SPICER -- After four years in the making, a 9-year-old Spicer girl cut off a foot of her hair for donation to Locks of Love.
Toni Bonnema and her mother, Heather, walked into a Spicer salon Thursday and had the hair stylist cut off about 12 inches of Toni's blonde hair for donation to Locks of Love, a nonprofit association that provides hair pieces to children suffering from long-term medical hair loss.
Heather, who also donated 10 inches of hair, said "it didn't surprise me" four years ago when her daughter said she wanted to grow her hair for Locks of Love. "She has a big heart," Heather said, her daughter smiling while gripping her cut ponytail.
Heather said Toni probably came up with the idea after meeting a child at her day care who was diagnosed with leukemia, a blood and bone marrow form of cancer.
Heather said summer events such as weddings kept Toni from cutting it earlier, but that wasn't the case for Thursday.
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Toni will show off her new, shorter hairdo to all her classmates and teachers at Community Christian School today during her last day of school. "They all know about it," Heather said.
While her daughter looked at a book of shorter hairstyles, Heather said this probably won't be the family's last donation to Locks of Love.
"I definitely see her doing this again in a couple of years," Heather said. "It's like everyone says, it's only hair."
