Caitlin's Smiles - Giving sick children laughs, hopes and smiles.

About Us

The Difference a Smile Can Make: Caitlin’s Story

Caitlin Hornung’s favorite colors were yellow and pink. She loved swinging and taking walks and playing outside. She loved to dance and sing along to Disney songs, play dress up, and take care of her baby sister, Danielle. One of her greatest joys came from creating art. In 1997, at the age of four, Caitlin was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. She spent the next three and a half years battling for her life.

Caitlin underwent surgeries, chemotherapy, stem cell transplant, radiation treatments, hundreds of blood transfusions, two long stays in the Intensive Care Unit and was treated at four different medical facilities. Several times her cancer appeared to have been in remission but it kept coming back.

Despite the tiring treatments and long hospital stays, Caitlin managed to keep a positive attitude by finding joy in creating art. She could always be found with a backpack full of arts and crafts supplies, coloring pictures for friends, family and hospital staff.

In October of 2000, shortly before her eighth birthday, Caitlin lost her battle with cancer. What friends and family learned from Caitlin was that healing is as much a mental process as it is a physical one. That is why in March of 2004 Cheryl Hornung, Caitlin’s mother, began Caitlin’s Smiles.

Though Caitlin passed on in 2000, her smiling spirit is kept alive through the work of Caitlin’s Smiles™.

Our Goals

We provide patients with "Bag of Smiles" packages through our Creative Arts Care Program. These packages promote activities such as drawing, creative writing and sculpting. Hospital staff distributes the packages while the children are in the hospital.

We provide individual arts and crafts kits to hospital departments and clinics where children wait for lengthy treatments.

We offer children a monthly card program.

We provide family support through family care kits that include items such as gas cards, local restaurant gift cards and phone cards.

We also provide small toys for treasure boxes.