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Hi! My name is Kylie Flanagan. I am a 17-year-old junior at The Branson School in Marin County. I am positively thrilled to announce the launching of Nancy's Club with Nancy Novack. Nancy has developed a beautiful grassroots community non-profit organization to support everyone living with cancer and those who love and care for them. Nancy's List provides resources and relationships and creates an empowered community. The mission of Nancy's List is simple: NO ONE WILL EVER GO THROUGH CANCER ALONE. Nancy and I realize that an important population is largely left out of the conversation: the kids. Marin is one of the most cancer-afflicted counties in the country. Thousands of children are touched by cancer in some way. It is anticipated that there will be 1,465 new cases of cancer in Marin in 2010 ... you do the math. Nancy and I are committed to the mission of Nancy's Club: NO CHILD, FROM KINDERGARTEN THROUGH HIGH SCHOOL, WILL EVER GO THROUGH CANCER ALONE. Whether they themselves are battling the disease or are watching a parent, sibling, grandparent, teacher, a family pet, or a special friend go through it, they need support. And so Nancy's Club will exist to inspire the middle- and high-school community of Marin to form a collective system to support, understand, provide friendship and joy, and unite, to assure that the youth of Marin will have the opportunity to be connected (and have some fun along the way). As one young Club member said, “I don’t want to go to a therapist or a support group, but a Club is way cool.” Cancer is a powerful disease, but we think we can fuel its might into uniting communities, not disconnecting them. Kids in all schools of Marin will come together and receive support from the Nancy’s Club support teams, coming together to lend advice or a shoulder, share laughter and friendship. We have some special projects we think would be great fun to do together ... group trips to professional sporting events, drumming lessons, whale-watching trips, kayaking lessons, white-water rafting, surfing, skiing adventures, rock-climbing, a couple parties with live music, making our own band with some Marin rockers, a Giggle Group every month with the local comedians, a field trip to Safari West, horseback riding, hanging out in the City, at Stinson, on Angel Island, and more. We plan tennis clinics, cooking classes, makeovers (with carcinogen-free cosmetics, of course), evenings at the movies. We want to provide academic assistance, athletic coaching, and music instruction, and all extra-curricular activities that often go by the wayside when cancer comes along. Ultimately, we want our own clubhouse. To launch Nancy's Club, we are planning an outrageous one-of-a-kind concert to capture the attention of Marin’s youth and adults alike, to raise awareness and funds, and to share a whole lot of fun. And then there is the serious stuff. Everyone who is living with cancer needs a 'buddy' ... someone who understands and will hang in when things get weird. Most importantly, someone who will just listen. We will create small groups of Members with a Big Buddy. We will provide free counseling by Nancy, a licensed clinical psychologist, a blog section on our website, and message boards and chat rooms. Our website will have a calendar of events, educational material on preventing and dealing with cancer, resource pages, pictures, and more. It will be a great informational and community-building tool. This is a project dreamed up and made real by the amazing kids in our community. I will be the team leader for the teens. Nancy will be standing right beside me, helping in any way she can. Please consider WHAT we are doing and WHY ... and then please help us. Donations are needed to outreach to the youth, to get our website going, create the launch event, and structure our first few Club activities. Please send your contribution to Nancy’s List (a 501 c-3 non-profit organization … tax ID is EIN #20-5898260) at 240 Almonte Boulevard, Mill Valley, California 94941 or donate on the Google Checkout on any page of the Nancy’s List website. We need sponsors and hosts and hostesses to create terrific events. We hope that Bay Area individuals and businesses will jump at this opportunity to bring smiles to the faces of these kids. Thank you so much for your support. Kylie Flanagan kylie@familyflanagan.com ♥♥♥♥♥ ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ ♥♥ ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ TO BE A MEMBER OF THE CLUB ....
If you are a student from kindergarten through high school and your life is touched by cancer and you would like to be a Member of Nancy's Club, please email me and I will sign you up ... kylie@familyflanagan.com TO JOIN THE STUDENT SUPPORT TEAMS .... If you are a middle- or high-school student in Marin and want to help out on our support teams, please email Kylie. TO REFER A CHILD OR TEEN TO NANCY'S CLUB ...If you know a child who may benefit from our Club, please refer her or him to this website. If you would like cards to give to these children, please contact Nancy and we will mail them to you. nancy@nancyslist.org TO SPONSOR AN EVENT FOR NANCY'S CLUB ... Contact Nancy. With immense gratitude .....
♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ In just a few days time of announcing our new club, the community has responded in its own magnificent style. The children and families of Mill Valley Montessori School and their awesome teacher Susan Lissberger exemplified the spirit of Nancy's Club in their sweetness and generosity. These 17 children, ages 3 and 4, made wonderful wonderful valentines and collected toys and art supplies and blankets and hats and socks and stuffed animals for the 29 young children in the pediatric oncology unit at UCSF Children's Hospital. They made a beautiufl paper chain to fill all the rooms. Susan even included a huge box of chocolates for the nurses and caregivers. When we delivered the many many boxes of extraordinary love-filled gifts, 4-year-old Siena said to me, "My heart feels so big!"
Thank you to magical Susan Lissberger, the parents of these wonderful children, and Mill Valley Art & Paper for their exquisite gifts to the children in our big community. Susan and the Mill Valley Montessori community are "adopting" the pediatric oncology unit at UCSF and will present them with an abundance of gifts throughout the year. If you want to join this magnificent gesture, please send $5 - 10 to Nancy's Club and the children will make a gorgeous heart for one of the patients .... with your name on the card, if you so wish. Send your check to Nancy's Club, 240 Almonte Boulevard, Mill Valley 94941. With immense gratitude to Susan and the entire MV Montessori community for teaching us that we can realllllllllly make a difference.
Nancy's Club ROCKS! We are incredibly grateful for the support of Christine and Derek Featherstone to help create our concert, to Irene Kotnik and Jake Messing for assistance with our logo and website, to Dianne Andrews for offering sailing trips on the Bay for families living with cancer. The support keeps pouring in. Please say yes..... I am inspired by Cayla Mihalovich and her team of students at The Branson School who deliver home-cooked meals to an individual or a family who is living with cancer. Two or three students prepare and deliver meals every Friday night for their clients, and spend a visit together for a couple of hours. The students create their menus with the guidance of Rebecca Katz, author of The Cancer-Fighting Kitchen. One of the best aspects of the program is that the students usually stay in the program for 3 - 4 years and are really able to develop meaningful friendships with the clients. If you know a person or a family who would enjoy this generous and delicious experience with the Branson team, please contact Nancy. I hope that this super model of community support can spread around the county, that other high schools will follow their lead, and families will 'adopt' families and 'break bread' together. Second graders at the Bacich School in Kentfield, with the help of the seniors at The Tamalpais in Greenbrae, and 1st and 3rd graders at Old Mill School in Mill Valley made wonderful get-well holiday cards for cancer patients at Kaiser Permanente and Marin General. Dena Selix, the lovely program coordinator for Bridging Generations and Love is the Answer (LITA), partnered with Nancy's List to make this wonderful project happen (www.litamarin.org) . Many, many, many of the cards had peace signs .... 'made in Marin'. The children from the First Friends Montessori Preschool made a huge sunflower for one of the local hospitals. Each of the petals has a child's handprints. So adorable. It is my hope that more children in more schools in Marin will follow this loving gesture. I will be pleased to pick up the gifts and deliver them to our friends in the hospitals. It truly warms my heart to have the children, teens, and seniors in our community participate in Nancy's Club. ♥♥♥♥ HAPPENINGSART INSPIRING HOPE 16th Annual Art Inspiring Hope Gala
Saturday, March 6, 5 - 11:30 pm
Herbst Pavilion,. Fort Mason Center, San Francisco
A benefit for Camp Okizu 
Every year. Okizu holds a fundraiser entitled Art Inspiring Hope: A Child's Struggle with Cancer. This event helps make it possible for over 700 children to attend Camp Okizu each year. Camp Okizu offers programming for children with cancer and their families at no charge. The annual black-tie evening has a different elaborate theme each year, with gourmet food, specialty drinks, silent and live auctions, and headline entertainment.
Past performers have included Huey Lewis & The News, Sheryl Crow, The Robert Cray Band, and the Doobie Brothers. Okizu (oak-eye-zoo) comes from the Sioux language and means unity, to come together, to heal from a hurt, to make whole. The mission of Okizu is to provide recreation, respite, and peer support programs to meet the needs of all members of families affected by childhood cancer. Okizu camping programs are the result of a collaborative effort by Okizu and the pediatric oncology treatment programs of Northern California. Okizu offers the unique opportunity for children with cancer and their siblings to learn independence, develop self-esteem, and gain skills they never thought possible. At camp, kids are just kids, and they can feel comfortable being themselves in a safe, trusted environment. It is a place for fun, the birth of lasting friendships, and the development of self-confidence. Children who are diagnosed with cancer often miss out on the joys of a normal childhood. Their illnesses, the time consumed by treatments, their physical limitations, and concerns about how they are perceived by their peers, keep them from enjoying activities that other kids take for granted. Yet, these children, like all children, need the opportunity to grow, explore, discover who they are, and just have fun. Camp Okizu nurtures their development in a setting
where there is no need for them to feel self-conscious.
Recognizing that childhood cancer affects the entire family, Okizu also provides a camp for the siblings of children with cancer. Okizu's SIBS (Special and Important Brothers and Sisters) Camp meets the often-neglected needs of healthy children when all energies are understandably focused on the sick child's treatment. One of only a few such camps in the United States, SIBS Camp allows these kids to feel valued, and gives them the opportunity to learn they are not the only ones coping with the conflicting and difficult emotions that accompany having a sibling with cancer. While at camp, the children are in a trusted environment
where they can share their feelings and gain support from other campers and the staff.Okizu's Family Camp is designed to give the whole family a few days of worry-free fun, play, and relaxation. It is an opportunity to 'get away' with others who share common experiences. Many families consider these weekends to be the highlight of their year, when new and lasting friendships are made.
Each dollar raised at Art Inspiring Hope goes directly to support a child's summer camp experience. Because of our minimal administrative costs and our generous all-volunteer camp staff during the summer, the funds we raise on this special night can be earmarked solely for camp operations. It is our goal to raise enough money to send campers to both the oncology and siblings summer camp programs. Contact Sarah Udricks at 415. 383. 1503 or sarah@okizu.org for more information or visit www.okizu.org BAYKIDS UCSF PREMIER 2010 Sunday, March 21, 1 - 3 pm
Koret Auditorium at the de Young Museum
50 Hagiwara Tea Graden Drive, San FranciscoRoll out the red carpet!! BayKids is recognizing our talented young moviemakers from UCSF. Please join us to celebrate our kids' accomplishments and view their work. Please RSVP by Wednesday March 17th by sending an email to rsvp@baykids.org BayKids empowers children facing medical challenges to find joy through the art of film-making. Working in partnership with Children's Hospital and Research Center Oakland and UCSF Children's Hospital, BayKIds teaches digital film-making skills to hospitalized children. Through our programs, children discover their own unique voice and creativity while learning film-making, teamwork, and leadership skills. As of July 2009, BayKids has helped over 5,000 children and their families get through cancer and other medical conditions. BayKids' roots took hold in 1995 when founder Dave Spencer started a community outreach program for the San Francisco Giants. Inspired by the program's success in helping children, Dave founded BayKids in 1997 with the goal of offering new and innovative ways to empower children through self-expression. Initially, BayKids developed cutting-edge multimedia programs to teach kids how to create websites, animated shorts, narrative films, documentaries, music and art. Today, BayKids has evolved to focus its multimedia expertise on serving children in the Bay Area facing medical challenges. 1007 General Kennedy Avenue, Box 10
San Francisco 94129
415. 561.6262
info@baykids.org
www.baykids.org ♥♥♥♥RESOURCES FOR CHILDREN Click on the tab RESOURCES on the Home page. Click BY POPULATION. Click CHILDREN. FOR TEENS AND YOUNG ADULTS Click on the tab RESOURCES on the Home page. Click BY POPULATION. Click TEENS.
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