Sahara's dream

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The construction team arrived Friday evening to empty the basement family room at the home of Shannon, Amy and Sahara Aldridge. Out went the furniture, pictures and sports memorabilia. Down went the drop cloths.

The extreme room makeover, sponsored by the Make-A-Wish Foundation of Missouri, moved into full swing early Saturday morning with volunteers from the Eagles Lodge 3775 painting and preparing the room for transformation into Sahara's dream room.

"It is everything I asked," Sahara said Saturday morning.

But by late Saturday evening, with a half-dozen volunteers working furiously and delivery workers building the entertainment center, Sahara had resisted the temptation to check in on the work.

Chad Golden, left, and Julie Breshears moved a new entertainment center with a flat-screen television into place in the Aldridges' made-over den Saturday. (Kit Doyle)

"I want to," she said, pushing herself to sit up as she watched NBA playoff basketball.

The room makeover is the latest expression of community support for Sahara, who was diagnosed with brain-stem cancer last summer. The disease keeps 12-year-old Sahara -- an honor-roll student and avid sports fan who was a ball girl for the Southeast Missouri State University women's basketball team for so long they considered her a part of the squad -- close to home.

The family room will be transformed into a young girl's dream: a daybed that can double as a couch, a mini-refrigerator so she doesn't have far to go for refreshment and her beloved sports pictures. Stripes of bright colors with fuchsia, orange and ice blue will adorn the main wall, but volunteer painters were still working on them at 9 p.m.

"Sahara is basically stuck in the house all the time," Amy Aldridge said. "This will make everyday living easier, more convenient and better all around."

The room makeover is one of the more unusual requests the Make-A-Wish Foundation has received over the years, said Julie Breshears, director of program services for the Springfield-based chapter that serves most of Missouri outside of St. Louis.

"With the popularity of the home makeover shows, and Sahara being confined more to her living room and family room areas, that is what meant the most to her," Breshears said.

Mike Chiles filled a basketball with foam at the Aldridge home. Once the foam hardened, the basketball was to be cut in half and used as a wall ornament to go with the sports theme that Sahara requested. (Kit Doyle)

The home decorating and home makeover shows, like "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" on ABC television that renovates homes of people battling disease, overcoming grief or lacking in means, are among Sahara's favorites. Whether she prefers those shows to sports "just depends," she said.

If the University of Tennessee women's basketball team or the University of Kentucky men's basketball team is playing, that's what she wants to see, she said. Other times, she wants to watch people renovate their homes.

Some shrinkage of tumor

Sahara has become a community cause, with churches making collections and performance groups staging benefits, including a concert by music and TV star Rick Springfield in December. That assistance has helped defray the costs of experimental treatments that Shannon Aldridge said are beginning to show some results.

"Our last MRI three weeks ago showed some shrinkage of the tumor," he said. "The medicine is working. What we are on is working. We've just got to have enough time to get there."

Sahara began the treatments in Houston, but now is able to maintain her treatments through the facilities of both Cape Girardeau hospitals.

"We just try to keep a good attitude," Shannon Aldridge said.

The Make-A-Wish Foundation is best known for the fantasy trips it provides. But that is only one part of the organization's efforts. The programs, targeted at children with life-threatening illnesses, can also provide a chance for children to meet their heroes, experience what it is like to be anything from a cowboy to a zookeeper, or have something that will make their lives happier or easier.

And Make-A-Wish doesn't do things in a small way. With help from more than a dozen businesses, from local retailers Buchheit and Hutson's Fine Furniture to Internet retailers such as Dinette.com and US-Mattress.com, the room will be transformed, Breshears said.

"It is not just rearranging furniture and bringing in a few new items," she said. "It is something big, a powerful, impacting experience."

Breshears enlisted Vickie Hoernig, a wish-granter volunteer and mother of a wish child, to help put Sahara's ideas into words. Interior designer Bethany Earley volunteered her services to make the ideas come to life.

"First of all, it needs to be functional for Sahara and her needs," Earley said. "And it is important that it be a space for her and her family."

The room will incorporate Sahara's love of basketball and show off her personality, Earley said. "It was really a lot of fun to be creative with it," she said. "She had some really fun ideas she wanted to do."

As the family waited for a chance to unveil the new room, they were joined by coach Franqua Bedell, or "Coach Q," a former assistant women's coach at Southeast who led basketball camps Sahara attended and now coaches at Southeast Illinois College in Harrisburg, Ill.

He came by to show off his new tattoo -- Sahara's jersey number, 21, her nickname "Hoops" with a "hobo ring" in the middle.

"The hobo ring stands for 'never give up,'" Bedell said.

rkeller@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 126