Relay for Life 2016

We did it - we celebrated another Relay for Life & it was great! After months of planning, we finally lucked out & had perfect weather & a huge attendance! We don't have final numbers yet, but we did much better than last year. So far, we have raised over $65,000! And technically, we will continue to collect donations through the summer before we close the books in August. We even have a couple of fundraisers planned for this summer, including a big tennis tournament that netted $10,000 so I am hoping we will still meet my personal goal of $75,000.

 

Friday morning started off calm. I stayed up until 3:00 the night before finalizing everything so I let myself sleep in. I had a few last minute errands to run so the girls came with me & I took them to brunch:

 

I knew I needed a good meal before the day got away from me. And I wanted to spend some extra time with them before the craziness hit. We ate at Celebrity Café because we had to pick up some donated cookies:

 

 

Yes, that is a lot of cookies! They said they would donate some but I was shocked when I got there & saw how many! Not only did they taste good, but they were beautifully decorated! My parents met us at the restaurant & they took the girls so I could go meet Cody at the school. Cody works for the American Cancer Society & has been my true partner over the past couple of months. This event could not have happened without him:

 

 

Those are the only pictures I took! After that, I was running around crazy most of the night. I hardly got to talk to anyone or enjoy the event but luckily most of my family & friends took pictures & shared them with me. So here we go - a night at Relay:

 

We had the same team together again - the Cancer Crushers - with several additions. Bryan's uncle Paul was diagnosed with cancer earlier this year so we were so excited to have them join us:

 

 

We also had both of Bryan's grandmothers come along & my family drove in again for the weekend. And of course we had a ton of friends - we had so many friends stop by & couldn't keep up with all of them! I am so thankful for their support & I know my girls had a blast running around with all of their friends & their cousins:

 

 

We started the night with an opening ceremony where I actually had to speak to everyone - like 700 or 800 people!

 

 

And of course the first lap is the survivor lap:

 

 

The second lap is our caregiver lap:

 

 

After that, the track was open for the entire evening & someone was walking at all times. If you weren't walking, there was plenty of entertainment from local singers, cloggers & even the Dallas Cowboys Rhythm & Blues dancers:

 

 

We even had a couple of mascots walking around including Rowdy (from the Dallas Cowboys) The Chick Fil A Cow & a couple of high school mascots:

 

 

There was a food court with Brooklyn's Pizza, Chick Fil A chicken sandwiches, Dickey's Barbecue sandwiches, cookies & a snow cone truck:

 

 

This year we even opened a kid zone with face painters, crafts from Home Depot, bubbles, hula hoops & a bounce house! The kids loved it:

 

 

They had fun participating in a cake walk:

 

 

But mostly everyone just had fun hanging out on the football field all night running around, playing games & visiting with each other:

 

 

Apparently Kason & Sadie even got to pie a doctor in his face!

 

 

Once it got dark, we had our luminaria ceremony. This is by far the highlight of the night. We line the track with the luminaria bags in honor of someone who either lost their fight to cancer, is currently battling or has beaten it. We have a slideshow in honor of all of those mentioned & we have a cancer survivor speak. This year I was proud to introduce Anna, who is a student here in FISD who beat Leukemia. We also had Sadie & Riley dress up as angels again to lead the memory walk:

 

 



 

I am so thankful Paul's family was able to join us this year since he is a new survivor:

 

 

And what would I do without the Cancer Crushers:

 

 

This isn't even all of us! This picture was taken pretty late in the evening so several people had already gone home. I am so thankful to have the support of these family & friends over the past couple of months as I put in tireless hours to make this event happen. And it couldn't have been done without our committee either:

 

 

Yet again, this is not all of us. This is just the few of us that were still hanging around at 2:00 in the morning after we finally got everything cleaned up:

 

 

And yes, that is the way we really felt!

 

Thank you everyone for your support! I am proud to have helped raise funds for a cause that means a lot to me & my family. It was a fun night & I enjoyed celebrating with everyone. Now it's time to take a break & enjoy summer for a while :)