Breaking records

 

Well, we did it! The grand total for the 2024 #Dominicstrong auction is $11,727 - the most we've ever raised in a single event.

It took so much behind the scenes work to pull off, and was not without its challenges.

Planning actually started last year, when one organization informed us that a month's notice was not long enough - so I asked for the next year's auction and they said yes. Then a news story prompted one woman to donate five huge, framed Ducks Unlimited prints. We had a pretty good head start.

Procrastination is a strong point of mine, so it's common that we only start asking for auction items a month out. This year we got going six weeks ahead of the auction, which was a huge help. It gave time to come back to potential donors and not seem pushy, and as a result we got new donors involved.

Our friends rose up, too. Krista, Nicole, and Kelsey all found donations, with Kelsey getting the feature item, a cornhole board adorned with the iconic #Dominicstrong word art thanks to a donation from City Signs and Canvas Shop.

It was all setting up to be a record. In 2017 we raised $10,921, but crossing the five-figure mark has proved difficult in recent years. It's OK - we aren't going to do this forever, and every penny helps. But all the new energy this year - spurred in part by going to Ignite/Extra Life United in Kansas City - definitely helped.

So now what?

Well, we've had a fantastic year with Superhero Night, Ignite/Extra Life United, and now the auction. But Extra Life's main event is the 25-hour game day, and that's happening Nov. 2-3!

Similar to last year, we're doing our marathon as a private event. It's basically a big house party, and we live-stream the whole thing on my Twitch channel (@gomerstraw). As always, we'll take donations to roll the 20-sided dice and do whatever crazy thing we assign to each number. I can also tell you we'll have some great prizes to give away to donors this year - stay tuned to our Facebook page and a game day blog post right here for details.

Thanks for your support! Heading into 2024 we'd raised US$244,254.52, and if you include where we're at today our total is beyond CDN$350,000. We couldn't have done it without you.

Auction 2024: Generosity

 

Get ready to bid! It's hard to believe this is our 10th annual #Dominicstrong auction, but what we have in store is definitely worthy of a major milestone.

From small, handmade gift cards to huge items like barbecues and ladders, we're always amazed at people's generosity.

Tracey, for example, has made dozens of cards, gift bags, and tags each of the past few years. The amount of time she must put into it is immense.

Sarah hand-glues beautiful beads to a travel mug, and spent upwards of 12 hours doing so to make a thumbs-up pattern.

I mention our auction to Brandon, and he goes and gets a huge multi-compartment cooler from his business.

Kelsey takes the iconic word art logo that Natalie made for us years ago, goes to another business which then donates a custom vinyl wrapping on the cornhole boards she bought. It is so amazing.

These are just a few of the stories behind this year's auction. 

In all, this is our biggest auction ever. There are 124 items, but a bunch will have multiple winners. The actual total of items is 137 - and as usual my biggest worry is having enough people to bid on all of it.

Don't be shy, share this blog post or the link to the group or auction album please! Every penny we raise goes to the Alberta Children's Hospital by way of our Extra Life pages.

We'll be live on Facebook to kick off the auction, then live again once or twice during the weekend to provide updates.

The specifics

To be safe, I'm going to post the auction rules here. For those new to the auction, it's run off our Facebook page, #Dominicstrong. On the group you'll see the featured posts, including the long one with the rules and a link to the auction album itself.

Every picture in the album is an item. You bid in the comments! Remember, bidding starts at 5 p.m. Mountain time Friday (Sept. 27) and ends at 5 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 29. Any time stamp with 1700 Sept. 29 on it or later is ineligible.

There are starting (minimum) bids for every item, and bids have to be at least $1 higher than the previous high bid.

Once it's all over, we go in, tell the winners they've got 24 hours to pay, then get to the process of delivery/pickup of auction winnings.

My parents are driving in from Calgary and can therefore bring winnings back to the big city for anyone who wants them to. Otherwise, you've got to arrange pickup/delivery with us, at your cost. I'll happily ship something to Turkey, but I ain't paying for it!

In the news

Thanks to Collin at the Medicine Hat News who wrote this story about the auction.

Cheers

We knew today would be tough. Sept. 3 always is.

It was more of a whirlwind than usual.

For the first time, the anniversary of Dominic's death coincided with the first day of school. Seeing everyone's happy first day posts on social media carries some extra weight, wishing he were among them. But we had our own post to make, as Samantha was off to Grade 2.

We started the day as expected. At every meal, we do a cheers and say why we're doing it. Today, Sam said there were two reasons: Sad cheers for Dominic, happy cheers for school.

She gets it. We couldn't be more proud of her.

Then we went out to his memorial bench and tied a few gold and orange balloons to it. Gold is for childhood cancer awareness month, which happens to be September. Orange is for leukemia.

Trish stayed home, as usual. Today's her day to mourn. She usually stays in bed, off her phone. But I got a text from her at noon: "Dommy's balloons are gone."

It's happened before. Once it was the wind. Another time we saw a couple kids walking away with them. There was no wind today.

"Next year I'm gonna sit out all day and watch the park," Trish said.

I understand the allure of balloons to a kid. But it's pretty obvious they're there for a reason. The sign on the bench spells it out loud and clear: "Dominic Rooney, Oct. 12, 2012-Sept. 3, 2015. Cancer took his life, not his joy. Forever #dominicstrong"

I added the sad news to the social media post. At 5 p.m., I got another text: "Dommy's balloons are back." And this time, they had a weight attached to them in the shape of a heart, with the word love on it. Someone had gone and bought new ones.

I look out the window a half hour later. The new balloons are no longer on the bench. A group of kids is hanging around the playground. One girl, about 10 years old, is holding an orange balloon.

"I don't know how to read," she says when I ask her to read the sign for me.

I didn't have any energy left. I took the balloon home.

Does it really matter? No, I guess not. It's just foil filled with helium. But it sucks that people can't be more respectful.

We had dinner; pasta with cheese, just how Dominic liked it. And one more time, we gave a cheers. To Dominic. And to the kind people who tried to cheer us up.

Auction 2024: Can we count on you?

 

When the Dominicstrong auction first took place, everything was a blur. He'd only been gone a month; his room still had his things in it, and the grief was fresh. Friends were helping organize it all, and it was a lot of work just to keep up with all of the offers coming in.

The auction has changed a lot. It's rare (but still wonderful) when someone comes to us with something, but for the most part it's us going out and contacting prospective donors. If you didn't donate last year, we're not going to bother you this year unless you specifically told us to remind you.

Results don't lie, and the auction has brought in nearly $10,000 a year. But every year at this time I'm stressing because our Facebook group isn't getting much reach.

So here we go: This year's auction runs Sept. 27-29, 2024, and it's the 10th one we've done! Dom would be turning 12 this year. As we always say, it's how we parent a child who's no longer here.

Would you, someone you know, your employer, or a business you frequent be interested in giving something? We are ridiculously easy to get a hold of: email donations@dominicstrong.com or message Trish or Sean on Facebook. We've even uploaded the official 2024 request letter PDF if you'd like to download and use it.

We don't have much time to get this rolling. The auction is basically a month away, and we have to catalogue, photograph, write descriptions for, and post all of the items. The deadline to get something in this year's auction is Sept. 20.

Thanks so much for your support. It means the world to us, but more importantly to the kids who use the hospital.

The best late plans

“The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry” — Robert Burns’ To a Mouse

Here I am writing a blog post while riding a public transit bus in Kansas City, two days after the Ignite (Extra Life) event ended.

It’ll be at least another two days until we’re home but on the plus side, there’s extra time for reflection.

We had some amazing moments at Ignite. There were a handful of champion families there, and on the first day Samantha made friends with Ella, a remarkable girl from St. Louis who has cerebral palsy. Before long she was practically adopted by their family, cheering Ella on in all of her official duties: they ask a lot from these families to help inspire attendees.

On the second night, Children’s Miracle Network CEO Aimee Daily had her flight home delayed, so she came around to introduce Ella to our Yellow team (they split the attendees into four groups for some fun team building and assigned each team a champion child). We approached Aimee and gave her a special token we had made up for this conference: A yellow, wooden meeple in the shape of a thumb with #Dominicstrong etched onto it.

We told his story hundreds of times this week. Every person we played in a game or interacted with got one of those meeples. And Aimee… she was inspired by Dominic to the point she got up on stage and told the crowd of more than 800 people about him, totally unscripted.

Then she invited us on stage. But we hadn’t told her about Dom’s sister. Sam comes up ahead of us, crying, and says into Aimee’s microphone “I miss my brother because he’s dead!” or something along those lines. And Aimee pivots marvellously into supportive mom mode, helps Sam, and the entire crowd is in tears as we take a selfie with everyone giving the thumbs up.

Sam finished the night dancing with a new set of friends, the college-aged attendees with Dance Marathon. They became her second adoptive family of the week, hanging out and playing while mom and dad competed. The idea behind having these two groups at the same event is to share best practices and maybe convert some graduating college kids to continue fundraising for hospitals, just using Extra Life instead.

CMN wound up including us in the official wrap-up video of the weekend, using an interview that Trish gave after I was unable to because I was busy playing a tournament game.

This brings us to the original reason we signed up for Ignite/Extra Life United. They have US$150,000 to give away to member hospitals, and of course we play for the Alberta Children’s Hospital where Dom spent most of two years.

Both Trish and I signed up for three board games plus a mystery game, and practised as best we could for the past couple months. I’d played the deck building game Star Realms at a prior ELU, but Trish despised it, so didn’t really practice. We’d both enjoyed Love Letter at ELU 2016. Shifting Stones was brand new but we liked it. Most importantly, all the games had a significant luck factor which I think was meant to keep competition friendly.

Trish’s theory was that she’d bow out early and I’d win some money. Well, she did in Love Letter but not the other two! I advanced in all three and even made it to the top eight of Shifting Stones, so I at least won some money. But organizers had to make tough decisions as the games went far beyond the allotted time, and by the time ELU was slated to finish Trish was still alive in, you guessed it, Star Realms! First the top 24, where Trish and two others had to play a full tiebreaking round after beating each other in their initial round robin. Then she won two intense head-to-head matchups. Hotel staff were taking down the event when she won and earned a spot in the final against Kori Joyce, a gamer from Vermont who as it turns out liked Star Realms as much as she did and offered to split first ($3,000) and second ($1,500) prize without playing. The relief on Trish’s face when offered that first place split ($2,250) was iconic.

In the ensuing delirium we celebrated and hugged so many friends old and new goodbye as many had flights out that evening. We checked in for our Monday morning flight and even got our boarding passes printed out before going to bed.

And then we got a rude shock. On the way to the airport we discovered our flight had been cancelled and we’d been rebooked onto a Thursday flight home instead.

Our late plans may have taken some crazy turns but we’re so glad we came. Hopefully it’s not another five years before we get to see our Extra Life family again.

Superhero recap and off to Extra Life United

Another Superhero Night is in the books, but we’ll have to wait and see if we stuck the landing.

Saturday’s event with the Medicine Hat Mavericks baseball team saw a good crowd in attendance, a marvellous first pitch from honoured guest Keagan, and lots of smiling faces at Athletic Park.

We were sad not to see the 501st Legion Star Wars character volunteers due to a scheduling mixup, but the Medicine Hat Skateboard Association came through with face painting, stickers, and even a Spider-man in costume to match the special edition jerseys the players wore.

You can still buy the jerseys for $105 at the team store, and we’re sure there will be a donation from the proceeds at some point this summer, but for now all we can report is the $139 that was donated directly at our table. As we always say, every dollar counts.

On the heels of Superhero Night, we are now in Kansas City to participate in the Children’s Miracle Network Ignite conference and Extra Life United, where we’ll play games and hopefully win some money for the Alberta Children’s Hospital.

It’s been five years since we last attended Extra Life United in person, and even then it was just me (Sean) who went. Between the pandemic and the fact it happened right in the middle of Trish’s tax season every year, it simply hasn’t worked out for us.

We are excited to see many old friends. We were initially invited to the first ever ELU in 2014, but Dominic was going through too much to consider going anywhere. Once the next event happened in 2016 he had passed away, and we debuted the video about him in the place (Orlando) where he died just six months earlier. Needless to say, it was a tremendously emotional experience, and the connections we made then will never be forgotten.

I went by myself in 2017 since Sam was just a month old and Trish wasn’t cleared to fly after the C-section. The three of us went in 2018 with Sam running rampant in her onesie through the venue’s halls. I went again by myself in 2019.

Things transitioned online during the pandemic, and I even won a tournament during the 2022 event. They were back in person last year but it was a really difficult tax season for Trish, so nobody from our family went to Florida.

This year’s event is different. United is no longer part of Children’s Miracle Hospitals’ main annual conference, which still takes place in Orlando in spring. Extra Life has grown and this ELU feels like a reboot of sorts, getting back to the reason why it began: a celebration of the important work being done to change kids’ health, and a time to be reinvigorated as we promote our charitable efforts in the months to come.

It’ll now be part of the Ignite conference, started to support another group that operates within Children’s Miracle Network: Dance Marathon. DM targets U.S. college students 

There are going to be some fundraising challenges this week and we hope you’ll follow us on social media and maybe consider a donation. Trish’s page is www.extra-life.org/participant/trish and mine is www.extra-life.org/participant/sean - we appreciate any support as we play for the hospital!

With great power... (Superhero Night No. 6, July 13)

How is it already July? How has it been seven years since the first Superhero Night with the Medicine Hat Mavericks baseball team? Life comes at you quick, but as Uncle Ben said, "With great power comes great responsibility." Now's time to sling some exciting news at you about Saturday, July 13!

At the first three Superhero Nights in 2017, 2018, and 2019, the players donned custom jerseys which were then sold off for charity. Coming into 2020, I had the idea of a Spiderman-themed design. Well, we all know what happened then: COVID. Once the team emerged again in 2022, they went with special socks. Last year it was hats. Our Dominicstrong network snapped them all up, helping us raise money for the Alberta Children's Hospital in the process.

Finally, we're doing those Spidey jerseys. And man do they look awesome! The game day sponsor is EBT Chartered Professional Accountants, who do a ton of charity work.

Like in past years, we'd really love if you could come to the game. It's a 7:05 p.m. start. But for out-of-towners, message Trish or I and we'd be happy to help you get your hands on one. Be warned, they're $100, and there won't be as many on the shelves as there were socks or hats!

The Mavs don't have to do this every year. There are so many wonderful causes to support in our community. But after Dominic threw out the first pitch in 2015, this one's become a bit of a tradition. Everyone — from the public address announcer mixing in superhero references and songs to the game day staff modifying between-innings contests to fit the theme — gets involved, and there's a different demographic in the crowd with more kids and adults dressed up. We are so thankful to have them suiting up again.

I'm expecting to see the 501st Legion (volunteers who cosplay as Star Wars characters) in attendance again, and of course we'll be there promoting Extra Life to anyone who'll listen.

One person I'm particularly looking forward to see is Mr. Keagan Hohn. Keagan first came to a Superhero Night when he was around seven years old, dressed up in Star Wars cosplay and involved in one of those mid-inning contests, except instead of a bat to hit a ball he used his light sabre! We knew the family because Keagan's been to the Alberta Children's Hospital since he was little.

Well, he's 14 now and still going to the hospital, though not for what he'd dealt with when he was younger. Now it's autoimmune encephalitis, which he describes as his immune system attacking his brain. The things he's gone through over the past two years is nothing short of terrifying, and the fact he's even able to get out to the game shows just what kind of superhero he is.

"He had influenza, his body went into hyperdrive," noted his mom of what happened in 2022.

Said Keagan: "It was a little bit frightening." Understatement!

When I asked him what makes the hospital special, he said "it's a place where kids can feel really comfortable, it's nice to have coloured walls (instead of boring white ones) and people who are there to help you."

Yes, Dominic is why we started doing this. But kids like Keagan are why we continue. They're all superheroes, and we feel a great responsibility to do right by them.

The Fourth was strong

Hundreds of Hatters released their inner nerd Saturday at the Medicine Hat Public Library, and we were lucky enough to be with them.

Typically, the first Saturday in May is a free comic book day with lots of opportunities to delve into some new content. May 4 is also notable in geek culture because of the Star Wars reference (May the Fourth Be With You). When those two were set to collide on the same day in 2024, library worker Stephanie knew she had to take advantage. Thus was born the MHPL Comic Con.

Once we heard about it we asked to have a table to let folks know about Extra Life. It was a safe bet we'd have plenty of gamers walking by, after all.

They sure proved us right! We gave away lots of dice and pins with the Extra Life logo to folks who signed up on the spot. One said he was looking for something like this for a company with hundreds of employees. Others talked about their hospital experiences and how important it is to give back. More than a couple visitors signed up their spouses since "they're always gaming anyhow. Might as well be for a good cause!"

We got to tell our story and let folks know what we're up to this year. After raising a couple hundred dollars at a board game flea market at the end of April, our next planned event is July 13 when the Medicine Hat Mavericks hold Superhero Night. The 501st Legion will be there and we'll unveil the special jerseys the Mavs will wear closer to the big day. Then we're off to Kansas City for Extra Life United (now part of Children's Miracle Networks' Ignite Conference). Later this year we'll do our online auction and finally do the big 25-hour game day Nov. 2-3.

It was great fun playing the Imperial March whenever Darth Vader walked by, and Samantha loved story time with Spiderman.

Hoping this becomes an annual event, since Calgary's Comic Con is always during tax season, which prevents Trish from going!

More Extra Life news

Speaking of Extra Life, I'm honoured to be part of a new initiative known as the Community Council!

It's a group of 16 people hand-picked to give ideas and feedback to Extra Life.

Extra Life has changed a lot over the years, but the mission remains the same: Play games, help kids. I like to think Dominic would give us a big thumbs-up for continuing to do it.

In like the Lions

Ten years ago, Dominic was the poster child for the Country 105 Caring for Kids Radiothon. A big part of doing that was telling our story publicly, even as Dominic was in the midst of his cancer journey.

Speaking about him is always something I jump at the chance to do, and back then there were lots of opportunities. We spoke at a high-falutin event for Children's Wish, plenty of times on camera for news stories, and again for Helping Families Handle Cancer at an art show. Six months after he died we were on stage in Orlando at Extra Life United.

But the speeches are fewer and further between now. It's more likely to talk about him when a stranger asks if we have any kids, but big groups? It's been years since we did something formally.

So when the Alberta Children's Hospital asked us to help out at the convention for the Lions Clubs of Southern Alberta this past Saturday, I was excited (and a little nervous) for the assignment.

As luck would have it, they put us in the exact same ballroom at the Medicine Hat Lodge where we held our 2022 game day. Only about 40 people came, but they represented a dozen different clubs.

Our message was about how important it is to support the hospital that kids are sent to when their hometown health care systems are unable to handle their critical or unique pediatric cases.

In 2022, 538 kids from Medicine Hat alone accessed ACH care. They combined for 1,335 hospital visits. It's crazy how many people we'll talk to in town who have had to go there.

A handful of the Lions came up to us afterwards to let us know their clubs are donating. One noted that they were going to donate to a couple other charities as well, but after hearing our speech now wanted to give only to the hospital. Our response? NO! Places like Ronald McDonald House, Make-a-Wish, and regional hospitals all need support too. It just so happens that Alberta Children's is our focus, simply because that's what Dominic used the most. There are people fundraising for other causes that are absolutely worth supporting. But if you're looking for a cause to start helping, we know where we'll send you.

PJ's for a Purpose

Speaking of which, and because this aligns with our Extra Life gaming efforts, there's a fundraiser this Friday organized by students at Medicine Hat College you might be interested in. PJ's for a Purpose asks you to wear pyjamas to work or school and donate $5 to the Medicine Hat and District Health Foundation. They want to buy a gaming system for the pediatric ward - I suspect they haven't upgraded the Nintendo Wii Dominic used in 2015, which gives me an excuse to share this video:

 

Plans for the year

As for our charity plans, 2024 has some exciting things in store.

• First off, we've already got the date set for Superhero Night with the Medicine Hat Mavericks. Block off Saturday, July 13! And stay tuned for the merchandise announcement: I'm really excited for this one.
• As soon as that's done we'll be on our way to Kansas City for Extra Life United July 18-21. This will be our first time at ELU in person since 2019. We have a couple things in the works there which we'll bring home as well.
• The #Dominicstrong online auction will take place in September, and we've already got a few fantastic donations - contact either Trish or I if you've got something to give.
• Extra Life's 25-hour gaming marathon will be Nov. 2-3. It'll be a private event again but we're thinking public for 2025 as it'll be the 10th anniversary of Dominic's death.

Similar to our speaking appearances, this blog doesn't get the traffic it once did so thanks if you've read this far! As always, if you'd like to donate to the Alberta Children's Hospital, it's easy to find my page (www.extra-life.org/participant/sean) or Trish's (www.extra-life.org/participant/trish).

Back to basics: Game Day 11

Looking back on our first ever Extra Life event in 2013, a couple of things stick out.

First, my goatee was a different colour. Feels like it's been white forever! But they say trauma can turn your hair white prematurely. I think it's a safe bet that's what happened.

Second, it is absolutely incredible that most of the people involved in that first 25-hour marathon will again be with us this Saturday at 8 a.m. when we do it for the 11th time. Chris didn't even create a fundraising page for himself until 2021, and I remember him passing out with a controller in his hand at 7 a.m. that first time. No, it's not the same as running a marathon (Chris, Jordan and Nicole have done a half-marathon), but it's still a unique challenge.

Third, and perhaps most important, there will be no evening Facetime with Dominic. We'll have to watch some of his videos instead. It's all we've got.

We got in to this because we wanted to give back to the place that did so much for him. And even though we are more and more disconnected from that place as time goes on, we hear so many stories of other kids in our community who need it. We want to remain connected, both to Dom, and the hospital, and this is one of the best things we've got.

Our team has raised more than $15,000 this year, which is both a good chunk of change and not even a blip on the Alberta Children's Hospital radar. There are bigwigs who drop that amount in an evening at one of their big galas. We can't compete. And we don't need to. Because every dollar does SOMETHING. It might be an extra couple animal-themed stickers to hold down a feeding tube instead of the basic ones, lessening the chance of a kid pulling it out and causing all sorts of problems. Or it might be a candy to give that kid's sibling who feels like they're not important because the other one's getting all the attention.

They aren't buying new MRI machines with our fundraising, but it is important. It was the little things that our hospital did that made life there more palatable, and it's little things that add up to big things - like us wanting to give back in Dominic's memory.

So bring on the games. Our group is now largely focused on board games, but there will still be MarioKart and Rocket League and Call of Duty played. We'll take a break to head over to SixOneSix for axe throwing, break out the cellphones for some Pokemon Go, and take part in some NSFW JackBox Games during the overnight hours.

I've got two shipments I'm tracking ahead of game day: One is The Last Dab: Xperience hot sauce, made with the new world record-holding Pepper X. The other is Black Death Mega Sours, which touts itself as the world's most sour candy. If we reach our team's US$15,000 (CDN$20,800) goal, a bunch of us are going to try both, but we're doing the sours if we his US$14,000.

In addition, we are rolling out the 20-sided dice again! If you make a donation of $10 or more during game day to any of the team members on the dice roll sheet, we'll get rolling and doing some crazy stuff.

James says he'll get an Extra Life-themed tattoo if he breaks $2,000, we want to earn Krista and Chris some rewards by hitting the $200 and $500 levels, and we'll break the US$240,000 lifetime mark as a team with another $2,000. That's more than CDN$330,000 - we raised US$226,918.75 if you add up all the past events' official totals prior to this year (yes, this is me putting that number in the blog to spare future calculating).

Stay tuned for Saturday! It's going to be a great time, as always.

Auction totals and the plan for Game Day

 

Once again, our community came through.

This past weekend's ninth annual #Dominicstrong online auction raised a whopping $9,639, which I should note is $350 more than we announced during a live video reveal Monday night.

Why the discrepancy? Turns out I had a mistake on my auction spreadsheet, not counting the last four items until one of them gave a few dollars more than they'd bid, prompting me to notice that the official total didn't change when I entered it.

Yes, I've gone back and checked that this has never happened on any of the other auctions we've run.

The total of the 108 items (actually 119 - 11 items had duplicates which were won by second-place bids) was $8,639. The other $1,000 came from an item that was intended to be in the auction, but sold privately hours before I was about to post it. Ray, who had wanted it in the auction, donated the proceeds so we're counting it in the total. What an incredible gesture!

Aside from my spreadsheet snafu, this year's auction was smooth like butter. It's only Wednesday but the auction room is mostly empty. Everyone's come to pick up their winnings! We started a week later than usual but the total came in higher than 2022. Huge thumbs-up to everyone who played a part - whether you just shared the auction, donated, bid, helped behind the scenes, anything. Thank you.

Now to what's next: Last year we ran a public 24-hour charity game day for the first time in years. We had a sponsor. Lined up a whole separate mini-auction. Set up gaming stations and challenges and just a ton of effort from our group to make it happen. Got great publicity. And we didn't raise much different that day than any of our non-public game days. It was fun, but every game day is fun. I can't justify all the extra effort.

So, this year we're not going to do a public game day. Friends and family only. We'll live-stream (Nov. 4-5) as much of it as we can, and I'll blog and do social media about it, but really we'd like to see folks inspired to do their own Extra Life events.

Our hero is Dominic. You probably have your own reason to give back to a children's hospital. Go tell the world about it. Go do something good; we're right alongside you. Sign up at www.extra-life.org - make a team if there's a group of you doing it together! And if Dominic really is your reason for doing it, contact me and I'd be happy to have you on our team.

Auction 2023: Generosity, love, and a bit of retail therapy

Welcome to the ninth annual #Dominicstrong online auction in support of the Alberta Children's Hospital.

Every year I get stressed about whether we'll have enough items, and every year donors come through.

Every year I worry we won't have enough people to bid on the items. I'm doing it now. And every year, they do. I really should worry less.

This year's auction started off with a bang. I got a call from a fellow I'd known when he wrote a bowling column for the paper. His son, an adult with autism, had grown disinterested in a bike built for two they'd bought, and they wanted to donate it.

Well, it wasn't just any bike built for two. It was a quadricycle that looks more like a golf cart and goes for $3,000 new.

You won't see that item in the auction, as he sold it last week and intends on donating the proceeds.

What you will see is 108 items - a handful of them double items where the top two bidders will win - ranging from handmade cards to a month-long hot tub rental.

Every donation, whether it's in the auction or not, no matter how big or small, helps.

Even though the hospital's operating budget is more than $40 million, I like to think what we're doing matters somehow.

At the very least, it matters because Dominic mattered. And we don't just do it for him. I visited a restaurant in Airdrie this week with a donation box out for a girl with cancer. She's being treated at the same hospital that Dominic was at. I think of the kids we met at Superhero Night this year being treated there. I see a plane take off from the Medicine Hat airport and think of when we flew in one to get to the children's hospital.

We may be a drop in the bucket but over the years we've raised more than $300,000. That's more than a drop. And it happens one bid increase at a time.

So please, take advantage of the great deals to be had this weekend, for sure. But if it's a $50 gift certificate for a place you'd shop at anyhow, consider adding another $5 to your bid because it's a good cause. And know that every person who donated, created, or gave something up did it because they cared.

Thank you, all of you. You make this thing work. You're what keeps us coming back to spend dozens of hours every year putting it together and running it.

The specifics

To be safe, I'm going to post the auction rules here. For those new to the auction, it's run off our Facebook page, #Dominicstrong. On the group you'll see the featured posts, including the long one with the rules and a link to the auction album itself.

Every picture in the album is an item. You bid in the comments! Remember, bidding starts at 5 p.m. Mountain time Friday (Sept. 29) and ends at 5 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 1. Any time stamp with 1700 Oct. 1 on it or later is ineligible.

There are starting (minimum) bids for every item, and bids have to be at least $1 higher than the previous high bid.

Once it's all over, we go in, tell the winners they've got 24 hours to pay, then get to the process of delivery/pickup of auction winnings.

My parents are driving in from Calgary and can therefore bring winnings back to the big city for anyone who wants them to. Otherwise, you've got to arrange pickup/delivery with us, at your cost. I'll happily ship something to Turkey, but I ain't paying for it!

In the news

Two of our local media sources have done stories on the auction this year, and of course in Canada right now you can't post news links on Facebook. So here they are!

Children's hospital fundraiser honours memory of local boy (Medicine Hat News, Sept. 26)

Thumbs up: #dominicstrong auction this weekend (CHAT News Today, Sept. 29)

A good reason to miss school

We took Samantha out of school for a couple hours today to do something important.

It was a chance to tell Dominic's story.

A couple weeks ago our friends at the Alberta Children's Hospital asked if we'd be able to represent them for a cheque presentation at the local Save-On Foods here in Medicine Hat.

We don't get asked to do much anymore with regards to him, so it was an obvious reply: yes!

We've done a few of these over the years. I remember one of the first ones was at Costco. And in every case, it's supporting various initiatives which wind up raising money for the hospital.

Usually that's an ask at the till. "Would you like to donate a dollar?" Sometimes the employees stop asking after a while because of how many people say no. And I get it; you don't want to be bombarded with more requests for money with the way inflation is these days.

But there's a reason they ask. And hearing stories like Dominic's hopefully makes them more empowered to ask, and maybe that sense of community grows a little stronger because of it.

The folks at Save-On Foods have continued to ask, and the Medicine Hat store raised the most for Alberta Children's than any other Save-On in the province. A total of $122,737.53 was raised - way more than we'll raise in our little auction next weekend.

It's important to remember that every cent does count. So we hope you'll share and participate in our auction which begins Sept. 29 on our Facebook group - www.facebook.com/groups/dominicstrong.

If you don't want to do the auction but still want to donate, you can get a tax receipt when you donate through Extra Life - www.extra-life.org/participant/sean (or /trish, or any of our teammates' pages at www.extra-life.org/team/dominicstrong).

It was good to tell his story but it's never easy. I broke down, and Trish finished talking for me. Sam played shy for a bit but had her smile nice and big for the photo.

It was important we were all there together.

Missing you

 

The anniversary of Dominic's death is always bound to hit hard.

September is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. Kids are going back to school. All these reminders that he's not here for it.

Trish and I handle Sept. 3 differently. She's strong all year and allows herself to fall apart today. Doesn't eat much, barely gets out of bed, turns her phone off. If it's a weekday, it's a mental health day. This year it's on the weekend so there's not much impact.

Me? I have moments here and there. Maybe it's a song, maybe it's the reminder in the calendar, or just looking out at his bench and seeing kids at the playground. I feel like today I need to step up, make sure she does eat (even if it's greasy poutine), keep the kid and dogs are taken care of, and that the house doesn't burn down.

Together, there's one thing we always do: Put some balloons out at his bench. An orange one symbolic of leukemia, a gold one for childhood cancer. Sometimes a family photo; this year, just the bench.

Samantha was away at the grandparents' house and I picked her up. She had a few rocks she wanted to decorate so I suggested she do something for her brother.

On one rock, the word miss. On another, a heart. And on a third, brother. We left them at the bench with the balloons.

Pretty good for a kid who never got to meet him. She probably still weirds people out by talking so openly about her dead sibling, but we're proud of her for it. It's an honest relationship with death.

Tomorrow we'll be back to auction mode, hoping the people we've contacted respond to us. As we always say, this is part of parenting a child who isn't here anymore.

It's how we cope.