For some reason I have been called to creatively helping with cancer. It's a deep karmic thing I guess.

 

In my volunteer work with Hawaii Children’s Cancer Foundation, I saw a need for these children to have an escape from the world of medical conversations, treatment schedules, and constantly being told they are ‘sick’. Some of the children would have to spend weeks, and even months at a time in the hospital, and as we all know, hospitals are a dreary place to be. Not to mention, the stress on the family both financially and emotionally. As a parent, seeing and photographing that through a dying child's eyes, truly broke my heart. That experience had such a profound impact on me as a person, parent, and artist, that I knew I had to do something.  So what better way for a child to escape that world, then by engaging with their own imagination? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the follow up project to my 2009 book "The Survivor Spirit: The Beauty, Passion and Power of Breast Cancer Survivors",  which won the 1st Place National Independent Publishers Award for Women's Issues. That project was a similar format and featured 20 breast cancer survivors and their stories of inspiration and hope through their battles with breast cancer. The purpose was to create an opportunity to "feel beautiful again" by providing a full makeover, optional wig styling, and creating a platform for them to share their uplifiting and inspirational stories. After seeing all the women meet at the book release, and hug like they had been friends forever, it inspired me to bring this format to children facing similar situations. 

 

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Lemuria Project began in 2009 and I have funded the project entirely out of pocket and through the support of friends, family, and film production volunteers. We have completed the process with 2 children so far. As each child went through the process, the process itself grew. Our first child Kaela, began with just her idea of a "I dont know... a Queen" and we had to really pull the ideas out of her and then built her image around the queen and her sister. The initial concept was a 'day of dressup experience'  ultimately leading to a children's book series. Once we turned the video cameras on for the behind-the scenes, we knew we had way more of a story than children's book could tell. When we met Xander a year later, he was carrying his sketch book under his arm and proceeded to show us pages upon pages of dragons, creatures, and worlds that he created himself.  I was blown away by his creativity, personality, and artistic talent, not to mention having beat cancer once already. Lemuria Project then blossomed into what it is today...being led by the children's creativity into the world of their imaginations. Then I realized that for this to flurish, I needed to find children with their own creative vision and ideas.

 

Currently we are looking for our 3rd participant and finalizing animations for Xander The Dragon Rider's Film. Clips from his film are incuded in our main video and full film set to be released in 2015. Xander continues to be a main source of inspiration for this project. He even conquered cancer a second time during production! We hope and pray for continued healing and clear scans. Since participating in the project Xander has gone on to being heavily involved in youth theater and even was featured on Hawaii 5-0 with a speaking role! And that's why I continue to to this, because it has become a healing experience that inspires creativity and changes lives!