Vivienne Burgess turned 3 on Nov. 10, 2016.

Two days later, Vivienne and her family — her parents and her big sister, 5-year-old Elianna — celebrated by going to see a Saturday performance of “Cinderella” at the Children’s Theatre. At the end of that long but fun day on Nov. 12, Vivienne’s dad, Wade Burgess, tucked her into bed a bit early. About a half-hour later, her mom, Julia Burgess, went into her daughter’s room to give her a goodnight kiss.

“I found her not breathing, unresponsive,” Julia Burgess says. “I gave her CPR and called 911. The first responders did everything they could do. They were able to get her heart started somehow. She was taken to Children’s St. Paul, where it became quickly apparent that she was gone. … She was basically brain dead. We were in complete shock. She was a perfectly healthy 3-year-old. We kept her on life support until the next day, so Wade’s parents could get back from out of town — they were in California at the time. She died on Nov. 13. … We never even had her official birthday party.”

Why — how — does a perfectly healthy child die in her sleep?

No one knows: This is why Vivienne’s death has been classified as “Sudden Unexplained Death in Childhood” (SUDC). It is similar to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.

Six months later, the St. Paul family is finding a way to honor Vivienne’s life.

“After Vivie died, I met Sarah Zahradka, another SUDC mom, from North St. Paul,” says Burgess. “She told me that in the midst of her grief, they ended up building a playground — Janie’s Playground — at Casey Lake Park in North St. Paul. It inspired me to do something with the playground in our neighborhood.”

It brought a welcome new focus to an old haunt: The playground at Boyd Park, located near the Burgess home in the Cathedral Hill neighborhood of St. Paul.

“At first, I had thought, ‘Oh, God, how can I face this playground?’ ” Burgess says. “We went there all the time.”

The playground could use some joy: There are safety concerns in and around the vicinity of this park, including a child abduction that occurred adjacent to the park in May 2016.

“Even before, we were working as a community to improve the park,” Burgess says.

She hopes that Vivienne’s Joy Foundation can help with this — and help in other ways, too.

“First, we want to raise awareness of SUDC — it’s not well known at all,” says Burgess. “The SUDC Foundation has been helpful — they are working on research and figuring out why this is happening. … It’s not a diagnosis or a cause — it’s a category of death when they can’t find the cause of death. We want to help raise awareness of these deaths and help other bereaved parents.

“And third, as Vivie’s parents, we want to bring joy to others as Vivie did.”

Which brings the mission back to redeveloping the existing playground at Boyd Park.

“How do we transform this playground into being a destination playground?” asks Burgess.

It’s not a rhetorical question: The plans for Vivie’s Playground involve the community.

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St. Paul council approves mayor’s basic-income project for poor families “We will go through a community-build model,” Julia says. “We partnered with a company called Play by Design, which focuses on custom, community-built playgrounds. They will help us with the design and planning. The kickoff event is Tuesday (May 23): During the day, the designers will be spending time at Cathedral Montessori, a neighborhood preschool, and MacDonald Montessori, where our girls went/go to school, to engage the kids in talking about what they want in a playground. Then we will have the kickoff event that evening, with the unveiling of the initial design.”

After the unveiling — in which people can also sign up for volunteer opportunities — the next phase will begin.

“While the city has to be involved in approving this design, this will be an all-volunteer-built playground, we will fund it through the foundation,” says Burgess. “So the next year, the focus will be on fundraising $200,000 to $250,000, with plans to build in the fall of 2018.”

Clare Cloyd, spokeswoman for the St. Paul Parks and Recreation Department, confirms: “We will be consulting with the foundation through the design process to ensure that the community playground meets the safety and maintenance needs for our city play areas.”

Even as this re-imagining and redevelopment process gets underway, the Burgess family continues to go to the playground; they still think of it as Vivie’s playground.

“Since it happened in November, I thought, ‘I’ll never be able to go over there again,’ ” Burgess says. “But Ellie still loves playing there. And I like the thought of making it a fabulous playground that brings a lot of joy to people — just like Vivie did.”

FYI

What: Boyd Park Playground Design Reveal Party. The public is invited to learn more about a new playground in Boyd Park to be built in memory of Vivienne Burgess, a St. Paul girl who died suddenly in 2016 at the age of 3. This playground redevelopment is a project of the Vivienne’s Joy Foundation.

Where: Boyd Park, 335 Selby Ave. in the Cathedral Hill neighborhood of St. Paul.

When: Tuesday, May 23: There will be face painting as well as special visitors — the St. Paul Mounted Police unit and the Saint Paul Fire Department — from 4 to 6 p.m. at the park. The initial design unveiling will be at 6:30 p.m. across the street at Virginia Street Church, 170 Virginia St. The public can also sign up for volunteer opportunities for this community-build project.

Info: Viviennesjoy.org

Donate: All construction labor will be donated by volunteers. The foundation is seeking approximately $200,000 to fund the design and materials for the playground, including structural elements, hardware and the playground surface. Online donations can be made at Viviennesjoy.org.