relay for life

this past weekend was the annual relay for life. this years theme was: 

 and the fundraising goal was $127,000 (last year they raised over $125,000)

my mom has been on a team for about 10 years, and my dad has been a "battle-er" for 4 years now. so we have lots of memories of the relay down by the river. the team my mom was on sold rootbeer & orange floats this year. i volunteered to be the official taste tester and both were good, but i think rootbeer floats will always be better than orange or creamsicle or whatever you want to call em.

ive never been to a different city for their relay for life but here we have plenty of different entertainment and activities, from bagpipes to the drumline, to a butterfly release, speaker, survivor (or as dad prefers "battle-er") picture, silent auction and then of course lighting the luminary bags. im not exactly sure how many bags there are but id say at least a thousand. and then of course going to all the stands to buy things...from the floats, subway sandwiches, desserts, games and so much more, theres definitely a lot to do and see. 



Kenzie & Dad

luminary bags. thats one of my favorite things. each team/team member decorates the "in memory of" or "in honor of " bags differently so i love to walk to the lap and look at all the different decorations. i might be a BIT biased, but these were my favorite. mom got creative and used pictures of stained glass my dad has done & used them for his bags.  

another one of my favorite parts is a different part of the luminaries. the pathway is down by the river and at a certain point theres a hill across the river. a few years ago (well it seems like a few years but it could be more---ive learned this weekend im getting old) so anyways, a few years they created a message on this hill.



simply: HOPE. and halfway through the night its switched to LOVE. simple but yet memorable.

the relay goes from friday night to saturday at 5 am. so it can be a very long night, especially for the best emcee ever. who was that you ask? ya-ya mary of course. (fyi she also makes a great friend and personal attendant/organizer/planner if you were by chance getting married last summer. just sayin.) she once again did a great job.

we however did not stay that late.  we left around 1 to a musical medley of  a car alarm. but thats a different story for a different day. feel free to ask mom about that one ;) this years relay, just like years past had a lot of great memories and raised a lot of money for research. hopefully that research pays off soon. until then, you'll find my parents (and me if i get the weekend off) down by the river the first weekend in august. 

p.s. in case you were wondering, it takes 4 people to clean & sanitize the ice cream machine. heres the proof: