Kathy's Cure Trike-A-Thon

The long time former-administrator at Owen and Harris's pre-school, Kathy O'Reilly, is one of the dearest, sweetest people you ever will meet. She battled and defeated breast cancer 5 years ago and then about a month after she retired in September of this year, she found out that she had a reoccurance and she is now battling bone and brain cancer.

She has done so much for our family with Owen and she had worked at the school for 23 years! She really has made that school successful and has devoted her life to it. Her daughter was one of Owen's one year old teachers and her grandson is there, as well. With all that said, can you tell I love this woman? She's amazing.

So many people love her that we are really concerned about her finances since she needs some help right now. So, we got together and did a Trike-a-Thon for her to show her how much all the kids love her and support her. It was so sweet and special. We were scheduled to hold it outside, but today's high was about 44, it rained all last night and it was ugg-lee. So, we moved it indoors to a local church gym. There were 3 different divisions: the fun run (for the youngest kids who can't ride- like Harris), the tricylcle division and the bicycle division (where there were several scooters, as well). We had 3 different tracks for these and it actually worked out pretty well, logistically considering that we (meaning some other people- I was a little late- don't want to take the credit here) threw the tracks together this morning and had to scratch the original outside plan.

Here's our trike rider with his registration:

Here's Owen with Ms. Kathy. He was more interested in riding than posing, but I was so glad to see her. And I'm glad she got to come. She was a trooper!

I know, I know. We found out today that Owen's tricycle is entirely too small. He doesn't ride it alot, so we hadn't noticed. His poor little knees were hitting the bars and are probably bruised, but he was still out there going to town. I think we might work on an upgrade for Christmas.

The kids got a tally mark on their backs each time they completed a lap. We got pledges and donations either per lap or just a flat donation. I just asked for all flat donations because I didn't want to deal with math... or go back to someone and tell them Owen completed 432 laps! Ha! I can't wait to find out how much we raised!

So, please keep Kathy in your prayers. Recent good news is that her chemo is working and she had a clean brain scan this week. Praise God! She is taking treatments at MD Anderson in Houston and having to be driven back and forth every other week (because airplanes have too many germs- more than that room full of kids, though? Doubtful!).