Swing sets and super heroes: a way to help a child's dream come true

EDWARDSVILLE - This Saturday at the Wildey Theatre the Masinelli family will be celebrating their son Kelan's 10th party and raising funds to help his Make a Wish dream a reality.

Kelan was diagnosed at only four months old with a rare disorder called Lissencephaly. Tim Masinelli, Kelan's father, said throughout the years they've done fundraisers for different charities and as his 10th birthday approached they were able to get a grant from Make a Wish.

"Our wish was to install a wheelchair accessible swing at the Boundless Playground in Edwardsville," Masinelli said. "The playground was designed to allow kids with disabilities and without disabilities to play at the same playground."

Although the playground was designed to for children with disabilities it was still never quite as accessible for Kelan. The Masinelli's wish for the swing is much more than something that can benefit their own family, but families who may share similar situations.

"It was never able to be a park that our son could really enjoy," Masinelli said. "As he got older it's just not feasible for him to go to a park and just swing and get out of his wheelchair. That's kind of how we arrived at our wish. To have something at the park that we can wheel him on in his wheelchair and swing."

The addition of the swing will give the Masinelli family and many others the opportunity to experience family fun in a way that they previously had been unable to.

"For years what we would do when we go to the park was my wife or I would sit back with our son and the other would go and play with our daughter," Tim said. "We could never really play together as a family. There was never going to be a time when my son was swinging and my daughter was swinging and we kind of just came to terms with that. Then the Boundless Playground came in and we thought that was a great idea, but it just never worked the way we thought it could work.

"It really got us to the point where if we can make this happen and we can go to the playground and our son can swing on his swing and our daughter could be playing, it would really finally create that idea of going to the playground, and there's the aspect that not only will he enjoy it but there has to be other families out there like us."

Although the Masinelli's could have chosen to have the swing installed at their home they felt that installing the swing where it could used by people for many years to come was the right choice.

"We could have done this just at our house but it felt like there was something more to benefit more kids," Tim said. "Long after he's gone it will always be there and it will be a way for us to keep his memory alive."

The installation of the swing is costly, so this year for Kelan's birthday celebration there will be a free screening of the Lego Batman Movie at the Wildey Theatre at 3 p.m. on Saturday with donations going to cover any expenses that the Make a Wish grant can't cover.

More information about Kelan's party and how to help can be found on Facebook.

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