Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY — The story of two Salt Lake City girls folding 1,989 paper cranes for Taylor Swift’s mother received international attention and the girls were awarded Thursday morning with concert tickets and other Swift swag.
Salt Lake City resident Laurie Brady said her daughters, 11-year-old Sam Brady and 8-year-old Jo, became interested in origami and learned about the Japanese legend that if someone folds 1,000 paper cranes they will be granted a wish.
Brady said both girls love Taylor Swift and decided to fold 1,000 paper cranes to “get a wish” and potentially get tickets to her upcoming concert. They later changed their goal to 1,989 paper cranes in honor of Swift’s world tour “1989.”
However, their wish changed when they found out Swift’s mother, Andrea Finlay, had been diagnosed with cancer and they decided to give the cranes to her. The Brady girls made a video of the effort in hopes of garnering attention from Swift so they could get her mother’s address to mail the cranes.
The story was picked up by several national media outlets and even Taylor Swift responded, favoriting KSL.com’s story on Twitter. As a result, when the girls went on a local radio show Thursday morning, they were surprised with four concert tickets to Swift’s sold-out Salt Lake City show on Sept. 4, Brady said. They also received T-shirts, CDs, Swift’s signature perfume, and calendars.
“We are just way excited,” Brady said. “I think the girls are probably still bouncing in their seats at school right now.”
The Bradys will also receive a signed guitar in the next few days. But most importantly, they were put in touch with Swift’s public relations office to mail the paper cranes directly to her mother.
“To us, our end goal has been met,” Brady said. “The very most important thing to us was that we got that address that all those hours and hours and hours of folding are going to get where they need to go… that is the thing we are the most excited about.”
Brady said they have plans to start an organization to fold 1,000 cranes each month to donate to children with cancer.
