My name is Ann Marie Foonberg.  While today the Pink Ribbon Foundation represents so many contributors and benefactors, it all started less than a decade ago in memory of my grandmother, Virginia Grace Kuhlemeyer.  She was a woman of courage and determination; and just like her name stated, she was a woman of grace.  My sisters and I had a bond with our grandmother that will never be broken, even by death.  She lost her battle with breast cancer eight years ago.

Grandma Kuhlemeyer resided in a village of 500 people in northern Illinois. She lived there all of her life. Grandma traveled to visit us in New Orleans where my sisters and I were born and to Denver where we now live. Even though there were always a thousand miles between us, we visited Grandma and she visited us frequently each year. In fact, when my sisters and I were young, we would each separately spend a week alone with Grandma in Pearl City.

In the summer of 1999, my sister Erin, my sister Jessica, Jessica's fiancee, and I flew to Chicago, drove to Pearl City, and intended to share the magic of a "Grandma visit" with Jessica's fiancee. This was the summer that I was preparing for my spring wedding. Grandma would get to see the dress that we selected for her to wear and I knew she would love it!

Bounding into her never-locked kitchen door and hoping to smell her secret recipe sugar cookies, our foursome descended on Grandma. Grandma was reclining on the kitchen sofa by the fireplace. It wasn't the grandma we knew. She was brittle, thin, and in pain. Instead of piling into Grandma's car to reconnect with Grandma's relatives, we gingerly assisted Grandma into her car and headed to the hospital.

Our week as young adults with Grandma became a summer of people, prayers, and a prognosis. Grandma had breast cancer. Her future would not be long.

Over the coming months, I flew back to Illinois to be with Grandma and to encourage her during her treatments. Those treatments caused Grandma pain and illness. Still, Grandma remained stoic and stubborn. She insisted that she was fine. From Colorado I would call her almost daily. She declared her good health each time I spoke with her! She said that her dress for my wedding would have to be altered to fit, but that she eagerly anticipated my ceremony.

Her condition grew worse. Could she really be at my wedding? I loved her so much that I had to have her at that special day. I even told her that I would not have a ceremony if she were not in attendance. I meant it, too. Deep down, I knew she would not be well again, but I also knew that her stubborness could get her to the wedding. She suffered from both the cancer and the treatment, but I knew that Grandma would be there on March 4, 2000, when I walked down the aisle.

Determined to be escorted to her seat at my wedding by my sister's finacee and watch Michael and I take our vows, my 86 year old grandmother agreed to heavy doses of chemotherapy as well as radiation.

Grandma was escorted to her seat at our wedding by her soon-to-be grandson-in-law and she glowed with happiness at our March 4 wedding.

We stretched our hope to allow ourselves to think that maybe, just maybe, Grandma would live to see the birth of our baby. I'll never forget my last trip to see my grandma. I gave her a full leg massage and a pedicure. My entire family was there. We played a name-that baby game and tried to entertain her and encourage her by thinking of the baby. We wrote possible names on the message board in her hospital room. She was still stubborn and usually only responded with her deep, "NO!" when we put up a name that she didn't like! She wasted no time in saying, "NO!" to our front-running name for a boy: Reuben! She entertained us with her insistence that we think of a different boy's name!

We didn't name our baby Reuben after all but Grandma didn't live to see this bundle of joy. Grandma died with her toes painted by me, but I wasn't there. On the day that Grandma died, we learned that the baby was to be a girl, but that there were complications with my pregnancy. I had to leave Illinois immediately and return to Denver for treatment. Michael and I were unable to attend Grandma's funeral. It was then that I knew I wanted to do something in Grandma's memory. It was then that I knew that I wanted to do something for someone else's grandma and that I would do it with my husband, Michael, and our daughter, Madilynne Grace, by my side.

In Grandma's memory, The Pink Ribbon Foundation begins.

I look forward to the future. I am driven to continue to work year after year in developing The Pink Ribbon Foundation's ability to aid patients in need at The University of Colorado Anschutz Cancer Pavillon in honor of my grandma. I visualize the joint efforts of the staff at the University of Colorado and our Foundation in helping to achieve The Pink Ribbon Foundation's mission:  To improve the quality of life for patients undergoing treatment at the Anschutz Cancer Pavilion.