Shrewsbury Relay for Life

This year's Relay for Life in Shrewsbury had 30 teams and over 300 walkers!!!

This was our first Relay with Katie "off treatment", so we were excited that we didn't have to give her any medicine this year.

Mike spoke during the opening ceremony about Katie's story and she stood up with him looking as cute as can be. I am so proud of Mike for standing up and telling Katie's story.  I certainly never could have done it without breaking down in tears.

After the Opening Ceremony, Katie was honored by cutting the ribbon to kick off the Survivor Lap. I am extremely proud of her too because she is such an inspiration to anyone who knows her and her story.

This year, she proudly walked her survivor lap without her Mike & I and she held the banner along side all the other survivor's...such an amazing little girl.

Her second lap, she walked hand in hand with her cousin. This is so significant because Sophie has been by Katie's side for her whole "leukemia" journey. It's only right that she should be walking with her as a survivor.

Katie's teachers - Miss Nicky, Miss Brook & Miss Becky came to the Relay to support Katie. The owner of her school closed the program down a half hour early so that the teacher's could come to see Katie walk her survivor lap.  We were deeply touched that they came to the Relay. We thanked them for coming and they responded, "No, thank you. Thank you for sharing Katie with us, she is such an inspiration. She has changed our lives." What a touching response.  As Katie's mom, I will always feel that she is an amazing inspiration, but it is nice to hear it from others.

Beatles For Sale rocked the house again this year. I always enjoy listening to some great Beatles music!! Thanks for playing guys, YOU ROCK!!!

Saturday morning, we woke up to Katie's face totally swollen... turns out she was having an allergic reaction to the sunblock that we put on her last night.  We had a sense that she was having a reaction because she was really itchy and we gave her some allergy medicine before she went to bed.  But, we woke up and it was much, much worse. The poor kid could barely open her eyes. So, we took her to Fallon Urgent Care to have it looked at. The doctor prescribed her with prednisone (steroids) for the allergic reaction. She will be on the steroids for a week...oh the joy... So, this was supposed to be our first Relay without any medicine, but SURPRISE! not going to happen! This poor kid just can't cut a break.

But, even with all of this, it didn't dampen Katie's spirits. After our trip to urgent care, we went back to the Relay for the last half of the event. DoDo was supposed to make an appearance, but by the time we got back to the event, people were packing up and he figured it wasn't worth his time to do it.

Katie made the GraftonTimes and the ShrewsburyTimes!!!!

The Shrewsbury Relay for Life has raised over $47,000 to help fund the American Cancer Society programs of research, education, advocacy efforts, and patient support services.

Total Team (G-Squad) Dollars Raised: $$4,843.11 (4 times as much as last year!!!)
Mike & I raised: $955.00 (5 times as much as last year!!!)
Pictures taken (by me): 193 (336 LESS than last year. My camera crapped out on me on Saturday morning and I didn't take a SINGLE picture with my "good" camera on Saturday)