When you see a need, fill it.
Our Story…

The Fall Funding will be announced in September 2026. As a reminder, please save the date for The Day in the Park, Sunday, August 16, 2026. Please join your neighbors at The Day in the Park this summer, at North Park, Spring Green, for music, games, food, fun, and a coming together of our communities to raise money for those who, through no fault of their own, are in need of a boost up. We hope to see you there! For more information please go to www.4petesake.com. Thank you.

2025 Spring Funding Recipients
You matter. The River Valley community cares about each other. This is never more apparent than when I look at the cycle of help and hope provided by 4PeteSake in our community each year.

The next Fall Funding Round will be announced in September. If you, or a loved one, face extraordinary financial need and are unable, through no fault of your own, to provide for yourselves. Your community is here for you.

The generosity of people in the River Valley has brought comfort to the following community members over the last year. I invite you to read their stories and know that they are forever grateful for the contributions you have made in the past. You made a difference.

Troy Vanderheyden

Troy and Cerry welcomed me into their home with comfort and open hearts. It wasn’t long
before I felt that we somehow had known each other for years. It was the ease with which they
shared Troy’s story, but really their story, with me, a stranger to them, in their home that struck
me so strongly. The back and forth, the respect, and the kindness that they showed each other
opened the space for me, almost as an observer, to lean in and inhale their story.

Troy grew up in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and then married. It is a place that still has a pull on him
and is where his first daughter lives with her four children. A series of jobs and promotions
brought him to Madison where he had four additional children with his now ex-wife. When they
divorced, and then he married Cerry, they all remained family, raising his first five children in the
company of Kiera, the child that Troy and Cerry had together. Family is what Troy comes back
to with joy, appreciation, gratitude, and hope for the future. They are what he lives for.

Because of his love for his family, and dream of getting better for them, I learned about
Shawano Lake west of Green Bay and now want to visit it! If Troy can get well enough to qualify
for the double transplant that will give him quality of life, his goal is to take all of his kids, their
partners and his grandchildren to Shawano Lake for a reunion of sorts. It would be a time of
celebration, game playing, joke telling, and teasing, all imbued with so much love.

When Cerry and Troy look back at the life they had before Troy’s troubles began, they talk of all
the things he loved to do: gardening, wood working, holidays (celebrating and decorating for)
camping and helping others. With tears in both of their eyes, they shared how much they miss
those times, how much Troy needs a purpose, and how the treatment, dialysis, infections, and
hospitalizations have taken so much out of him. And then they quickly revert to talking about
their gratitude.

They had always thought that 4PeteSake was for someone else, someone who “needed it
more.” Like so many recipients with whom I have talked, they wanted to take care of
themselves. They are hard workers, they don’t ask for help…and yet they find themselves
needing it.

Then 4PeteSake, you, your neighbors, the people of their community stepped up to help them
and they couldn’t be more grateful. They want you to know…Thank you. With tears of
appreciation Troy said, “I can’t express it enough…”