CLEMSON — – The scope of it all can be difficult for Tanner Smith to fathom.

From a paper he wrote as a fourth-grader to an enterprise that covers all corners of America, Tanner’s Totes has truly taken on a life of its own.

When Smith was 12 years old, the Alpharetta, Ga., native wrote a school paper discussing his three wishes – to have a golden retriever puppy, to play professional basketball and to make kids with cancer smile.

His parents, Craig and Kathy Smith, got him a puppy, Griffey, and a Sacramento Kings locker for Christmas, as well as a “Patch Adams” red clown nose.

Two years later, he wrote the paper again. “Oh, he’s serious,” Kathy said to herself.

Tanner’s Totes was born –a non-profit organization that provides pre-teens and teenagers underdoing long-term treatment for life-threatening illnesses with tote bags full of new, non-food items designed to brighten their lives.

As Smith, now a Clemson senior guard/forward, winds down his college career (the 13-13 Tigers visit Atlanta Tuesday to play his hometown team, Georgia Tech, at 7 p.m. inside Philips Arena), Tanner’s Totes is just hitting its stride.

A wave of media attention has made it a nationwide name – the Smiths estimate they’ve distributed over 1,000 totes in the last year alone. They go to over 40 hospitals in 21 states, stretching from Seattle to Miami and New York to Honolulu.

“It’s really been amazing,” Smith said last week. “I know when I started it, I don’t know what the expectations were. I wanted to do something. I liked the idea of the totes. I never thought it’d get to the point where we’re in 40-plus hospitals, all the way across the country and we’re 100-percent donation-based, 100-percent nonprofit. Being at Clemson has taken it to a level I never could’ve imagined.”

The reach of Tanner’s Totes hit Smith when the Tigers flew to Hawaii at Christmas for the Diamond Head Classic. As the plane landed, Smith could see the Tripler Army Medical Center – a tote recipient.

“It’s funny to think we made the trip to Hawaii and Tanner’s Totes bags have made that trip three, four times,” he said. “Being on the platform of basketball has allowed it to take off. (Reporters) always want to do articles and talk about it, and it just helps get the word out there.”

Tanner’s Totes has been featured on ESPN.com, “Everyday Health,” a lifestyle program distributed to ABC stations, and ESPN’s College GameDay; Smith said HLN (Headline News) has filmed a segment which will air next month.

Every time a national segment airs, the Smiths say, donations spike. Several NBA players have even expressed interest in and donated to the charity, and Smith’s friends have taken up the cause, too. Florida State All-America outfielder James Ramsey, a childhood buddy, spearheaded a benefit drive at FSU, as did a friend who plays basketball at William and Mary.

They ship from 40-120 totes per month, Kathy Smith said. They’re gender-specific, containing items that either boys or girls can enjoy, ranging from Frisbees to footballs to water bottles to playing cards and much more; each tote is worth between $65-70. This is done at no cost to the hospitals.; Tanner’s Totes received about $30,000 in donations last year.

Kathy does all the shopping, buying at Target, Wal-Mart and online, buying in bulk when she can.

The Smiths coordinate with child life specialists at children’s hospitals and receive requests through the charity’s Web site – tannerstotes.com – where those interested can learn more.

Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts and others doing community service projects help fill bags – Tanner says a group of 30 can fill 60 bags in an hour, or “a lot faster than my family can.”

He says the tote bags have become far more elaborate and larger as the charity has matured.

“I used to be able to carry eight, nine tote bags,” he said. “I’m bigger now, and I can only carry four or five. It’s funny to see that.”

While he isn’t able to be as personally involved in-season, Smith happily balances the demands of school, sports and totes. On the court, he is the quintessential “glue guy”, averaging 11.1 points and 5.2 rebounds per game while leading Clemson with 4.1 assists per game. Coach Brad Brownell calls him “a guy you love to have on your team.”

“It’s tough. But it’s something I’ve loved doing,” Smith said. “It’s easy to find time for something I enjoy doing. Time management is key. I think with any college athlete, you talk to any of them, the time management aspects of our lives are a lot different. Sometimes I’m at my best when I’m doing a lot of different things because I have to plan my days out, hour by hour.”

Brownell says Smith’s unselfishness makes him special.

“He’s made a lot of difference in a lot of young people's lives,” Brownell said. “I think it speaks to his maturity, with all the things he has going on in his life that he would be thinking of somebody else.”

Tanner’s Totes has also helped Tanner connect with Craig on a personal level. When Tanner was two years old, Craig was diagnosed with Stage IV non-Hodgkins lymphoma.

A bone marrow transplant from Craig’s sister left the cancer in remission, but complications arose. Craig was attacked by Graft vs. Host disease, a condition where the transplanted white blood cells attack their new body.

Craig’s immune system is compromised; he produces no saliva and no tears. He has constantly dry eyes and has had four cornea transplants – they can rip just from a blink. Due to the lack of saliva, his teeth have deteriorated; ironically, before he got sick, he was a dentist. He has 20 percent lung capacity and open wounds on his feet; each night before bed, he must moisturize and wrap them or face unimaginable pain the next day.

“We’ve had a few health scares, but he’s still with us,” Tanner says.

Tanner says he’s “great friends” with Craig, and “respects him more than anyone in the world.”

Tanner’s Totes allows Craig to give back and connect with children and parents who are experiencing what he did.

“When I was in the hospital, right next door was a 12-year old and an eight-year-old,” he said. “I tried to put myself in the child’s position and I don’t know how they were making it. For kids, it’s very difficult, and for a parent, I’m thankful that I had cancer and not my child. For him to make those kids smile and watching the parents’ faces light up, it really meant a lot.”

Craig’s illness left Tanner an only child, but Tanner says the Totes have given him 3,000 brothers and sisters.

“Having a little bit of a silver lining in a dark cloud has been good for our family as a whole,” he said. “We’ve been able to stick together and it’s given us something to do.”

If Tanner has his way, totes will keep getting filled for a long, long time.

Tanner says he wants to continue the charity “as long as I’m alive.”

He plans to pursue a professional basketball career, either in America or Europe, and then begin a college coaching career.

“It’s gotten so big and I’ve seen all the things that it can do that there’s no way I can stop it,” he said. “And I don’t think I want to.”

Tanner hopes to sell corporate sponsorships on the now-blank back sides of bags, offering a NASCAR-like business plan with sliding scales for size of the logo, length of commitment and web site placement.

And he’d love to take the totes international, with a potential European hoops home as a jumping-off point.

“That’d be the next step for us and it’d be a really cool step for us, if we can bridge that boundary, language-wise, culture-wise,” he said. “I don’t know what hospitals are like in Europe. I’d like to go over there and see what they need. We might have a different international tote bag compared to a domestic one. We’d have to change our slogan on the front to a different language, but we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.”

As Tanner Smith prepares to step away from Clemson’s platform, his mission is only beginning.

“Tanner’s Totes are something where no matter where you say it now, people know what it’s about,” he said. “That’s what we wanted to do. Get our name out there, get to as many hospitals as we could, reach as many patients as possible.”