great strides

On Sunday our family took part in the Great Strides walk for Cystic Fibrosis. It was a great event to participate in, and our little fundraiser in DeWitt, MI raised over $30,000. We had great support from family and friends, not only in helping us raise over $2,100 as a team, but many came and walked with us. It was not a beautiful day, it was quite chilly. And the walk which we figured would probably be about a mile or two, turned out to be five miles! But it was fun anyways!

Me, Baby R and Rick

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Mitch, Steph and Skyler came to support us!

Grandma and Grandpa (not pictured) came too! In fact, Grandpa walked the entire 5 miles by himself! Well he did lean on Grandma for part of it, but that was just to keep from tipping over - he moved his legs by himself! Aunt Pat, Uncle Chuck, and Steve kept driving by him to try to pick him up, but he insisted that he would make it the whole 5 miles by himself! He said that may be all that he can actually do for Baby R, so he didn't want to give up. Now he won't be able to move all week, what a sacrifice!

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Uncle Nick was there too! He is such a strong supporter for Baby R. He single-handedly raised about half of our team's donations. He also made great CDs for everyone who participated with us. I'll have to post a playlist, because the songs are very uplifting and motivating!

Karyna was a great sport too! She rode in the Baby Bjorn for the whole walk, which probably helped Nick burn mucho calories!

Austin and Nayeli joined the festivities.

The back of the t-shirts that Mike made for us...

The Babbling Brooks take Great Strides for Cystic Fibrosis

Other walkers that I didn't get pictures of:

• Beth and Rob Cebelak
• Aunt Pat, Uncle Chuck and Steve Cross
• Dave, Victoria, Wyck and Embeth Hall
• Allison Miller
• Grandpa Miller
• Amol and Kanchan Pavangadkar
• Molly Stump

This is such an important event for Cystic Fibrosis, because the Great Strides walks are the biggest fundraisers for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. We learned that there are 26 different cures that are being researched at the moment, but there isn't enough money for all of them. That is why it is so important to raise money, so that we can find a cure soon! Apparently one of the retired pulmonologists from Lansing said that he thinks they will find a cure within a decade! That would be such a wonderful miracle, to find a cure in Baby R's lifetime!