Thank you for taking the time to visit our JustGiving page. This photo was taken at the end of the Bristol Half Marathon on 6th September - we all look suitably exhausted and will no doubt look even worse after the London Marathon on 25th April! Peter and I had thought that 2009 would be our last marathon but meeting the staff from NDCS after the race made us think again. They really do depend on the money raised by people like us and so we decided to have another go at beating our five hour target. Peter's abrupt halt at 18 miles, followed by the announcement that he thought marathon running was 'boring and a waste of time' (!!) meant we crossed the finishing line after 5 hour 6 minutes. Having Linus with us will hopefully give us a boost. I called him from the Marathon Expo on 25th April last year and told him he would love to be part of it all. Happily he allowed himself to be talked into it and it will be great to run in a team with him. We have run two half marathons together and both times he has got me round in a personal best time of 2 hours 12 minutes.

But back to the reason we're running....The London Marathon is officially the biggest fundraising event in the world; this year we'll be three of the team of 58 runners running for NDCS, hoping to raise a total of about £90,000. There is plenty to read about the work of NDCS on their website; their aim is to remove the barriers faced by deaf children and young people. As parents of a profoundly deaf child, Peter and I are very aware of how such barriers can be thrown up without warning. Toto relies heavily on lipreading - she can't watch cartoons unless they are subtitled because there are no moving mouths to follow. In fact she can't watch anything without subtitles. She can't hear us when we talk in the front of the car - Jackson tells her what we are saying or she lipreads me in the wing mirror! She can't speak on the phone. She struggles when she is in a big group of friends because she needs to have her eyes on one person. She can't hear fire alarms or smoke alarms. There are lots of small things which can make straightforward days hard work and, at times, make Toto feel very isolated. Looking at her, you would never know. In the UK there are 20,000 children with moderate to severe hearing loss; NDCS is there to help them and their families. We hope you will want to support them too.

Every pound you donate makes a difference and donating through JustGiving is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving – they’ll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they’ll send your money directly to the charity and make sure Gift Aid is reclaimed on every eligible donation by a UK taxpayer. So it’s the most efficient way to donate -  we raise more, whilst saving time and cutting costs for the charity.

Many thanks, Kate, Peter and Linus