7’s Hero: An Idaho mom is on a mission to make dreams come true for kids with chronic medical conditions

BOISE, Idaho — On Mother’s Day, people honor their moms. There is also a mom right here in Boise who is taking it even further. She saw a need in our community and decided to act on it. 

Katie Marshall aims to make dreams come true for kids with chronic medical conditions. Her 8-year-old son inspired her. 

“Tommy is very fun and very loving,” Marshall said. “If I squeeze him, he starts laughing like crazy, and every time he laughs, it’s a miracle.” 

Tommy Marshall is a quadriplegic and has spina bifida. 

“He has been through ten surgeries,” Marshall said. “I had in utero surgery at 24 weeks, and that led to some complications. He had a brain injury shortly after he was born. There was so much trauma coming out of that.”  

As Tommy grew, Marshall reached out to local wish-granting nonprofits to see if he could qualify for something special just for him. But he was denied because his condition was not life-threatening, as some nonprofits require.  

“Serious chronic illnesses like Tommy’s, even if he is stable now, we know there are ups and downs. There’s going to be trauma after trauma. They are never going to live a normal life. He’s never going to recover, and there are so many kids that deal with that,” Marshall said. “We want to support them too. We want to fill this gap. If there’s someone missing out in the Treasure Valley, then we have to bring it to them.”  

That passion inspired her to bring “The Dream Factory” to Idaho. 

“When I deal with disappointment or rejection, I want answers. So I did all kinds of research, I looked up all kinds of organizations, and eventually I found the Dream Factory,” she said. 

“The Dream Factory” does not limit its mission to children with life-threatening illnesses. The organization believes children with chronic diseases, illnesses and disorders also suffer from substantial emotional and physical pain.

“I learned that it’s over 40 years old, and the reason no one knows about it is because it’s super local,” she said. “You have to find crazy people like me to talk and talk and talk and build up all these volunteers. Then we flew the CEO out from Kentucky, and he gave us all the training we needed, and we became official.” 

The first recipient in Idaho was Paxton Mayer from Star. He is now ten years old and said he was surprised at a special assembly at Star Elementary School. 

“He came in and he had no idea what was going on, they just told him it was time for PE. He wanted to go to Disney World, and I watched his face light up. The board members they lit up, they were glowing, some were crying. We got to send them off in style with a limo ride,” Marshall said.  

Paxton and his parents said they had the time of their lives at Disney World.

Since then, Marshall’s organization has partnered with the “Grid Iron Dreams Ambassador Program,” which includes Boise State football players past and present. They helped make a young boy named Landyn’s dream come true. 

Currently, fundraising is being done for Juliet Stewart of Eagle, Idaho. She was born with spina bifida. Her summer is filled with surgeries and therapy appointments, but Juliet wants to go to Disney World with her family. “The Dream Factory” sells raffle tickets to win a dream vacation, and all proceeds will go to Juliet’s trip.  

“This is so special because it is community-powered,” Marshall said. 

She hopes that one day, her son Tommy will be chosen by “The Dream Factory” board, too.

“He struggles to even hold a toy, or to grasp, or to tell us what he wants. I want to give him the ultimate play set up,” Marshall said.  

For now, she said she gets so much joy out of each dream granted, and she wants to make “The Dream Factory” as successful as possible here in Idaho. 

“I like really big goals, and one of our ideas is to be a household name,” Marshall said. “Where everyone knows that this is a part of our community and this is a resource for kids to be loved.”

Marshall is a mom with a huge heart and a mission to make dreams come true. 

For more information on The Dream Factory of Idaho, and the dream vacation raffle to raise money for Juliet Stewart’s trip, click here.