Noteworthy

9-year-old Raleigh girl selling paintings for charity

Nine-year-old Olivia McGuire is using her passion for painting to raise money for breast cancer patients and to help victims of last month's theater massacre in Aurora, Colo.

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RALEIGH, N.C. — For 9-year-old Olivia McGuire, of Raleigh, seeing a canvas transform into a work of art just comes naturally.

"I've always liked to color and paint and draw and stuff," the Pleasant Union Elementary School fourth-grader said Tuesday.

This summer, the paintings piled up, and when her mother asked her what she wanted to do with them, Olivia had the idea to sell them and donate the money to a good cause.

At $20 each, she's raised more than $1,000 in less than a week, and she's received orders for at least 60 more paintings.

"With just doing what I like, I can help other people," Olivia said.

Olivia decided to donate the money to 1in9, an organization committed to helping people battle breast cancer, and to the victims of last month's theater massacre in Aurora, Colo.

She plans to keep painting until Aug. 18, when school starts back.

"I've always know that she's amazing, but to hear it out of her own mouth, for her to come up with it on her own, I was beaming with pride," he mother, Nicole McGuire, said. "I don't think she understands how big what she's doing is right now.”

Tanya Drake already got her painting.

"I think it's absolutely incredible that she's motivated to spend her time helping others," Drake said.

For Olivia, it just comes naturally.

"I'm glad, because it's helping people," she said.

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