Andy Pletz can do it. Dressed in literally just angel wings, a pink bandana and showing off her strategically-placed bicep in a Rosie the Riveter stance, the Bellevue resident and breast cancer survivor smiles, looking directly into the camera in the Angel Care Foundation’s new 2012 calendar.

The $15 calendar, called “Our Angels in Wings Celebrate the New Year 2012,”  benefits the Angel Care Foundation’s efforts to reach patients, friends and family of those diagnosed with breast cancer.

Angel Care is a nonprofit organization founded in 1997 by Redmond resident Jan Harris, a breast cancer survivor diagnosed in 1993 at a stage three. She saw the need to offer one-on-one emotional support for those diagnosed with breast cancer.

“We’re hoping everyone will see that the calendar can be a perfect gift to family and friends as a reminder to get an annual mammogram or as inspirational support – just in time for October, National Breast Cancer Awareness Month,” Harris said.

The calendar models are Angel Care volunteers, photographed in only white, feathery angel wings and strategically posed so as not to reveal too much. The purpose is to show their strength as survivors, Harris said.

While Pletz admitted it was a little “awkward” posing without a shirt on, she was happy to volunteer for the calendar, along with other Eastside locals/breast cancer survivors, such as Bruce Young, a former pilot from Beaux Arts Village.

“When they asked me to do the Rosie the Riveter pose, I had this strong powerful image in my mind of we can do it, we can take breast cancer on.”

As it reads in her Ms. September page of the calendar, Pletz a banker, was diagnosed in 2008 with two stage one breast cancers and treated with chemotherapy, bilateral mastectomy and reconstruction. Last year, she became a volunteer with Angel Care, which recruits breast cancer survivors to help provide support newly-diagnosed patients. Volunteers accompany patients to early chemotherapy or radiation appointments, for example.

While Pletz has yet to work with an individual via Angel Care, she’s mentored and supported other newly-diagnosed women, including her sister.

“Anything I can do to help,” said Pletz, who’s eager to “give back.”

There are more than 45 volunteers in the Puget Sound area who attend trainings provided by the foundation to enhance their abilities to lend appropriate and sensitive assistance.

“A doctor tends to the cancer; Angel Care tends to the emotional support.  One does not have to go on this journey alone,” Harris said.

For more information about Angel Care and the calendar, contact Renée Olson at 206-417-3484 or go to www.angelcarefoundation.org.

Bruce Young, a Beaux Arts Village resident, poses as Mr. November in the Angel Care foundation’s new 2012 calendar.