High Five Gang!

Here are just a few of my many pictures from doing the Relay for Life in Fife-Milton-Edgewood.  I did this for you dad, you are awesome.  We don’t talk a lot about it, but you getting cancer was a scary part of our family history, and I wanted to celebrate your courage, commitment and  survival some way.  When I brought this up, I wasn’t sure how it would all come together, but with the help of everyone, we did it.  I think this event ended up being such a great experience.

Our multi-family garage sale was a lot of work.  Mom and Stephanie you really helped when me and my girls got sick, so thank you many times over.  Thanks for the treats for the garage sale, the hours Matt and everyone spent setting up, and getting of donations.  So many things went into that that I can’t thank you enough.  Thanks Matt & Ilea for all the donations, and Ken thanks always for supporting me and spending the day haggling with garage sale shoppers. 

Thanks Stephanie for all the jewelry and hair clips at the Relay itself, Christina for the rice krispy supplies, Ilea for the cake & help, Matt for the awnings, mom and dad for the snacks, tables and chairs, drinks and RV, and everyone for walking along with me and my family.  I couldn’t have even thought of doing this if I didn’t have such a great family support, and that . 

Here are a few pictures from this 24 hour long event.

Cute Camille

Isaac was great at entertaining the younger cousins.

I never knew that a wagon could entertain so many kids for so long.  Even Claire wanted to pull people around the field with it.

I love the sign we made for everyone to learn about colon cancer.  Did you know how common it is?

Here are all the cute things Stephanie sold to raise money. 

This Fife Milton Edgewood Relay for Life had a theme of “Cancer is a Beach, Let’s Make some Waves!”  For Alicia, that meant wearing her hulu outfit as she walked around holding our hulu themed “totem,” our baton we were supposed to have on the field at all times.  We probably had it on the field 23 of the 24 hours (we stopped for the luminary celebration around 10 o’clock, but that was the only time it wasn’t on the field). I appreciated my friends from Discovery Primary who helped us make this fancy totem when I hadn’t realized we needed one about 20 minutes into the walk.

Here are dad & mom, whom I dedicate my walk to.  It may look like we are sitting all the time, but I promise our feet were sore from all the walking.

I have such a cute family.

Here is Stephanie’s luminary for her Mother-in-law.

The sign next to Alicia shows gratitude for mom’s generous contribution,  dad had one as well.  The luminaries were also ones we had done.

Our family picture, and yes we have been working out .

These pictures show the end of the sunny, perfect weather.  I went home to sleep while Matt & Ilea took the middle of the night shift (thank you bro.)  I came back with Tabatha at 5 am, and the weather had turned from warm and beautiful to rain showers and wind.

We powered through the rain, although Tabatha took my pullover to stay warm.  After a pancake breakfast, the girls did a few sack races and a pinata, Christina and her girls came back out as did my parents, and we made it until noon, but it was very cold by the end. 

Was all of this worth it.  I think so.  My girls know that cancer is worth fighting against.  They learned about relatives who had it, we talked about friends, they saw teachers around the track wearing wigs because they were fighting it RIGHT NOW.  I am grateful to have been part of this event because as a family I think we grew closer.  It was a lot of work, but as we were leaving the field after cleaning up, mom and dad both with sore feet (dad powered through with a bone spur), mom said to my dad and I, “we should make this a yearly tradition.”  

That could be a definite possibility.