Kids with lemonade stand inspire strangers to donate $150,000 to a children's hospital

When two young siblings and their friends donated their lemonade stand earnings to a local children's hospital, it inspired others to give. And they kept giving, until eventually they had raised a combined $150,000.

What's the story?

Young Beatrice "Bea" Weidner was diagnosed with a rare and serious liver condition when she was only 6 months old, and had to get a transplant. Now, five years later, Bea's parents decided that Bea, her sister, and two friends should donate the $148 they raised from a lemonade stand to Cincinnati Children's Hospital to help children like Bea.

"Because I was a match for her, I was able to donate before she became too sick," Bea's mother, Hillary Weidner explained. "There are many kids and adults who don't have that luxury."

She posted a picture of the lemonade stand and explained the donation on Instagram on Sept. 1.

The story began gaining traction. By Saturday, people inspired by Bea and her friends had given Weidner $9,000 for the hospital.

On Saturday, she shared her Venmo account in case anyone else wanted to donate to help the hospital, and the results were staggering. By Monday, the donations reached $50,000, and by Tuesday morning, it had climbed to $125,000.

On Tuesday evening, Hillary commented on one of her posts to announce "We just hit $150,000! Thank you all for your support and love for lemonAID!"

With this flood of donations came media coverage, including by ABC's "Good Morning America."

"The news can be so negative. There are shootings, deaths, car accidents. We wanted to show that there are good people out there," Weidner told GMA.