Friends Lamb Auction to Raise Money for Heart Transplant (Exclusive)

Last November, 12-year-old Lexi Anderson began feeling dizzy while playing basketball.

“We were running back and forth on the court and suddenly I stopped,” she recalled. “My eyes turned black and I couldn’t see anything.”

In December 2023, Lexi was diagnosed restrictive cardiomyopathya heart disease in which the muscle tissue in the lower chambers of the heart becomes stiff, leading to reduced blood flow.

“The only cure is a heart transplant,” explains her mother, 45-year-old graphic designer Tamala Anderson. “She’s a strong little girl. He has a real, good heart. It’s just broken.”

Lexi, who was placed on the transplant list on May 13, is still attending school but is not allowed to play gym class or run. “She’s not allowed to be a child,” her mother says. One of the activities Lexi can still participate in: showing animals from her grandparents’ dairy farm at 4-H cattle competitions near her home in Cumberland, Wisconsin.,

At the Barron County fair last July, after judges failed to select Lexi’s lamb as one of the 25 sold at auction, Carla Hargrave suggested to her two daughters – Holly, 13, and Hattie, 15 – that they donate one of their sheep to Lexie.

“We both said yes right away,” says Hattie. The sisters, who live on a 600-acre farm in Spooner, Wisconsin, and help grow crops such as corn and alfalfa, have been showing 4-H animals since the third grade. They chose Holly, who weighed 154 pounds. lamb because it was heavier, thinking it would raise more money.

“(Holly) said, ‘I hope you get a heart transplant and we want to give you money for a lamb,'” Lexi recalled. “I was very happy. She really cares about me. I just love her.

Typically, a lamb at a similar auction can sell for $700-$1,000. But the bidding started when Lexi’s lamb hit the block.

“I was in tears,” says Tamala. “People were just bidding. They bid and bid and bid.”

Lexi’s lamb was purchased, donated and resold four times, raising over $27,000.

“It was amazing to see a small act of kindness turn into something much bigger than I could have imagined,” Holly tells PEOPLE.

The Hargrave family struggled with health problems: 46-year-old Carla beat breast cancer (she has been in remission for three years). Hattie had seizures when she was younger, and their brother has a feeding prosthesis due to a birth defect. Holly herself was born with a cleft lip and palate.

“I have had many surgeries and I know how important it is to have friends and family to support you,” she says.

Echoes Carla: “It’s hard to deal with all these medical issues and you always wonder why. “Why is this happening to us?” But now that you look back, it really taught the kids compassion for others and how important it is to be there for each other, support each other, and pray for each other. It really spread throughout the community how people supported each other (the Andersons) and I pray for them. Lexi has a tough road ahead of her, and being able to ease some of the financial burden so they can really focus on Lexi and her health was really important.”

Tamala says the entire community has come together to help and donate to her daughter’s transplant fund through a website called “Love for Lexi”

“It shows how good the world is,” he says. “I was surrounded by pain. For people to just come together to show love to my child and they don’t even know it. They just want her to be well. We are so grateful for everything people do because we now have one less thing to worry about and our worries are so extreme.”

For more on Lexi and Holly – and others across the country who have performed great acts of kindness – pick up the current issue of PEOPLE, on newsstands now, or subscribe.