Sweet Charity and Bachelorettes

Since winning the 2022 Parker County Today Sweet Charity and Bachelorette Award, Carsyn Carter has been amazed at the number of calls she’s received and the messages passed along through coworkers congratulating her on the accomplishment.

    Carsyn was one of five hardworking ladies who raised a grand total of $826,654.31 for four local charities, all of whom are much appreciated; but Carsyn raised over half of that total herself — $437,311.16 — for her partner charity Freedom House.

    She doesn’t take the credit for herself, however, but instead expresses how grateful she is for the amazing amount of support from the community. Her experience in raising funds for Freedom House was both scary and gratifying for Carsyn, who says she was out of her comfort zone when she began knocking on businesses’ doors fundraising for Freedom House. “I didn’t know if I had the confidence to do so, but once I started, it would lead to five more introductions, so it was both cool and scary.”

    The words she uses to describe the process of reaching out to community members that she normally wouldn’t have a reason to contact are “interesting, challenging, and enjoyable.” Carsyn says she was “amazed to see different community members come together for the cause.” She is also very happy for Freedom House to have benefitted from her efforts and is “proud to have represented them and help fundraise.”

    Carsyn also was “really surprised how many people would talk to me, and how many have reached out after to offer their congratulations.” Her outreach felt “like a shot in the dark” — which should she focus on more, ticket sales or donations? But she found that community members didn’t really care about winning any of the potential goodies, such as wine or gift baskets; they just wanted to help. “What they did was for the county, not for themselves,” she says.

    She also came away with some new friendships, as she and fellow bachelorettes Haley Morris, Katie Eaton, Erin Glenn and Kate Hogan met together to prepare for the event. They received information on the process involved in being a Bachelorette and then set about their fund-raising, meeting a few times throughout the weeks leading up to the event ceremony.

    Carsyn shouldn’t be too surprised at the spirit of generosity in the Parker County community, as she’s a fifth-generation Texan on both maternal and paternal sides of her family. The Lone Star state is known for its friendliness (our state motto, after all, is “friendship”), and out of that same tradition comes the desire to help those around us.

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