Keyan's Make-a-Wish Trip

[hogansteph]

OK...I am not sure how good this will be, but I am going to give this trip report thing a try! Our whole family will be going to Disney October 15-20. We will be staying at GKTW and we are thrilled!!!! Alright, who is going...

Me-Stephanie-32 years old--I LOVE everything Mickey and if you look around my house you will see hidden Mickeys in most every room.

Paul-37-My fabulous husband who I have turned into a Disney liker, but not quite a lover! He is a Computer Geek by trade but dosn't fit into that mold at all.

Grammie-??-Wouldn't miss this trip for anything and we could not take the trip without her help. (You will see why as I continue with the list...)

Jamahl-6-been to Disney twice but not since he was two and a half. He can't wait to go since the last time he was not tall enough to ride some of the things that he wanted to. And yes..he remebers both trips VERY well!

McKenzy-3-my "alien" child. God love her but she is a little air-headed. She can't wait to meet Aurora and hopes with everything in her to see Wall-e! Wish me luck!

Sidney-3-our shy, nervous little girl who adores Belle and Spiderman. SHe is going to do "everything that Jamahl does!" when we get to Florida.

Abagayle-3-Our princess extrodinair. She loves EVERYTHING princess, especially Cinderella. Abby can't wait to meet Prince Charming when we get to Disney and has already packed all of her dress-up clothes! She is our Diva!

Keyan-3-Our Wish girl-She is obsessed with the princesses as well, but ARIEL is her favorite. Her exact wish is to sing with Ariel, although I am not sure how that is going to work out. She knows every word of every princess song and is absolutly precious singing them.

SO...Can you see why Grammie is going? Yes indeed, the girls are quadruplets. Yep, four three year olds and a six year old. Our house is crazy but our hearts are full. The girls were born at 27 weeks, weighing between 1-2 pounds. Keyan's umbillical cord stopped working so we induced labor in order to save her life. She, unfortunatly, got all the short sticks. She has severe chronic lung disease, cerebral palsy, some brain damage, breaths thru a trach, gets fed thru a tube in her tummy, wears contact lenses, and probably a whole slew of things that I am forgetting!!! She so deserves this trip. She spends a lot of time at the doctors, hospital, therapy, and just sick in general. She is just now realizing that she is "different", and it is so hard!!

Anyhow, more later...but for now that is us in a nutshell. You are welcome to check out our blog at www.hoganclan7.blogspot.com to get to know us even better!

 

[HeatherSue]

What a wonderful start, Stephanie! I'm so glad you started a pre-trip report so we can all get to know you even better!

My husband is the Disney-hater, so you're lucky to at least have a Disney liker!

 

[hogansteph]

Some more background information...

We just found out a little over a week ago that the wish was being granted. At first, our wish manager could not get us into GKTW but called last week to tell us she was finally able to confirm our dates for the 15-20th of October. She asked us if that would still work for us and I just had to laugh! Who is going to say "No" to going to Disney in three weeks?
Now we are down to two and a half weeks. Unfortunatly, the Michigan Wish foundation was unable to find us local volunteers so everything has been done over the phone, mail, fax, or e-mail. I think having an actual person would make it more real but we did get a package in the mail with our flight itenery and t-shirts so that has helped! I am finding it strange to not be doing the planning, and it is hard to know how many questions you can ask since we are being given this trip, but these boards have filled me in on most everything! Thank you, thank you, thank you!
We are working on the last of the arrangments for all of Keyan's equipment to be rented down in Florida. It is sure scarey, not being in control, but yet so nice to let someone else do all that work. We have actually tried to plan a Disney trip two years in a row, but I got so flustered trying to figure it all out, that we gave up. So for us, not only is this trip wonderful for the financial aspect, I am even more grateful that someone can figure out how to get her there safely, and keep her safe while she is meeting all of those wonderful Disney friends.
Our biggest hurdle will be to keep Keyan healthy enough to make the trip. She is EXTREMELY prone to getting everything under the sun so we are sort of staying home as much as possible to control some of the germs. We are taking one of our nurses with us, whowill work third shift to keep Keyan safe while she sleeps. He is not going to be flying with us but rather driving down ahead of us. Can you believe that he didn't want to fly with 5 kids??? I think that He was the smart one!
So, this weeks plans will be to make sure that the nurse has his arrangments all set. He is not staying with us since he has to sleep all day and is a procrastinator so I will have to stay on top of him getting ready! I also need to decide if I am going to make any ADRs. I did call on a few today, but as you all know, with such short notice, it is virtually impossible. I really don't want to be tied down but am worried that with a party of 8 we will have a very hard time finding somewhere to eat without reservations.
***question*** Did anyone do a charater meal with a child that doesn't eat? Keyan is completly tube fed and would only lick a lemon or maybe a french fry, so I do not think that I should have to pay for her. Will they make me pay? I am so nervous about figuring this out. When I asked the reservatioist at Disney, she was unsure of what to tell me! I am trying not to be stingy, but with 5 kids, we have to watch where we spend our money! I think the biggest thing for me to remember is that no matter what we do while we are there, it will be great fun for the kids. THey will never know what they did not do! Why is that so hard to accept???

More later...I need to get some sleep before the week begins!

 

[hogansteph]

Oh dear lord I hope I can get this picture thing to work....


Our wish girl-Keyan

The whole family(including Poppie)

 

[momtoBrandon&Jacob]

I don't have any answers for you about the meals, but I did want to chime in and say you have a beautiful family and I hope you guys have an awesome trip!

 

[jham]

What a great start! I LOVE Keyan's "exact wish" that is just too sweet! We will be in Disneyland the exact same days you are in Disneyworld! Which is why I'm not going to have time to help out with the Big Give. I have one 3-year-old little princess, I can't imagine 4! I also have an almost 6-year-old boy (and a DS9 and a DD11). I just can't tell you how much I wish I could sew Disney outfits for quadruplet girls the same age as my Lily! But I know of some wonderful surprises in store for you I can't wait to follow along with you as you go on your trip! And how is it that you look all of 16 years old?

 

[jham]

double post

 

[tnmom25]

Stephanie, your family is just gorgeous! I hope you have the most magical time ever!

 

[oklamomof4boys]

What a beautiful family. I can't wait to read more. I keep telling my husband that I need a baby girl. I am a speech pathologist and I just started seeing the cutest little 3 year old girl. I told my husband, " I don't need a baby girl anymore. I want a 3 year old girl!" I absolutely love that age and I keep thinking how fun it would be to take a little princess to Disney! You are going to have a wonderful time!

 

[bigdisgrandma]

You have such a darling family. I have 3 3year old grandchildren, 1 girl and 2 boys and when they are all together, they are a riot. Can't imagine having that experience everyday!

I am so excited for your trip. Can't wait to hear all about it. As for ADR's we had some and we just walked up to a couple of places where we didn't have an ADR and they were able to fit us in and we had 10 in our group. Eating at odd times is sometimes helpful. I would imagine that if you explained your situation with Keyan, they would not make you pay for a meal for her. Most of the CM's we met were very helpful and worked with us in all kinds of situations.


Denise

 

[hogansteph]

Happy Tuesday! Exciting things are happening this week with our Disney planning! I have had a lot of communication with our wish manger this week and it sounds like she is working on a special meet and greet with Ariel. Keyan will be so excited if it comes to fruition. Our wish manager is also going to schedule a character breakfast for me so that I don't have to worry about it. She was kind enough to ask if there were specific characters we wanted to meet, and what time would work best for us. From my experience thus far, MAW does a really good job finding out what you actually want, not just giving you what they can find. It is so impressive!

I guess that is all for now, we are busy counting down the days on our princess calendar! It will be here before I know it!

 

[muffinstuffin]

I can't wait to read all about your trip. Your family is beautiful!!!

 

[hogansteph]

2 weeks from today we will be arriving in Florida!!!!!
I can not believe that literally 14 days from this exact minute we will be landing in Orlando! It seems impossible that this is actually happening to us. We feel so overwhelmed and blessed that I can't put it into words. We just started talking to the girls about the fact that we will be flying in an airplane to get to Disney. McKenzy tells everyone who comes to the door, including the UPS man that we are going to ride in an airplane. They are all so excited. Jamahl is busy scoping out the internet to decide what his "must-sees" are. I am really hoping to get a ADR for Ohana becasue I know he would love the whole experience, however, I am not having good luck. It may come down to some of us going and some of us staying in the parks doing something else. I know that he is going to get tired of the princesses pretty quick!!

Oh! I guess it is time to let everyone know that we have been "adopted" by the disboutiquers and are lucky enough to be included in the "Big Give." This group of artists have hearts so big it is incredible. We are anxiously awaiting some of their creations! Did I mention how blessed we feel?

Back to my everyday chaos of the kids!

 

[bex271]

I just found your ptr, I can't wait to hear how everything goes I know y'all are excited and your family is beautiful.

becca

 

[hogansteph]

Can it really be only 11 more days until we leave? Actually, it is so late that it is almost 10!!! All of the kids have been taking turns putting a sticker on the calendar and than counting the days left. Jamahl just said that we are almost into single digits!
We have SO much going on before we go that I havn't been able to focus on planning like I have wanted to. The girls start preschool on Tuesday and we are still missing a preschool sized spiderman backpack! Sidney is starting to panic. We have parent-teacher conferences next week, Jamahl started science camp today, Keyan has three doctor appoinmets, two of the other kids have to see the doctor also, and that is not counting all of the pre-trip shopping that I need to do. If there is one thing that I am sure on, it is that we NEED a vacation.
Good news, the nurse officially booked his hotel last night, so I have one lesss thing to worry about! He is also making a master list of all the supplies that we need to pack which will be extrmemly helpful. So many of her things we just can't pick up at Walmart if we forget them!
I did make reservations for Boma....not sure if we will keep them, I was really hoping for Ohana, but that is not working out so well. Any comments on Boma???? The other thing I did was pick up some glitter for the girls hair and face. We would love to do Bippity-Boppity-Boutique, but with 4 princesses, that gets way to costly. So, we are going to have our own boutique in our room. Wish me luck though when Abby realizes tht she could have visited the Fairy God Mother...Abby truely thinks she is Cinderella, so I could have one very upset princess on my hands!
Anyhow, enough rambling...it has been a long day, off to dream of Disney!

 

[teachermom]

oklamomof4boys, I have a 3 year old girl with a cochlear implant. She goes to Children's Hospital of Philadelphia one day a weel for speech therapy and attends preschool at PA school for the deaf where she gets 20 minutes of speech therapy a day! Do you want her?!? LOL I wouldn't get rid of her for anything but let me tell you she is lucky she is a cute 3 year old little girl! Megan

 

[jham]

I did make reservations for Boma....not sure if we will keep them, I was really hoping for Ohana, but that is not working out so well. Any comments on Boma????

We went to Boma on our trip last January (for full report click on the link to my TR) and I was surprised it was one of my kids' favorite meals. They loved the fresh fruit, the kid standards like mac 'n' cheese (I swear it looked better here than anywhere else) and chicken strips and they all tried some new and different things I'm not a vegetarian but I think I ate vegetarian at Boma. They had a lot of good salads, soups, etc. (oh, and desserts) It is also fun to walk around the AKL and look at the animals from the balcony.

 

[bigdisgrandma]

Bomas is one of our family's favorite restaurants. They have marvelous soups, salads, desserts and main dishes. I am allergic to tomatoes and that makes eating unusual foods a little difficult but the head chef always takes me on a tour so that I know what is ok and what I need to avoid. Luckily I seldom have to pass up the desserts but I love the foods at Bomas. I am so excited for your trip. I know you will just love it.

Denise

 

[portocall]

I stayed at GKTW in 1992, I was 17, my "wish kid" sister was 5 and had cancer (she is lucky and made it). I remember taking those same precautions to keep her healthy enough, as me and the other two "well" kids went by our grandma's for a week.

This is what I remember, I hope that it is still the same for you. The rooms were great, plenty of space for the 6 of us. They did the charachter dining at GKTW, princesses, Mickey, Minnie, Pluto... you name it. Pool was nice, playground was fantastic, fishing was fun too, neat arcade, and nothing cost a penny there...

Have they sent you any information about what to expect. I will be interested in hearing your post report since I donate to them every year thanks to the wonderful time we had...

 

[hogansteph]

We got our confirmation e-mail from GKTW today! When I read it to the kids, their faces just lit up. This is going to be such a special trip.
After the recommendations, we have decided to keep our reservations for Boma. It should be a fun experience even if the kids don't eat much. We are also looking forward to get our final itenerary, expense check, and all the rest of the information sometime this week! I will be posting more when the package comes!
That is all for now....

Stephanie