Local Artist Crosses the Globe

by RYackley, Triblocal.com

Well known Tri-City artist Joe Gagnepain is headed to Italy this winter, to compete in the annual International Snow Sculpture Festival with his team, The Starvin’ Carvists.

The Starvin’ Carvists, which includes Stephen Bateman and Jason Anhorn, both artists in Eau Claire, WI, has competed in three former snow sculpting events. This team took second place February 2007 in Mt. Prospect, IL, at the annual Snow Visions competition. In January, they took third place in the International category at Zehnder’s Snowfest in Frankenmuth, MI, and they finished in fifth place at their first competition in 2006, at Frankenmuth.

Now this team of creative talent is gearing up to head to Italy for the Snow Sculpture Festival, to be held from January 9 to 11, 2008 in Innichen, and from January 14 to 16 in San Viglio, where they will compete against teams from all over the world.

“We’re the only American team going,” said Gagnepain. “This is a sanctioned snow carving event. We had to be juried in to go.”

For the Snow Sculpture Festival, The Starvin’ Carvists submitted drawings for their two planned sculptures: “Fool of the World,” showing a boy and his dog on a clipper ship, flying in the clouds; and “Mother of Invention,” showing a woman’s face with gears comprising the back of her head.

At each event, Gagnepain’s team is given a huge 10 foot block of snow. Referring to a small clay model crafted ahead of time, the team sculpts their design using hand saws, ice scrapers, and sanding pads.

Snow sculpting competitions differ from ice carving events in that teams must use all hand tools, and, in general, the scale of the snow is much larger than when ice is used.

“We make our own saws out of aluminum. We use chain saw chains to cut out the big sections. We use a horse brush to smooth the snow, and we use a drywall knife for detailing,” Gagnepain said. “We work maybe 16 hours a day on the sculpture. We want it to be perfect.”

Italy is no stranger to snow sculptures. An Olympic sanctioned event, Bardonecchia, Italy was host to the 2006 Olympic Snow Sculpture contest, held as part of the cultural program of the TuriWinter Olympic Games, that year.

Maybe The Starvin’ Carvists will make it to the Olympics some day, but in the meantime, you will be able to see Gagnepain with his hands in the snow at a premiere snow event coming to Geneva February 18 to 22, 2008. According to Gagnepain, who is one of the coordinators for this first time local event, the City of Geneva is planning on providing a snow making machine for the competition.

The Starvin’ Carvists are currently raising funds to help pay for their airfare and transportation costs to Italy, as well as for winter gear for the team, such as matching parkas and snow pants. The Tourist Boards for the participating towns, which are located in the Italian Alps, are providing room and board, and about a third of each team’s airfare.

Interested businesses are invited to contact Gagnepain for information on getting promotional patches and logos on the team’s gear, which will be worn in Italy and at all future competitions. Visit www.artbyjoseph.com for more information.

Wise words by others

"The American ideal is not that we all agree with each other, or even like each other, every minute of the day. It is rather that we will respect each other's rights, especially the right to be different, and that, at the end of the day, we will understand that we are one people, one country, and one community, and that our well-being is inextricably bound up with the well-being of each and every one of our fellow citizens." --Arthur J. Kropp, former U.S. Surgeon General

"The test of courage comes when we are in the minority: the test of tolerance comes when we are in the majority." --Ralph W. Stockman

"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius to move in the opposite direction." - Albert Einstein

Carol Stream girl to take lead victory lap at Kane County Relay For Life

Rachel Baruch Yackley
Posted Monday, June 18, 2007

“Sarah Beth is scared to death
’Cause the doctor just told her the news ;
Between the red cells and white
Something’s not right
But we’re gonna take care of you.”
— “Skin” by Rascal Flatts

Lorelei Fasetti of Carol Stream was driving down I-294 when she first heard the above song by Rascal Flatts.

“I was in outside sales and I was driving on the tollway when I heard a song about a girl diagnosed with cancer. I was so affected that I had to pull over. When you’re a mom, you know what that family would go through,” said Fasetti.

That was one week before Fasetti’s daughter, Nikki Diehl, was diagnosed with osteosarcoma, the most common form of cancer which forms in bone. She was just 10 years old.

Nikki had been complaining that her knee hurt, and although Fasetti tried everything she could think of, including making Nikki trade her flip-flops for gym shoes, nothing helped. So she took her to the doctor for an x-ray, just to check things out.

“Nikki was diagnosed July 6 of 2005. I got a call at 2 p.m. from the doctor’s office. I was in there for 20 minutes. The doctor held my hand, flipped her chart, and I could see it was cancer in her femur bone of her right leg.

“Of course I just broke down. The doctor told me to get Nikki to the hospital by 8 p.m. that night, and to promise her not to be alone this weekend. I was helpless ... I pulled myself together and drove home. What do I tell Nikki?”

Nikki entered Loyola Hospital in Maywood, where she remained until June of 2006. She received 48 rounds of chemotherapy. She also had surgery on her leg in October of 2005, during which her femur was removed and replaced with a magnetic metal rod, which will lengthen as she grows.

Fasetti still becomes upset when she remembers the toll all this took on her little girl.

“Nikki never came out of her room. She didn’t talk to anyone. They had a little school and everything, but for some reason, she didn’t want to be associated with the ward. She was so sick and so quiet and so small.

“I stayed with her for the first five months, and slept on a little bench. I would wake up at 4 in the morning, drive to Carol Stream, let the dog out — he would run away — take a shower, and go to work. Then I found out that the other moms go home at night, so that’s what I started doing. Nikki would cry every night. I’d get home and that call would come: ‘Mommy, mommy, help me. Mommy, mommy, take me home,” said Fasetti, crying.

“When she was in the hospital for 365 days, I tutored her. I would pick up her homework and return it the next Monday when I picked up the next batch. I really pushed her. Without a doubt, I knew she could do this,” said Fasetti.

“The doctors said she should lay off the schoolwork; that Nikki would fail. I was reprimanded on four occasions. But she passed, and when she was going into sixth grade this past year, she was so happy to be with her class.”

Nikki will be 13 in September. She’s going into seventh grade. She passed sixth grade with high Bs. Although she had to use a wheelchair after the surgery, she has regained much of the mobility of her leg through physical therapy.

“Before she got sick,” Fasetti said in a tearful voice, “Nikki used to dance, she played basketball, she loved music, she loved animals and wanted to be a veterinarian.”

Nikki still can’t play basketball, dance, ride a bike or walk fast, but her thankful mother said, “She is doing awesome.”

She can swim, she’s active in her Girl Scout troop, and next month she will be going to One Step At A Time, a summer camp offered through Children’s Oncology Services Inc.

Any family would have been overwhelmed faced with a young child with cancer. For Fasetti, a single parent, it was even harder. To make matters worse, Fasetti was laid off from her job in November 2005. And for a while, things got even worse.

“I took a part-time job over the holidays,” she said. “Then I was shoveling the driveway and fell and broke two bones in my leg. I was in a cast and couldn’t work. It really took a toll on us financially.”

One of the things that helped Fasetti make it through that dire year was emotional support from others, including Nikki’s fifth-grade teacher, Liz Sharf, at Spring Trail Elementary School.

“Bless her heart, this lady kept Nikki’s desk in the room, in memory of Nikki. She never moved it out. And she called at Christmas and on her birthdays. That made Nikki a part of (the class),” Fasetti said. “Her teachers and our friends and our neighbors — their support and their prayers — I don’t know if we would have made it without that light.”

Nikki is now “one year clean,” said Fasetti. And she is walking.

A meaningful expression of how far this brave girl has come is her participation in this year’s American Cancer Socity Relay For Life in Geneva Friday night, at which she will be the honorary survivor.

Nikki and her mom will be participating as members of St. Charles resident Loretta “Doogie” Mayberry’s team. Nikki met Mayberry just by chance while eating at a Baskin-Robbins after performing in a school play.

Relay For Life begins with an opening ceremony Friday evening, and then things get going with a Survivor Lap, for which Nikki will be in the forefront. All survivors take one lap around the warning track which circles the baseball field in Elfstrom Stadium, cheered on by friends and family on the sidelines. Golf carts are available to participants who are unable to walk the track.

Then everyone present joins in, with somebody from each team walking in the relay at all times, until the event culminates with a closing ceremony at 6 a.m. Saturday morning.

This emotional, hopeful, supportive event is a fundraiser for the American Cancer Society. All proceeds raised for the Relay For Life fund continued cancer research and treatment. Anyone and everyone is welcome to come experience this event; you don’t have to walk.

Relay For Life will be held at Elfstrom Stadium at the Kane County Events Center. Admission is $25 per team of 10 to 15 people.

Campsite setup begins at 3 p.m.; team registration and Cancer Survivor Celebration will start at 5 p.m.; and the Opening Ceremony and Cancer Survivor Lap is at 7 p.m.

For more information about the American Cancer Society or the relay, call (630) 879-9009 or visit www.acsevents.org/relay/il/kane.

If you want to donate to the Relay For Life, send it to the ACS office at 143 First St., Batavia, IL 60510, marked “RFL of Kane County.” Include your team name and your name.

Ryackley@aol.com

If you go

What: Kane County Relay For Life
When: 5 p.m. Friday to 6 a.m. Saturday
Where: Elfstrom Stadium, Kane County Events Center, Kirk Road and Cherry Lane, Geneva
For details: Call 9630) 879-9009 or visit www.acsevents.org/relay/il/kane