We have so much to update from July! First I'll start with Love McKinley, Inc. We had our annual golf tournament on July 15 and this year we switched up the format to include a dinner the night before the golf tournament & about 200 people were in attendance (including some Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital families & staff). We raised close to $60,000 which is truly overwhelming. We presented a check to my friends, the Gilkey Family, which was a donation to The Benjamin Gilkey Foundation for Innovative Research. Not a day goes by I don't think of Benji.
Love McKinley, Inc has accomplished so much in our short time as a 501c3 and we have so much more to be done. We are SO grateful for all of you & the difference you're making in these sweet kids lives. Putting these events together could not of happened without the help of many many volunteers from this group! McKinley has a lot of love surrounding her & we are very blessed to have you all on our team. I looked around that room on that Friday & couldn't imagine this journey without every single one of you. It was an emotional, humbling, proud, grateful weekend ❤️
Now on to the warrior, McKinley herself. Well she had her LAST IV chemo this month & is scheduled to stop taking all her oral chemo meds on August 3rd & that will complete her treatment. A long 2 years & 3 months of treatment and we are almost done. This milestone brings up so much emotion & anxiety. I know the chemo was working & keeping this terrible disease away. Now I have to trust in Him that she is completely healed and that it will NEVER return. It's a feeling I can't really describe. I'm so happy for her but I truly am scared. She'll be attending VPK this year & starts school August 10! I'm so excited for her to be a normal kid again. Her immune system will take about 6 months to recover so we will adhere to her current on treatment protocol with regards to fever, germs, etc. Thank you all so so much for your continued love, support & prayer. Please continue to keep her in your thoughts & prayers as we enter this new exciting, scary, grateful life.
❤️ Karen
Watch McKinley ring the bell!