Does your New Year’s resolution involve exercise or supporting ALSF in 2013? You can do both with Team Lemon’s new

When I started my six month volunteer assignment at Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation, my sons Max (age 10) and David (age 7) were very curious about Alex and her lemonade stand. I would come home in the evenings and over dinner share stories I had learned about the Foundation. As the boys learned more, they were eager to get involved. Coincidentally, I had just heard about The Lemon Run, the Foundation’s annual 5K fundraising event. The stars aligned, and one evening we decided that we would run our first 5K as a family.

Although my husband Brian and I were casual runners (well Brian had actually completed a marathon a few years earlier so I guess you can’t really consider that “casual”) the two of us did not routinely run together and we certainly never ran with the boys. We decided that if we were really going to ask our family, friends, and colleagues to donate to our team - The Finnegan Family Runs - we needed to take the challenge seriously and make sure we could actually complete a 5K. 

We trained once a week with an early morning weekend run. The first few times, someone always cried. My coaching style ran the gamut - I tried positive reinforcement, “come on, you can do it!” as well as tough love, “don’t you dare stop running until we get to the next block!” 

Over the course of a couple months, Max grew stronger but David suffered through repeated illnesses (sinus infection, ear infection, walking pneumonia- ugh!). Our weekend training runs became dicey- David would start out strong but quickly start coughing and wheezing. I flip-flopped between trying to encourage him to push through it and feeling terribly guilty about even lacing up our sneakers that morning.

And then the big day arrived. It was a beautiful, blue skied Sunday morning in November. When we arrived at the race site, the energy was palpable and the sea of yellow (yellow shirts, yellow banners, yellow tu-tus!) was beautiful. We were all in high spirits and ready to run.  

And run we did! Although we had NEVER before run over a mile without taking a bit of a walking break, we breezed passed the 1 mile marker in stride. Brian and Max stayed a bit ahead of David and me but always well within our sight. As we pushed closer to 2 miles, I could hear David muttering to himself, giving himself the pep talk I had so frequently resorted to giving. Despite my assurance that it would be OK to take a break and walk, David soldiered on, red-faced and sweaty, but determined to keep running.

Near the end of the race the boys surged forward with a last minute energy burst. Max finished strong, but David seemed to use his final bit of energy and nearly collapsed with the finish line still out of sight. He started to cry and I heard the familiar, “I can’t do it,” whine pass from his lips. “Yes you can,” I assured him, and grabbing his hand, I encouraged, cajoled and sweet- talked his legs into continuing for just a few minutes more. And just that quickly, we crossed the finished line and went from being a family who TRAINED for a 5K run to a family who COMPLETED a 5K run.

The run was a huge success. Thanks to the generosity of our family, friends and colleagues, our family raised close to $5,000. In total the Lemon Run raised more than $200,000! This money will be used to fund critical research into better treatments for children with cancer.

The run was also a personal success for our family. I was so proud of my little guys and amazed at their determination to run the entire 5K. Still, I could hardly believe my ears when, at the conclusion of the race, Max announced that he couldn’t wait to run a 10K! I reminisced over the shed tears, the whines and complaints, and the repeated frustrations of the past few months that had gotten us to this place and smiled as I realized I couldn’t wait to do it all over again!