NEWS

Cary Magazine. Written by Nancy Pardue. Photographed by Jonathan Fredin. June/July 2016.

Quality Time: Fill Your Bucket List Foundation

WHAT WOULD you do, if you knew you were running out of time?

That’s the premise behind the Fill Your Bucket List Foundation, a Cary-based nonprofit that grants wishes to adults battling cancer, while creating memories to live on in their families and friends.

“Cancer can be a gift if you allow it to be. It’s a chance to do the things you want to do and say things you want to say. It puts life in perspective,” said Fill Your Bucket List founder Peggy Gibson Carroll.

When her own father, Charles “Chuck” Gibson, was diagnosed with late-stage lung cancer, Carroll saw her personal and professional lives collide. She’s retired from a career that includes extensive oncology and advocacy experience.

Chapel Hill couple donates Final Four and Championship tickets to cancer patients

Colin Hopper and fiancee Cindy

Mark Horn

On Monday night, Colin Hopper and his fiancée Cindy will be in NRG Stadium for the biggest college basketball game of the year.

“This will probably be the best experience I will have ever had,” said Hopper, a diehard college basketball fan.

Hopper is able to go to the game thanks to the generosity of a Chapel Hill couple who passed up cheering on their Tar Heels in the Final Four and instead decided to donate their tickets to two cancer patients. Seven years ago, Hopper was diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. He says the past seven years have been a tough, long and painful journey.

Tar Heel: Cary’s Peggy Gibson Carroll helps fulfill cancer patients’ wishes

CARY. Chuck Gibson didn’t have a long or extravagant bucket list when he was diagnosed with late-stage lung cancer in 2008. He wanted to visit his brother and his old Marine buddies – and to watch his grandchildren play on the football field and in the school band every chance he got.

Yet when the cancer took him a few months later, his daughter knew that fulfilling those final wishes had meant a lot. The experience planted a seed that Peggy Gibson Carroll has since nurtured into a full-blown effort to make cancer patients’ dreams reality.

Carroll founded the Fill Your Bucket List Foundation in 2014, and has since helped 10 Triangle people fulfill a dream and spend time with loved ones as they face a cancer diagnosis. The most recent recipient, 26-year old Grant Lafoon, went with his mom to see the Carolina Panthers play in Super Bowl 50 last weekend.

Raleigh man granted wish to attend Super Bowl 50

Grant Lafoon is one of thousands of Panthers fans in the San Francisco for Super Bowl 50, but his journey to the Bay Area is quite different than most.

WRAL. February 5, 2016

Raleigh man recovering from cancer to get dream trip with his mom to Super Bowl

The News & Observer, January 29, 2016

RALEIGH. Grant Lafoon is slowly regaining his balance. That will be important for all the cheering he plans to do for the Carolina Panthers at the Super Bowl next Sunday.

Lafoon, 26, has spent the past year dealing with stage four brain cancer. He has struggled to walk, hear and talk.

The good news is that he’s in remission now. And the Fill Your Bucket List Foundation out of Cary is making that news even better by sending Lafoon and his mom, Melinda Pupp, to Super Bowl 50 in Santa Clara, Calif.

The foundation started working on getting the tickets to the game about three months ago, long before the Super Bowl teams were decided.

Oncology TV Features Foundation

Fill Your Bucket List Founder and Executive Director, Peggy Gibson Carroll was featured on Oncology TV at the Annual Meetings of the American Society for Clinical Oncology (ASCO).

It was such a great opportunity to share the mission of the Foundation and talk about all the ways people are helping to make wishes come true!

And the next wish goes to....

Linda is a metastatic bladder cancer survivor who wanted to be able to take her grandsons to Disney World to see them experience all the magic, joy and wonder first hand.

We delivered the news that her wish has been granted in person and were delighted to catch her on video so we can share it here. Warning: It gets a little emotional- in a good way of course!

Click box below to see pictures from Linda's trip.

See Linda's Wish

The FIRST ANNUAL BUCKET BASH

The Inaugural Bucket Bash took place Sunday, March 29, 2015 in Cary, NC, and it was a huge success.

Over 200 people gathered together under twinkling lights to celebrate granting wishes for adults with cancer and to raise money to make even more dreams come true. The generosity and support of everyone who attended was overwhelming.

Thank you to everyone who was a part of making the event so successful.