When Life Gives You Cancer, Make Lemonade

Kids donate lemonade sales to charity that helped their father

ALEXANDRIA, Va. -- Some Alexandria children are spending the end of their summer pushing lemonade to raise money for charity.

Jake and Abby Hamilton, 10 and 12 respectively, are donating all of their lemonade profits to Brain Injury Services, which they said has helped their father, Bruce Hamilton, who is battling a brain tumor.

"We just wanted to donate some money to a place that helped him, and they did help him, so we wanted to donate to them," Jake said.

With help from their friend Taylor, Jake and Abby stayed up all night selling lemonade on the corner of Ramsey and Braddock roads.

"Pretty much we camped out," Abby said. "There's a tent. We had a fire going for like eight hours, and we had, actually, tons of people came by."

"I think the nighttime it sells better than the day a little bit, because we got a lot of tips," Jake said.

The lemonade stand was an idea that Bruce Hamilton had three years ago when he was diagnosed. He thought it would be a good project to distract his kids from his illness.

"I'm really impressed with how they are learning that even though they're younger than the average citizen, or what not, they really are kind of pulling people together."

As of Friday evening, they've raised $350. Business is growing as word gets out, and the kids plan to keep selling through the night.

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