WE DID IT!! Avon Walk '09

Nicole, Dawn, Leslie, Kris. Day 1. We're excited to start!!

Though it's been several weeks, I HAD to post about the Avon Walk for a Cure. I did this with my cousin Leslie, her sister Nicole and Nicole's sister-in-law Dawn. We walked in honor of Nicole and Leslie's mom (my aunt) Cheryl. She was often called Cherry, hence the name, the 'Pink Cherries'. :)
We had a wonderful pasta dinner the night before and even went for some yummy Cold Stone Ice-cream. Thanks Uncle Joe and Claudia!! It was hard to get to bed because we were so excited but we somehow managed to get a 'little' bit of sleep and were up bright and early.
They had several blow up pillars. The top picture is of Nicole writing her message. The second is mine.
We thought we were smart getting at the back of the crowd since the following year we heard that ended up being the front. Not this year though. We got stuck and were seriously almost the past people out. Oh well. I got a few sweet pictures along the way.


I loved that so many people came out to support us. The crossing guards, obviously, were dressed in tutu's and many wore pink bra's. Van's drove around with bra's strapped all over them. Posters and sayings everywhere like, "welcome to boob fest", "dudes for boobs", "save the milk makers". I wish I could remember all of them. They were really funny.
Several of the rest stations had different 'themed' cheer groups. This particular on had drag queens. Awesome! Everywhere we went we had amazing cheerleaders. Especially Nicole's family who followed us most of the two days and even walked with us for several miles. They were a constant support and it was so great to see their fun cheers. They even brought us yummy cupcakes to eat along the way! The best part was that they walked the last 2 miles of day 2 with us across the finish line.
Me and Leslie. It was so fun to catch up with Leslie. I probably talked her to boredom but it was so fun to learn new things about her and reflect on the amazing person her mother was. She also made a cool site of her pictures at www.leukhardt.org.
Day 1 was 26.2 miles. When we got to the sign, it seemed like 'forever' until the finish. Seriously, we think they marked it wrong.
My knee was starting to hurt by mile 26. Probably because I'm a slacker and should have trained a little better. doh!
We made it!! The sweet part was that we had to walk another 1/4 mile back and forth across the field to get to our tents and the bathrooms. :) It's all good though. We had yummy food and a much enjoyed hot shower. We slept in tents and giggled until we finally dropped on our pillows. Nicole was totally prepared and I kept calling her mother hen. Thank goodness she was so on top of it and there to help us.
Day 2: I woke up with a sore knee. That was not a good sign. Especially since we still had another 13 plus miles to go. The last 2 miles was very difficult with my knee. Not to mention that as we walked across the top of these stairs, it was obviously a loop and everyone was passing us on the bottom of them. Thankfully, Leslie and I were so sore we didn't think we could actually walk down the stairs to cheat and our integrity was kept in tact. :)


It rained all of day 2 but it was still a wonderful experience. Nicole was so happy! She totally out walked me! :)
Me and Leslie. Yahoo!!
The 'Pink Cherries"

This was seriously a very rewarding experience. I met some amazing people and got to hear their inspiring stories of sadness and hope. It was harder than I thought to walk that far but it makes me feel stronger. Cancer is a battle, it hurts and many times they feel as if they can't go on. We felt like that in some ways. Gives me hope to face whatever may come in the future.
Our team "The Pink Cherries", raised $9,152!!! The total money raised for the Washington DC '09 walk was $6.8 million!! That's amazing!
You can check out the Avon Walk site for more info about what they do with the money and how it helps. Also, there are many other sites you can participate in the future. A big thank you to ALL of YOU who helped support us. We couldn't have done it without you!!