Red Shoe Shuffle Recap

The Red Shoe Shuffle was on April 6th.  This is the third annual Shuffle, and this year we were Shuffling for Smiles!  All of the money raised will go to the McSmiles Fund, which provides special events and activities for the families in the House.  

As always, this was not  your typical 5K!  They have people cheering at every corner holding encouraging signs.  

A boy recovering from a kidney transplant was too sick to come out, so everybody cheered for him as he waved out the window.  Kids are EVERYWHERE, and it's like a family reunion with everybody running up and hugging friends they'd made during their stay at the House.  

Everybody is wearing red, and The Redder, The Better!  There are heart headbands, boas, sequins, sunglasses, tutus...it's a sea of red!  

Of course, we have to be different and wear our purple!  :)  It's Abby's color though, and it does certainly make it easy to spot each other (and in the sea of people when we're looking at pictures!)

The race officially started, and my sister was nowhere to be found.  Turns out, her little ones were being uncooperative and she didn't feel like she could go.  Dad and I helped her out and got the kids going.  

Meanwhile, Matt had Abby up with him.  It took us a while to catch up!  She rode in the stroller just about the entire time.  She didn't want to walk or really do much of anything.  We found out that night that she had Flu B. :(  It knocked her out for about 4 days!

Our wonderful adopted grandparents, the Reeds, walked with us again this year.  They are the SWEETEST people and truly love our family.  In fact, they had team day at their school and wore their Joy Runners shirts.  :)

Sara and Caleb ran quite a bit off and on, which helped them pass the time during the long stretches between encouragers.

Poor Abby.  You can see in her face that she's not feeling well.  I wish we had known!

Some of our team!  We also had a group from a local middle school join us this year.  They did a great job raising money too!  Sadly, they weren't here when we took this picture just before the race started.

During the opening ceremony, they honored the children who lost their battle and weren't with us any longer.  We are honored to have known Malachi and Brooke!

Once we got going, the kids were pretty good.  Lucy didn't particularly love riding in the stroller, but she eventually got over it.  Anna was actually really sweet with her!

Uncle Matt rescued her from the stroller now and then to walk.

There are lots of characters around, but the only one we got pictures with this year was the Oriole Bird.

These are two of the girls from the middle school who joined our team!  They ran the whole way, which I find pretty amazing!

Thank you to all of you who attended fundraisers, donated money, bought tshirts, and supported our family!  The House That Love Built most definitely appreciates it, and so do we!!