The Night Closes To Dancing Keys

Amie Breuklander gave a heart-filled speech shortly after 10am to open the 2016 Mahaska County Relay for Life. Breuklander is a cancer survivor, having fought and overcome stage 3 non-hodgkin's lymphoma in 2012. Breuklander underwent 6 months of chemo, “because my God has no bounds, I’m standing here 3 years cancer free”.

Amie Breuklander gave a heart-filled speech shortly after 10am to open the 2016 Mahaska County Relay for Life. Breuklander is a cancer survivor, having fought and overcome stage 3 non-hodgkin’s lymphoma in 2012.
Breuklander underwent 6 months of chemo, “because my God has no bounds, I’m standing here 3 years cancer free”.

Relay for Life 2016 ended with great crowd participation and excitement.

Oskaloosa, Iowa – The 2016 Relay for Life was held on the Oskaloosa Square on Saturday. A couple of hundred people and sponsors donated of themselves to help fight cancer.

Amie Breuklander gave a heart-filled speech shortly after 10am to open the 2016 Mahaska County Relay for Life. Breuklander is a cancer survivor, having fought and overcome stage 3 non-hodgkin’s lymphoma in 2012.

Breuklander underwent 6 months of chemo, “because my God has no bounds, I’m standing here 3 years cancer free”.

Breuklander, who is not only a survivor of cancer, but also participates as a committee member for the Mahaska County Relay for Life, “Because I am sick of cancer”. ‘Everyday there is someone I know diagnosed. Some family that’s affected by it, and it’s not fair to them and it’s not fair to our children and it’s not fair to us. And nobody’s gonna do a thing about it, except for us’.

Tents and awnings were sprinkled around the square, as team members searched for shade between laps. The summer sun and heat had driven away portions of the crowd.

Next to the bandstand, the traveling group, Fun Pianos – Traveling Dueling Pianos Show by 176 Keys, started to warm up, giving a taste of what the evening would bring.

Wyatt Russell is a co-chair for the Mahaska County Relay for Life. He spoke with Oskaloosa News as the luminary ceremony was about to begin.

“It was hot, but we had a lot of troopers that stuck with us throughout the day”, said Russell. “It’s been an awesome day. I want to thank all of our sponsors, and I want to thank everyone who came out and spent the day with us to support a great cause”.

We asked Russell about the return of Relay for Life back to the Square in downtown. “It was something we got a lot of feedback from the participants the last couple of years. They wanted it back outside”.

The committee then talked about potential outside locations, “It just settled back to the Square because it’s a great location to have it”, said Russell.

The time and energy spent on planning and coordinating an event like Relay for Life comes back to the life of a friend that was cut short because of brain cancer, explained Russell. “That was the reason we originally formed a team, so now we do it [planning] just in honor of her. It’s just a labor of love at this point in time”.

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