Teaming up for Tanner Foundation, Inc.

04/17/2026

Tanner’s legacy is built with love, imagination, some LEGOs and a whole lot of heart. 🧱💙

When Tanner dreamed of traveling but couldn’t due to his cancer diagnosis during COVID, Make‑A‑Wish surprised him with a camper he named “The Turtle Tank”—even designing a custom flag to fly from it. That joyful spirit lives on today through the Fill the Turtle Tank LEGO Drive and the work of Teaming up for Tanner Foundation, Inc.

Now in its fourth year, this annual drive collects unopened LEGO kits for kids receiving inpatient care at Children’s Mercy—bringing creativity, comfort and smiles to our patients with nearly $10,000 in LEGO kits donated each year.

Learn more about Tanner, his story and how you can support the LEGO Drive at https://cmkc.link/3QdzLcd

03/21/2026

For many personal reasons, we had to delay the donation drop from December, but it worked out pretty well. They were super excited for this mid March donation!

Thank you to everyone who helped us by donating, collecting, sharing posts, telling people by word of mouth about the drive, and more (especially our wonderful public donation locations Appliance Shark, Crown Realty - Gardner, and Hometown Sports Gear). This would not be possible without you all!

Children's Mercy tells us every year how they would not be able to bless the kids to the capacity they can now without our Lego donations.

And thank you from the bottom of our hearts for helping us keep Tanner's memory alive through the Lego Drive. 💝

03/02/2026

Today marks 6 years since our son was diagnosed with kidney cancer. March is kidney cancer awareness month.
It took another 2 weeks after diagnosis to figure out what type of kidney cancer he had. He had Translocation Renal Cell Carcinoma, which is extremely rare, especially in pediatrics. He was one of only 8 kids known to have this cancer worldwide that year. By the time we found his tumor, it's was 10cm. In 2 weeks it had grown to 12cm and was deemed too large to operate and had metastasized to his lymph nodes. It is a very aggressive and fast growing cancer. Treatment options for even adults are still, to this day, not great. They are still trying to find good options for treatment since it doesn't respond to normal chemo treatments. It's even harder for pediatrics, because their bodies can only handle so much and a lot of drugs are not approved for adolescents.
..6 whole years.

12/17/2025

These pictures only show a portion of what we were able to collect this year, but we will get a full photo of all the kits together when we take them to CMH.

I am VERY excited to announce that as of today, between our public and private donation boxes and our amazon deliveries, we were able to collect 450 KITS!!! Additionally, we were able to purchase another 53 kits with all of the funds that were donated by check, cash, or direct pay online!!!

Which brings us to a GRAND TOTAL OF OVER 500 LEGO KITS TO DONATE TO CMH FOR THE 2025 LEGO DRIVE!!!

I would like to express a huge thank you to our public donation locations once again at Appliance Shark , Crown Realty - Gardner , and Hometown Sports Gear! We really couldn't do this each year without all your help and generosity! And to everyone that has helped us by spreading the word, donating kits, hosting a private collection at your church/work/home, etc... each of you make this possible. From the bottom of our hearts, we thank you for helping us be able to do this year after year, and bring smiles to a few of the sick kiddos that pass through the doors of Children's Mercy every year. You help us honor the memory of our son Tanner as well, and as a bereaved parent.... that means the world to us.

(Don't worry if your Amazon delivery is running late, we have had a few that are and we have planned accordingly. And as always, we continue to collect throughout the year so if all else fails, any donations can go towards next year's collection).

12/10/2025

12/10/2025

TODAY is the last day for in person donations at our main donation locations: Appliance Shark on Shawnee Mission Parkway, Crown Realty - Gardner, and Hometown Sports Gear
We will be collecting and counting those donations over the next couple days! I've heard from multiple people that the donation boxes are filling up! We really appreciate it!!

ONLINE DONATIONS UPDATE:
We will be extending the deadline for online donations (Amazon and website monetary contributions). We have sadly had some losses in our family this last week. One of the funerals has informed us they will be collecting Lego donations in lieu of flowers. We need to give our family the time to grieve and not stress over fitting the delivery of donations in during this time.
We have also been notified that a few Amazon shipments are running late and this would also give them time to be delivered.

We have spoken with the volunteers at Children's Mercy and they have been so kind and understanding. They have been helping us set up a new donation delivery date and letting us know they even have remaining Lego donations from last year they have been able to give to kids inpatient just this week even!

Thank you for all the donations, and we will keep everyone posted about final counts as we pick up the donation boxes and close up the 2025 Lego Drive!

12/06/2025

Crown Realty - Gardner had their Lego Drive Christmas Party last night and there was a fantastic turnout! Look how full the donation box got after last night!! The party was so fun, the kids all had a great time seeing Santa, coloring, building Lego ornaments, and gorging themselves on the hot cocoa and donuts that were donated :)

Thank you to everyone that came out, donated,and had a good time with us last night! And a HUGE thank you to Crown Realty for another wonderful year of partnering with us for the CMH Lego Drive!

12/04/2025

6 days left until the 2025 Lego Drive ends!!!
As of right now, we have received $275 in monetary donations towards the purchase of Lego kits!!! When the drive ends, we'll count up how many Lego kit donations we have received and see what types we might be low on (duplo, small kits, Lego friends, etc) and then let you know how many and what type of kits we are able to purchase using your monetary donations.

Thank you to everyone who has donated money or kits this year, and everyone who has helped us collect them and shared our posts! We appreciate each and every one of you!

Here's a throwback of little Tanner building with some Lego :)

11/28/2025

Right now is the best time to snag some Lego from the stores for the 5th Annual Lego Drive! Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals are about to drop all over the country. Amazon deals can be shipped directly to the drive, Crown Realty has their annual Christmas Party this coming Friday evening where you can donate Lego AND see Santa/receive a goody bag for kids/enjoy the hot cocoa bar and daylight donuts & more (donation not required to attend), or you can donate in person at Appliance Shark or Hometown Sports and finish your new Appliance/sports enthusiast Christmas shopping at either location while you are there!

If you are local to Gardner, you know the hype happening -T.J. Maxx is officially open! While there checking it out with my youngest, we noticed they sell building bricks in the Christmas gift and toy areas for pretty cheap as well!

Hope to see you all on Friday! Happy Shopping!

11/28/2025

11/28/2025

Black Friday + Small Business Saturday deals are HERE at Hometown Sports Gear! 🎉
Save 20–40% off storewide — the perfect time to gear up, shop local, and support your hometown shop. 💛🏒🏈🏀
Come see us in Gardner!

11/27/2025

Happy Thanksgiving! We are immensely grateful for all the support we have received from everyone over the years. Thank you to everyone who continues to show us your kindness, love, and generosity year after year during each of our annual events, through the good days and the rough ones.

We hope you are able to sit down, relax, and appreciate the meaning of today - stuffed beneath the stress of the turkey dinner and the chaos that is typical of this time of year.

If you are experiencing your first Thanksgiving or your 50th without someone you love, we are hopeful that this day will be gentle for you. Take moments for remembering the good, and the moments to cry when needed. There is no shame in grieving. There is no timeline for healing, and holidays are especially difficult.
Hugs to everyone.

Love to all today -
The McCullough Family