Brookside Glen Families and Friends Annual Holiday Party

On Saturday, December 15th the residents of Brookside Glen in Tinley Park joined together for their annual Holiday Party. The exciting event raised toys and gifts for the Pediatric Oncology Treasure Chest Foundation, a non-for-profit organization that provides comfort and distraction from painful procedures to children and teens diagnosed with cancer by providing a toy, gift or gift certificate.

Twenty families gathered for the annual holiday party and after the last toy and gift had been donated, a vanload of toys and gifts to be distributed to children fighting cancer was delivered to the Pediatric Oncology Treasure Chest Foundation warehouse in Orland Park.

Brookside Glen resident and this year’s host Kristy Balta chose the Treasure Chest Foundation as the charitable recipient. When asked about supporting the Treasure Chest Foundation during the annual Holiday Party organizer Kristy replied, “We wanted to bring a smile to the faces of these kids suffering during the holidays.”

Treasure Chest Foundation CEO and Founder Colleen Kisel extended her most sincere gratitude to the Balta family and Brookside Glen families and friends for their efforts in organizing the neighborhood toy drive. “The POTCF is especially grateful to the families for their enormous donation.” said a grateful Colleen Kisel, Founder and CEO of the Treasure Chest Foundation. “It’s amazing to see what one neighborhood can do. And we are certainly grateful to be able to distribute such an impressive number of toys to the brave children and teens battling cancer.”

The POTCF is a unique organization whose services impact more than 13,300 young cancer patients enduring 20,000 clinic visits each month in 19 states across the nation. Nowhere else in the nation does such a program exist. Colleen Kisel founded the organization in 1996 after her then seven-year-old son Martin had been diagnosed with leukemia in 1993. Ms. Kisel discovered that giving her son a toy after each procedure provided a calming distraction from his pain, noting that when children are diagnosed with cancer their world soon becomes filled with doctors, nurses, chemotherapy drugs, surgeries and seemingly endless painful procedures. Martin celebrated his 25th anniversary of remission from the disease earlier this year.

If you would like further information about the Treasure Chest Foundation, please contact Colleen Kisel at 708-687-TOYS (8697) or visit the Foundation’s web site at www.treasurechest.org.

Photo caption: The Balta family, Kyle (age 4), Mia (age 9), Organizer Kristy Balta and Annie (age 10) deliver a vanload of toys and gifts destined for children fighting cancer to the Pediatric Oncology Treasure Chest Foundation facility in Orland Park.