had the flu, and eleven days later, he died of brain cancer," she explains. Mark was a gifted student at Roy Gomm and Huffaker Elementary schools, and attended Good Shepherd Lutheran church. He was a Cub Scout and played local youth basketball, baseball and soccer.

On the five year anniversary of his death, her family had two billboards put up along major highways in Houston, Texas, that read: Hug Your Kids Today. We Wish We Could. In Memory of Mark Nichols. 1989 - 1998. Five years later, it seemed only fitting to Nichols, a sales expert and entrepreneur, to take that message and turn it into a national holiday.

The holiday's message is for all parents - mother and fathers, grandparents too. "It's so easy to run out the door to work in the morning, and rush right past your family. It's like they're furniture. Yet what really matters in life is your relationships, especially your relationships with your family - your children and your spouse or partner." She started the holiday to remind parents everywhere to stop and hug their kids.

She doesn't work alone. Local and nationwide corporate sponsors have eagerly stepped in with their support. Clear Channel Outdoor is expected to donated digital billboards in fifteen major cities across the US. for the day that read "Hug Your Kids Today." Five Major League Baseball teams will announce the holiday on their Jumbotrons during their games. Eight Gannett newspapers will run contests and articles about the holiday. Besides the Reno event on the holiday, in Ottawa, Canada, their junior hockey team will have Hug Your Kids Night on October 25. In all, they expect to have something going on in 26 states for the holiday.

For her efforts, Nichols won the coveted 2008 Governor's Award for Start-up of the Year. Her book, the handbook for the holiday, Hug Your Kids Today! 5 Key Lessons for Every Working Parent, was a finalist for the Best Books award. It is available at Amazon.com or www.HugYourKidsToday.com. Her plans for 2009 and beyond are even more ambitious.

What's the ultimate goal of National Hug Your Kids Day? "World domination," jokes Nichols. "Seriously, our plan is to change the world's families, one million hugs at a time. Once we get to several million hugs per day worldwide, momentum will kick in. Our ultimate goal is that there will come a day, when every child around the world will be hugged by a parent or guardian."

And it all starts with a hug.