Holidays are built on tradition.  They come with a host of annual rituals that stir up all sorts of long-term memories from as far back as early childhood (when I got a “Baby This N’ That” from Santa), and as recent as just last year (when I failed at cookie decorating).  I remember who gave me almost every ornament on my tree.  I chuckle every time I count the 11 “Baby’s First Christmas” ornaments we have for Ty, and only one we received for Gavin.  Sorry Gavin, it’s just a fact of life when you are not the first-born. Then there are his ornaments.  The one he picked out when we were on our Make A Wish trip in Disney.  The ones where a bear holds a number for each Christmas he celebrated with us, but the numbers stop at “5”.  The ones that adorn his beautiful photos with sentiments such as, “always in our hearts,” and “Christmas in Heaven.”  I seriously don’t know how we survive tree trimming each year.  Every ornament I pull from the...

It 's been three years since we first opened our doors at the Ty Louis Campbell Foundation. I was so raw with grief and so angry about losing Ty to cancer, that this nonprofit became my lifeline. I lived and breathed fundraising and dove head-first into learning the landscape of childhood cancer research. I reached out to every other childhood cancer nonprofit I could find, and made connections with the parents and the game-changers. It is no secret that I believe collaboration is key and we will make more progress, faster, if we work together.   It has been a journey in itself - a long and winding road that has consumed my life in the same way cancer did 5 years ago - but this journey has the greatest reward imaginable at the end of the tunnel. If, in my lifetime, I witness a little boy like Ty who survives his diagnosis thanks to safer, more effective treatment options - the TLC Foundation will have achieved everything we set out to do. There is no place that I love ...