Lija Znakina

Our family and everybody around us are blessed to have Conan as a son, a brother, a grandson, and a friend. He brings us his contagious laugh and smiles that can brighten any room he’s in. Conan is an 11-year-old boy who happened to have Down Syndrome. But that does not stop him from going to middle school in Ridgewood, NJ and doing all the stuff that all kids do at his age – he loves playing basketball and baseball, his favorite band is Daft Punk and once in a while he is rocking a leather jacket with the name of this band on its back. He loves singing and playing the guitar and we learn the speech through singing his favorite songs. He is a sport to do anything adventures (and mischievous) and we are looking forward to going to the beach in the summertime.

Besides his amazing personality he is an amazing teacher for all of us. Sometimes we forget how to have fun, or how to be kind, or how to show love. And he brings all these amazing things back to us unconditionally. And for that we are always very grateful to him.