We are raising awareness of childhood cancer research in honor of our dear friend, Brooke English. She was an RN, MSN, CCRN at Children's Mercy hospital in Kansas City and devoted her life to advocating and caring for children with cancer on a daily basis. Brooke's life was tragically cut too short and I can't imagine the innumerable amount of people her life has touched that are feeling such heart ache at this time. Brooke was loving, caring, quick-witted, passionate, and a million other things! If you knew her well you'd also enjoy her grumpy times, love of naps, and challenges to wrestling matches that she would inevitably always win. In lieu of flowers we would like to ask for your help in honoring Brooke's memory by raising funds to help fight childhood cancer. Because in Brooke's words, "Kids can't fight cancer alone"

Please see below a Facebook post from Brooke this September 2017 raising funds for children in honor of a little boy she couldn't help win his fight -

When most people think of September, they think about back to school and the coming pumpkin spice latte season. However, when I think of September I think of something very near and dear to my heart...childhood cancer. No child should have to fight these diseases and no family should have to struggle with a child undergoing chemo and other harsh treatments...but the reality is they do. Most people don't think about kids with cancer because it doesn't affect their lives. We don't talk about it because it's sad. But here's the thing--these kids need us. They need us to think about them, they need us to talk about them and most importantly they need us to raise awareness and funds to help support their fight. Today, I want to talk about my boy Asher. The first time I met Asher he hit me with a foam sword and cut off my arm. Then he cut off my other arm and my leg and finally delivered the knock out blow when I could no longer stand or fight back because I was missing 3 limbs. I was ambushed and it wasn't a fair fight. The next time I battled Asher, I managed to cut off one of his arms but somehow it regenerated because he "had superpowers" (as he told me). Because Asher had super powers to grow his limbs back and I did not, he won every single time we battled. Now most of you know I hate losing, but this sassy, curly haired boy somehow made losing fun. Asher had super powers, Asher was a winner; but Asher also had cancer, and unfortunately, Asher couldn't ultimately win that fight. He was ambushed and it wasn't a fair fight. So now it's our turn to collectively use our super powers and work towards building a world where kids like Asher get to fight sword battles outside of the hospital and never have to worry about losing a battle with cancer. During September, Alex's Lemonade Stand supports a month long awareness/fundraising event for childhood cancer. I'm happy to be apart of Asher's Stormtroopers and am inspired by the many kiddos and families I've been lucky enough to know and love during one of the toughest times in their lives.

Every day, there are almost 700 new cases of childhood cancer around the world. This adds up to an estimated 250,000 new cases of cancer affect children under the age of 20 each year worldwide. And yet, childhood cancer is vastly and consistently underfunded with less than 4% of the federal government's total funding for cancer research is dedicated to childhood cancers each year.

Today, the money you donate has the potential to make a huge difference in the lives of kids with cancer (and their families). Your donation will go to research into better and safer treatments and more cures. Please don’t make these kids wait longer than they have to and give today!