MANKATO — After a year of tragedy upon tragedy, Terri Santee still is able to smile.

After losing her husband of 15 years in a car accident, she still is able to laugh. After a year of living with cancer, suffering through dozens of chemotherapy treatments that have sickened and exhausted her, she still is able to give.

Santee, 42, lost a great deal during the past year. Not so long ago she had a home full of love and special belongings she and her husband, Eric Santee, held dear. She also had her health.

Most of that is gone now. Yet, during one of the scariest and loneliest times in her life, she has found it in her heart to give to those less fortunate. Today Santee will donate her extensive collection of Barbie Dolls to Toys for Tots at the Realtor Association of Southern Minnesota in North Mankato.

She wants to make sure her dolls goes to girls who will love them as much as she did.

“Eric and I have always bought gifts and given them to Toys for Tots,” she said. “I would really like to see the little girls’ eyes when they get to see these beautiful dolls.”

It starts with one

A 150-piece collection of Barbie Dolls begins with just one, Santee said — a mermaid. The doll was gorgeous, she said, sitting on the store shelf in 1989. She had to have it.

Santee isn’t sure what appealed to her so much about the dolls. She just liked them and started buying more.

“I didn’t look for anything specific, just ones that I liked — lots of ones with long dresses,” she said.

More than 15 years later, Santee had accumulated so many of the dolls that she had no place to display them, not even in the spacious Mankato house she and her husband moved into two years ago. Many sat in their original boxes in closets.

Santee’s husband also enjoyed collecting things. He had an assortment of firearms and memorabilia of “The Simpsons” television show.

In their home with their dog, Bear, surrounded by their collections, Santee said she and her husband shared a happy life. They celebrated their 15th anniversary April 29, 2004, and renewed their wedding vows May 1, 2004, to commemorate the occasion.

A terrible year

Aug. 11, 2004, Santee was diagnosed with cancer. The worst news: It was cancer of “unknown primary.” In people with an unknown primary, the tests find evidence of secondary cancer but do not identify the site of the primary cancer.