Dear Friends and Family, 2011 was a most difficult year for Emily and so we begin our campaign for the annual Great Strides Walk 2012 with greater determination than ever! This year we will be walking on May 5th at Belk Tonawanda Park in Monroe! Great Strides is the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation’s largest and most successful national fundraising event. We have participated in Great Strides since Emily was diagnosed in February 2005. We walk every year to make sure that Emily and every child with cystic fibrosis have the very best chance to grow into healthy, happy adults. Despite Emily’s compliance with her regular medicines and treatments, last year was one of the hardest ever for Emily. She had a picc line from the end of January to the beginning of June to administer a variety of IV antibiotics to help restore her health. After lung function dropping to an all-time low of 74% and her weight down to 58 pounds, she was able to return to 104% on her lung function testing and gained 19 pounds! While we can definitely say a lot of prayer and faith played a big role in this, the availability of the drugs and research to know the right drugs to make her healthy again were crucial—and without the CFF the struggle to regain Emily’s health would have been even more difficult. We fight each day to keep Emily as healthy as possible, but even with all of the daily drugs and treatments, she still has severe setbacks. This year was so very hard on her, and it was hard to see her so sick. I pray that we don’t have another year like that again. Please help us cure this disease so that Emily and all the other children with this disease have a better chance of living a long and healthy life. CF affects over 30,000 people in the United States. The current average life expectancy for people with CF is the mid-30s. This means too many young people and children continue to die from this disease. While money from research has helped to provide new treatments and drugs, a cure is what we really need! The CFF does not get any federal funding for research that supports new drugs and treatments so it is efforts like the Great Strides Walk that provides the money for research. EVERY contribution counts and no amount is too small. In fact, you will be glad to know that 90 cents of every dollar you donate will go toward research. If you would like to sponsor us, please make your tax-deductible check payable to the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation (CFF) and return it to us as soon as possible. Donors may also make their contributions online. Go to http://www.cff.org/Great_Strides/CherylLawrence7012 and then follow the directions to “Donate”. It would also be helpful if you would forward our page to others that may want to contribute. Thanks for your continued contributions. We need a cure so Emily can live out her dreams of being a veterinarian and a mom and having a horse farm. Thank you for adding tomorrows to Emily’s life today! Also check out Emily's story on YouTube:

Love, Cheryl, Seth, and family