Verona Cedar Grove Times
by Joe Olivieri, December 8, 2009

Joni Jasterzbski had never heard of Hearts for Hope when she received the gift.

She’d just spent almost nine months in treatment for stage three breast cancer. On her last day of radiation at St. Barnabas Medical Center, she was given a small ceramic craft with a flower painted on it. The gift came with a note – "Never give up. I’m always with you. Always have a smile on your face!!" – signed Jacqueline, in careful print. Completing treatment was already an emotional experience. To give a child’s artwork to an elementary school art teacher like "Mrs. J," as her Verona students affectionately call her, put her over the top. "I started to cry," the Wayne resident said. "It was so moving and so positive."

Read the entire article here (pdf).