{"id":6367,"date":"2014-04-23T13:44:09","date_gmt":"2014-04-23T17:44:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=6367"},"modified":"2014-05-07T17:36:02","modified_gmt":"2014-05-07T21:36:02","slug":"six-year-old-captains-team-for-southlake-run-putting-a-new-spin-on-his-birthday-party","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/six-year-old-captains-team-for-southlake-run-putting-a-new-spin-on-his-birthday-party\/","title":{"rendered":"Six-year-old captains team for Southlake Run \u2013 putting a new spin on his birthday party"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Most seven-year-olds count down the days to their birthday. Their wish lists grow with each passing day, and their birthday party plans might inch closer and closer to Cirque du Soleil every year.<\/p>\n

Alfonzo Boseovski, however, is not most seven-year-olds.<\/p>\n

The Hartman Public School student turns seven on Sunday and rather than booking a swimming pool or a bowling alley to celebrate with his family and friends, he is captaining a team and taking to the streets for the 2014 Run or Walk for Southlake, sponsored by Nature\u2019s Emporium. <\/p>\n

The Run or Walk for Southlake was initially founded in 2002 as the Hartwell Challenge, in memory of then-councillor Bob Hartwell, who died aged just 54 while running the Toronto Marathon. <\/p>\n

Now in its 14th year, organizers hope to reach a goal of $175,000 for the local hospital and Alfonzo\u2019s team is ready to do its part. <\/p>\n

Alfonzo wanted to give back to Southlake after several trips to the hospital both as a patient as a visitor to family members. <\/p>\n

\u201cI got stitches in the hospital,\u201d he explains. \u201cI was at school and people were spraying water. There was water on the ground and I slipped and hit my chin! I\u2019ve been there maybe five times, but the first time was probably when I sprained my ankle.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd the last time was when mommy had her surgery,\u201d his father Jovan reminds him. \u201cDaddy has never been there \u2013 just visiting!\u201d<\/p>\n

Alfonzo\u2019s mother, Deneb, was treated at Southlake for what ultimately turned out to be a benign lumpectomy. For her and Jovan, giving back to the community and being a part of it, are values they want to instill in their children, including daughter \u2013 and team co-captain \u2013 Kira, who turns 2 on April 30.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe main thing is we are privileged,\u201d says Deneb. \u201cWe live in a nice town with nice people, and giving back is one of the values we want to instill in them. Not everybody has that opportunity. If you have that chance, especially if you take care of your community, it will make it better. We want to teach them to take care of and give back to where they live \u2013 and every time we have been to Southlake they have treated us well.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the lead-up to Alfonzo\u2019s birthday, Jovan says the family was brainstorming ideas of what to do. They\u2019ve taken the kids and their friends to Bruce\u2019s Mill to celebrate their birthdays, they\u2019ve done their birthday party at Gateway Lanes, and they\u2019ve even rented out the pool at Newmarket\u2019s Magna Centre, but they wanted to do something a little bit out of the ordinary this year. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe thought if we were going to do the run, why not just invite people and have a team,\u201d says Jovan. \u201cA lot of people thought it was a cool and good idea, but some people were confused saying, \u2018Hold on, what\u2019s going on exactly?\u2019 We explained it to them and it has been almost entirely positive feedback. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think people are eager to participate and hopefully raise some money for the hospital. We are not raising a lot of money, but I think $400 is a decent goal. When people go to a birthday party, they will spend at least $30 on toys and we figure he doesn\u2019t need any more toys. All he wants to do is ride his bike and he\u2019s got one!\u201d<\/p>\n

The Boseovski family moved to Aurora from Willowdale five years ago. After looking at over 200 houses in just about every city and town in the Greater Toronto Area, Aurora was the place for them. It was a sense of community, they say, they did not find anywhere else and that sense made all the difference.<\/p>\n

\u201cI tell my husband that where you live is not only about a house, but it is the community that makes the difference,\u201d says Deneb. \u201cI think Aurora is the place for us. Alfonzo loves it, it makes him happy, he loves his school, community centres, friends, and I hope he grows up with that sense.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope others can see opportunities and different ways to do things. I love giving [my kids] their birthday party, their gifts, and all of those things, but this is a chance for them to learn and also plant a seed in other people to do a bit of good in that day. He will get the company of the people and to learn the universe goes beyond yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Most seven-year-olds count down the days to their birthday. Their wish lists grow with each passing day, and their birthday party plans might inch closer and closer to Cirque du Soleil every year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6343,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/2014-04-24-07.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-1EH","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-03 05:30:28","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6367"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6367\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6343"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}