I know you’ll agree with me when I say that Tommy is a gorgeous and super cute little boy.  A normal 18 month old…..a lover of broccoli, mini pancakes, chasing birds, dancing, little brother to Peggy and Joe.  Known for his lovely mop of dark hair and gorgeous smile, he is the youngest child of friends of ours in the village.  As I said, a totally normal 18 month old doing normal things with the rest of his life stretching out in front of him.

But last June we learnt the devastating news that he had passed away from a very rare form of childhood cancer called Acute Myeloid Leukaemia.  He had only been diagnosed a few weeks earlier and while we knew Tommy and his family were in for a tough 6 months or so ahead, friends, family and our whole village had everything crossed.  He'd had the chance to have one course of chemo but as his immune system was low from that and the leukaemia, he developed an infection.  It was too much for him to overcome.  Gorgeous Tommy had been so brave.

A group of us, ‘Team Tommy’, are going to walk 100km of the South Downs at the end of June to raise money for his family’s chosen charity, Children with Cancer UK.  We are doing it in memory of this gorgeous bundle of sunshine as well as fundraising in hope that one day other families don’t have to go through the devastation that Hazel, James, Joe and Peggy are going through.

Walking on the South Downs trail is a challenge in itself but as we wanted to make it really tough, we are for going to do it as one continuous walk which includes walking through the night.  This means it is not only a physical challenge but with sleep deprivation, it is going to be a serious mental challenge too!  Our route starts in Arundel on the Saturday morning, taking us up and down steep terrain to where our finish line is at Beachy Head on the Sunday afternoon.  We hope to finish the 100km in about 30 hours.  Training is well underway, boots are being broken in and fundraising has started!  A donation……any donation…towards our team charity would be amazing.  Thank you xx