Mission: Possible

As part of our unification to form the new Greater Bay Area Chapter, the Mission: Possible Blog is now part of LLS: Truly Relentless. Be sure to visit LLS: Truly Relentless to find out all the latest happenings and stories here at the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. And don’t forget to subscribe to get every new post delivered directly to your inbox!

Earth Day is Monday, and what better way to celebrate than with a 5K or 10K walk/run in our beautiful Bay Area?! The San Jose Water company is sponsoring this walk/run on Saturday, April 20th on the Guadalupe River Trail to benefit the Guadalupe River Park Conservancy. The race begins at 438 Coleman Avenue in Downtown San Jose, and will be part of the celebration of the paving of the Guadalupe River Trail north to Alviso. Be sure to bring the whole family, as kids can participate in the 1K event. Come on down and run or walk on the flat, fast trail and enjoy our Spring in Guadalupe Gardens Festival. Be sure to stop by LLS’s booth and say hello!

TNT participants: Check your manager’s updates for a $5 off code. Visit www.grpg.org to learn more. Register here.

As a supporter of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, I’m sure you’ve learned by now that we love to have some fun in the name of finding cures for blood cancer. These next couple weeks are no exception, as our Man & Woman of the Year campaigns in both Silicon Valley and Monterey are getting closer to their finale dates. This year’s candidates have gotten very creative, from wine tastings to fitness classes, jewelry sales to car washes. Please check out the details below for upcoming candidate events and be sure to join us for one or all of them!

Saturday, April 20th: Evening at Cava Wine Bar (Jennifer Willoughby)
Cava Wine Bar, 115 San Jose Ave, Capitola. Enjoy a variety of delicious wines, and a percentage of the proceeds will benefit Jennifer’s campaign. Email jentwillo@gmail.com or call 831.750.0702 with any questions.

Sunday, April 21st: Zumba Fitness Class (Jennifer Willoughby)
Attend a Zumba class that will leave you sweating, smiling, and feeling the rhythm! Valencia Elementary School, 250 Aptos School Road, Aptos. $10/person. Email jentwillo@gmail.com or call 831.750.0702 with any questions.

Tuesday, April 23rd: Silent Auction and Wine Tasting (Topher Mueller)
Point Pinos Grill, 79 Asilomar Blvd, Pacific Grove. 6pm-9pm. $15/person, $25/couple.  Purchase tickets at manvscancer.org or at the door.  For a preview of the long list of fantastic auction items, check out www.facebook.com/events/434427379964889

Wednesday, April 24th: Bingo and Spaghetti Night (Erich Sonnberger)
Redeemer Lutheran Church, 468 Grand Ave, Redwood City. Dinner at 5:30pm and Bingo beginning at 6:45pm. Visit http://peninsulahappynest.com/bingo for details and ticket prices.

Saturday, April 27th: Mission City Creamery Day (Kalee Ruppel)
Visit Mission City Creamery at 2905 Park Ave, Santa Clara. Whatever the weather, who doesn’t love a decadent ice-cream sandwich? A percentage of all the proceeds for the day will go to Kalee’s campaign.

Wednesday, May 1st: Bar Wars at TGIFriday’s (Karen Routt)
5pm-9pm at TGIFriday’s 3101 S. El Camino Real, San Mateo for great food and great fun.

Friday, May 3rd: Comedy Night (Jason Burkhart)
Come to CSR Real Estate to start your weekend off with a laugh or two.  Wine, beer, and appetizers served beginning at 6pm. Comedians will start their performance at 7pm. Tickets are $50/person. Visit http://comedy4acause2.eventbrite.com for tickets.

Ending May 3rd: 5% of all sales from Augustina Leathers will go to Robyn DaRosa’s campaign. Located in beautiful downtown Carmel-by-the-Sea.

Ending May 4th: Purchase an item from I Heart This & 40% of the sales of the three signature items will go towards Jennifer Willoughby’s campaign.

Sunday April 7th: Our TNT Spring 2013 participants will be awfully busy this weekend! Wish them luck as they carb-loado, sport their purple, and head to the Santa Cruz Half Marathon, San Francisco Rock ‘n’ Roll Half Marathon, San Luis Obispo Marathon, and Paris Marathon. Go TEAM!

Thursday April 11th: Midpoint Party for Silicon Valley Man & Woman of the Year
Candidates will celebrate the official halfway mark of their 10 week campaign. Be sure to attend one of their exciting events in April and May!

Tuesday April 16th: Kaiser Support Group for Parents & Children
A gathering place for parents and children to support, relax, and connect with each other over lunch and discussion. Meets every other Tuesday from 12pm-1pm. For questions and to find out the location please contact Miriam Wong, MSW, 408-851-1218 or Wendy Fought, CCLS, 408-851-7425.

Tuesday April 16th: Patient Education: How to Make Informed Choices About Standard Care and Clinical Trials
6:00pm to 8:00pm at the Cancer Support Community in Walnut Creek. Contact Lauren Wilkerson at lauren.wilkerson@lls.org or 415-625-1115 for more information.

Wednesday April 17th: CML, Living with a Chronic Disease: FREE Telephone/Web Education program
Jorge Cortes, MD, D.B. Lane Cancer Researcher Distinguished Professor for Leukemia Research; Deputy Chairman, Section Chief of AML & CML; Department of Leukemia, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center will be speaking. You can register at www.LLS.org/programs or call 866-992-9950, ext 335.

Saturday April 20th: Guadalupe River Run
San Jose Water Company is sponsoring a 10K and 5K run/walk on the Guadalupe River Trail to benefit the Guadalupe River Park Conservancy. The race will be part of the celebration of the paving of the Guadalupe River Trail north to Alviso. Come on down and run or walk on the flat, fast trail and enjoy the Spring in Guadalupe Gardens Festival.　 Visit www.grpg.org to learn more! TNT participants will receive a code in their managers’ update for $5 off the registration fee.  

Thursday April 25th: TNT 25th Anniversary Celebration
Celebrate 25 years of Team In Training with appetizers, drinks and cake at BJ’s in Cupertino, 10690 N De Anza Blvd, from 6:30pm-8:30pm. RSVP here.

Last week, our Boy and Girl of the Year from Monterey, 8-year-old Cooper Bonessa and 6-year-old Priscilla Salinas, were featured on KION, a local Santa Cruz and Salinas TV station. Hopefully you were able to check it out, but if not, you can see the clip here:

March 22nd marked the midpoint for this 10-week fundraising campaign. The 11 Monterey candidates are doing a fantastic job raising money in honor of these adorable Boy and Girl of the Year, and having a lot of fun doing it!

To contribute, be sure to attend one of their exciting events happening in April here. From handmade jewelry to wine tastings to fitness classes, there’s something for everyone. The candidates only have a few short weeks until the grand finale on May 4th!

In 1988, Bruce Cleland assembled a team for the NYC marathon to raise money in honor of his daughter, a leukemia survivor. 38 runners raised $322,000 for LLS. 25 years, 1.3 billion dollars and 570,000 participants later, TNT has become the most influential endurance training program for charity in the world!

It’s incredible to see how far TNT has powered LLS over it’s 25 years. With the funds raised through TNT, LLS has driven research for treatments like chemotherapy and bone marrow transplants. Even today’s most promising advances like targeted therapies, are funded by LLS programs like TNT. These smart-drugs like Gleevec, Velcade, Dacogen, and Sprycel, take aim at cancer cells, and destroy them. LLS funds are also helping with repurposing old drugs for arthritis and antifungal for the treatment of specific leukemias.

Help us celebrate how far we’ve come, and be a part of the next Team In Training generation! Join us for a TNT birthday bash on from 6:30pm-8:30pm Thursday, April 25th at BJ’s in Cupertino, 1060 N De Anza Blvd, to kick off this year-long celebration. Bring your friends to enjoy great appetizers, drinks, and cake of course!

RSVP at https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/tntbirthday

Happy St. Patrick’s Day on Sunday! In the spirit of “luck” this St. Patrick’s Day, we thought we’d take a moment to point out just a few of the things we’re lucky for here at the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. So put on your green, find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, eat some Lucky Charms for breakfast this weekend, and remember how lucky we are…

10. That the Go Green St. Patrick’s Day run is back again for its 4th year in Los Gatos this Sunday, supporting LLS! A very special thank you to one of our TNT four-leaf clovers, Marnie Oshan, an Ironteam coach and the race’s organizer.  

9. That we have 23 outstanding candidates competing in this year’s Monterey and Silicon Valley Man & Woman of the Year Campaigns, committed to using their community ties and networks to raise funds for LLS in just 10 short weeks.

8. That this year’s brand new Peninsula Light The Night walk will take place in the beautiful downtown Palo Alto.

7. That we have a seemingly endless supply of volunteers, in the office, at events, within every single campaign, who dedicate their time to helping find cures for blood cancer.

6. That our Team In Training program has reached its silver anniversary this year. Twenty-five years, 570,000 participants, and $1.3 billion dollars raised so far!

5. That our kids are just as powerful and committed to fighting blood cancer as we are, with a record number of schools participating in our Pennies for Patients program this year.

4. That an incredible 78 percent of money we raise at LLS goes directly to research, patient and community services, advocacy and education.

3. That our Team In Training participants are cool enough to make videos like this one of the Ironteam doing the Harlem Shake: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEILqIi0PYE (And in the spirit of a little friendly competition, that our South Bay Marathon team answered with their own http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIQjYvoHtaQ).

2. That LLS is achieving the impossible today.

1. Because we know luck has NOTHING to do with it. We wouldn’t have been able to come this far with research, help blood cancer patients like we do, or be within such close reach of ending cancer, without the hard work of our supporters.