Princess Phoebe's Pre-WISH-Trip Report (arriving in MK 4/17/10)

[Granna4679]

Oh my!! What a fun couple days of opening gifts. They all look so cute on them. I love the hula skirts on them. How cute!

Just wanted to pop in and tell you that I think these girls are gorgeous. I can't wait to see the pictures of them @ Disney. I know you are getting excited.

 

[pnutallergymom]

Melissa,

I love seeing all the pics of Phoebe standing!!! She is so gorgeous!!! The outfits from the Big Give are beautiful!!!!

Tessa is such a little firecracker!!! She must keep you on your toes!!!! I am so happy she is so excited by all of this. They are both going to LOVE Disney!!!

 

[tricia]

We got two more packages today, both from Tricia, one for Phoebe and one for Tessa. Phoebe finished her dinner first so she got to open hers first.

An adorable Cindy halter dress! (This is the last "good" shot I'll ever have since the camera then slipped out of my hands, due to not having a wrist strap anymore )
I love the halter on her because she has really narrow shoulders so this is sure to stay put. (Also love the very soft lining inside the bodice. Attention to detail! Wow!)
She ran to get this flower girl "veil" and then asked me to sing the song again.
Thank you so much Tricia!!! The girls obviously love them as do I! I promise to get lots of great pics with the new camera (and Photopass!) when we are on the trip!

You are very welcome. Glad you like the lining. I try to line in flannel if I am making something for babies or very young ones, but I thought that Phoebe might appreciate it too. I was very concerned about the fit, cause these are the first dresses I have made for the Big Give (have done handbags and Tshirts before) Glad they seem to fit. Thanks for posting pics, and sorry about your camera.

 

[All7OfUs]

You are just getting so loved on!! Such a blessing to see how generous people around here are!

 

[NiniMorris]

More Big Gives!!! This one is from NiniMorris and also her little helper Brianna. Brianna wrote a very cute little note for Tessa (and "her sister").
I have to apologize now for the pics because they are horrible. On Saturday Tessa broke the lens cover and the wrist strap on our digital camera so I was using my phone to take these shots until I could figure out how to fix it. I was also babysitting that night so trying to get her to hold still was a lost cause. Just rest assured that even though I didn't capture it well, she LOVED this and the jumping and dancing around is due to her excitement over the dress.

The other girl didn't want to dance anymore so Tessa had to block her from the toys.

Thank you so much Nini!!! She loved it and so did I! I'm sure we can find a cute springtime T to go under it. (The long sleeve was what she was already wearing.)

So glad she liked the dress...(although looking at the photos it looks like it might be a tad too tight under the arms...) Brianna liked helping with this one because she noticed that Tessa is 'chocolate' like her. (to an adult, that means biracial in a white household!). It is the first time we have only done a Give for one child in the family and she was afraid Tessa's "sister" might feel left out, so she included a note. She snuck it in so I didn't have a chance to read it.

(good thing I bought extra fabric, my 2 year old grand daughter thought it was for her and is VERY upset that I didn't make it for her... LOL)

Glad you liked it...

Nini

 

[3princesses+aprince]

Wow, some more great gifts. Those crayon roll ups must be awesome for the plane! I know when we flew we took crayons and had to search around down below for some that dropped.

 

[kellyw8863]

What great Big Gives for the girls! I love the look on Phoebe's face as she's checking out the "grass" on the grass skirt. Ali is wary of new/unusual textures, as well. And I love, love, love the pic of her standing with the SW dress on - beautiful!

 

[pacrosby]

OK...............I am FINALLY caught up here. Can I just say WOW. All those beautiful dresses! The girls look just adorable. You're going to need to change them midday to get to wear them all Getting close now Are you more excited or nervous....................or both???? Have you pretty much finalized all your planning? You guys really are going to have such a great time!

 

[Wee Annie]

Melissa,

I found my sunglasses. How's that for planning and preparation? Am I done?

Will plan. Or just piggyback off your plans (as we are going at the exact same time).

Hope all is well.

 

[Mtopher4]

Juat checking in.. been thinking about ya.. Hope your cold is gone

 

[eyor44]

Hi Melissa
I just finished reading your entire pre-trip (in one day! ) Great pre-trip report. Love the Big Give stuff. Those ladies are so wonderful in all they do.

And......the girls are adorable.

Can't wait to read more. You all are going to have a fabulous trip.

I am surprised at your flights though. Southwest flys from Arizona to New Orleans, to Orlando. with a stop in Houston, but you don't have to change in Houston. I know this route well, as I send guys to Oakland every year for training and they often stop off there. Seems the straight route would have been much better and way less chance of a weather related delay for you.

 

[yinyanggirls]

My good news is that I found an old camera I forgot that we had. The bad news is, this is the camera...

It was freebie given to us 8 years ago. It takes very small pics (low quality), runs on regular batteries (that don't last long at all), has no zoom, and the flash totally washes out the shot so I have to hold something in front of the flash to diffuse it while I take them. It's sad really.

But they're better than my phone and will have to do until I make myself shop for my new camera, make the decision and GET IT. I'm such a procrastinator and totally drag out decisions. (Reminds me of this guy who had to choose a cake for his daughter's bday....)

Because of the impending camera purchase DH got away with only getting me a bottle of wine for my birthday. He was sweet enough to remember my favorite (Late harvest Riesling) and got a label I'd never tried before from WA state, where we hope to live someday. I also bought him a cake mix to make for me. Aren't I thoughtful?!? It really was not a very tasty cake but I chose it more for Tessa to have fun making because it had little springy decorations and colors.

The candles are not significant. We had no "number" candles, and we didn't have thritys....omething, so DH said let's just use all of 'em.

I bought myself the Princess and the Frog movie, again, more for the kids to enjoy. We've just about got it memorized by now. Our DVD does a weird thing where it kinda "skips", but it doesn't skip ahead or anything, it's just a little blip every so often. I know we didn't scratch it because it did it the very first time we played it. My friend rented it the day it came out and said hers did the same thing. Anyone else have this problem? I don't want to bother exchanging it at WalMart if they all have the same problem. Maybe I need to call Disney to handle it.

Since we passed the one month mark I finally allowed myself to browse the travel aisle at WalMart. Found a few fun/useful things. I'm going out tomorrow and will probably grab some more stuff.

I started packing the kids clothes, since we have SO MANY Big Give items already. I got out Phoebe's swim suits to pack (even though it was 80 today the pool is not warm enough to play in unless it's over 100 so we won't need it before the trip!). I just bought two suits for her recently. A 7/8 two piece with some swim shorts and a 9 one piece. When I opened the drawer to get them out I was surprised to find that she has 3 other 7/8 suits already! Oops! But last summer the bottoms all fell off of her (skinny, skinny girl) and I tried them on and they all fit much better (except for the new shorts, they fall right off). The 9 one piece actually fit the best because she's so long and it kept the bottom part on, being attached to the top. I have avoided one pieces in the past because she was wearing a swim diaper, but last summer she was finally "regular" enough on the potty that I knew if it was safe to put her in the water or not. Now I'm nervous to get Tessa's suits out. I may have more than I remember...

I'm in shock every day at how fast we are moving towards the trip! It feels like forever ago that we found out we were going. I never did get around to making a countdown with the Mickey Heads that I heisted long ago. I did get the girls both a regular calendar and we've been putting stickers on each date as it goes by.

We have "special" stickers marking each of our bdays and our trip date so it's been fun to teach them the months and to remind them when special dates are.

We do it at bedtime and it's a good way to get Tessa to get ready for bed. If she takes too long (because she doesn't want to go) I tell her we won't have time to do the calendar. She talks about it pretty much every day, so I think we've started a new and permanent bedtime routine.

P.S. Just got an email from Disney with a link to print our vouchers for free tickets from the GAD/GADD program we completed in the nick of time. Can't decide whether to take them to WDW just in case we want to use them there, or keep them safe at home and save it up for Dland later in the year. We expect to go to CA at least once. The kids have only been to DL once, last March, and my mom wanted to go but missed out because she was caring for my grandmother. I'd love to go with her, so she can see the kids having fun....yet another decision I'll procrastinate I'm sure.

OH!!! And due to the ticker debacle I followed Maroo's advise and had fun creating a new one. Well, three new ones actually. I loved the revolving ticker so I divided out three different dates that we are looking forward to. Check it out!

 

[yinyanggirls]

So we had a HUGE stack of boxes at our front door this morning from Fed Ex. I bet the mailman was happy it wasn't his route this time. Before you get too jealous the biggest three boxes were actually Phoebe's monthly supply of pull-ups.

The next two boxes had much more exciting things inside. These boxes were both from Sarah (syncsk8mom) and were clearly marked one for Tessa and one for Phoebe. She included a very sweet letter, that showed that she's really gotten to know our family. We had Tessa open hers first, just so she wouldn't destroy or lose anything while we opened the other.
We were all OOOOOHHHHing and AAAAAAHHHHHing when she pulled out this gorgeous quilt.

Tessa loved looking it over and finding some of her favorite little friends. Then in one corner she found her name. We showed it to her and her first words were Minnie Mouse.

So we had to make her slow down and READ it and she was then thrilled to read her name.

She then decided that it was time to get all wrapped up in it (even though it was about 80 today)!

(Notice Phoebe's hand in the corner of this one, feeling the "fringe")
It's just beautiful Sarah!!!

The colors are perfect, and the embroidered characters are amazing. She insisted on sleeping with it tonight, which is a high honor because she has several blankies to choose from. It's obvious which is her favorite now!


Next Phoebe gets to open hers...

Another amazing creation!
Now I have to explain that right around here were several more photos taken of Phoebe with her quilt as well as DH and I opening some presents for us, and Tessa ripping open yet another gift for her and Phoebe. My new/old camera does this weird thing where it shows a thumbnail of a previous pic instead of the actual file, so I thought they were duplicate files and deleted them from the camera. I forgot that it did that. So here are the rest of the pics after a little jump forward...
Phoebe getting comfortable with her quilt. If she isn't tickling the edges of her blankie she is biting it. It's what she does to relax, so again, a high honor that reveals how much she likes it!

I was showing off her name in the corner of this one but you can also see my cute Daisy Tshirt that Sarah made for me.

This one has Daddy in his new Mr Incredible Tshirt. Tessa was thrilled to see this and we just happened to have that movie on right before we opened the packages. I asked her "who is Mr Incredible now?" and she squealed "Daddy!!!!".

Phoebe's amazing quilt. It had lots of her favorite little critters on it - Cinderella's mice friends and a new "pet" right in the middle.

She loved feeling the "hair" on her pony and the fringes all around.
Both girls' blankets had a castle embroidered in a corner as well.

These are so gorgeous I just don't know what to say! Sarah had emailed me about doing some blankets but these are far beyond my wildest imagination! I don't know if you can tell in the pics, but the quilts are made from really soft, cuddly flannel. They are so snuggly!
Another little gift in the box were these adorable Minnie Mouse personalized, embroidered barrettes!

Thank you so much Sarah!!! Words seem completely inadequate. I hope that our schedules mesh long enough that we can meet up in FL so we can thank you in person!

We also got some fun mail from some "celebrities" over the last couple of weeks.

LindaBabe was the first to offer to be a Fairy Godmailer for us but I wasn't "in the groove" yet as far as reporting on all the kind things people have sent us. So a long overdue thank you to Linda.
The Princess card is a totally groovy 3-D card with a personal note from the Princesses themselves. Tim, your handwriting was fine, especially since I was the one who had to read it to them. Your note was great too. You've obviously been paying attention to Juliana's movies over the years.
We also got the "bosses" autographs on the furry character postcard. Dawn and Caitlin were so sweet to get these for us on their trip.

The girls must think we are top notch celebrities and all of WDW is awaiting our arrival. Tessa randomly mentions that she is ready to go on our trip. We also got a post card from some short, tuxedo wearing friends, but Tessa confiscated that card into her new photo album and I don't want to wake her up to get it. Since the person who sent that one won't be reading this right away I'll get it on here eventually.

A HUGE thanks to everyone who has contributed to our trip! It was hard to have dates so far away (for a Wish trip that is) but you all have helped us pass the time in unbelievable ways! Our trip will be so much more fun because you all will be with us!

 

[dawnbu40]

The quilts are beautiful! I am amazed at all the talented ladies on these boards!

 

[syncsk8mom]

You are so very welcome, but honestly the honor was all mine.

I am glad the girls like their blankets. Especially Ms Phoebe....I hope all the textures bring her alot of comfort and stimulation

And I HAD to do the Mr. Incredible Shirt for Dad after reading the first post of your pre-trip report about what the girls wrote about their amazing dad

Have a GREAT time and we hope to see you in Orlando

 

[cajunfan]

WOW!

What beautiful things! The quilts are AMAZING! (I want one of those!

Lynn

 

[noahsketomom]

Oh, my gosh -- not sure I've seen anything that brings tears to my eyes like those quilts!! GORGEOUS! And something that can be used for many years to come and remind you of the the loving nature of the BIG GIVE and your special wish trip!!

BEAUTIFUL!!!!

 

[pnutallergymom]

I love those quilts!!!! You guys are in the homestrech now!!!!!

As always, another amazing BIG GIVE!!!!

 

[Momofwishkid]

The quilts are amazing! So much thought and details, just beautiful. We just rented Princess and the frog and didnt have a problem with it. Yay! on getting some travel shopping done. I think I saw lotion in there but just in case, make sure to take some. We had to make a Wal Mart trip twice for lotion. The air was so dry our skin was literally cracking. Hopefully it's better by the time you guys go.

 

[wishin' on a star]

Hi Melissa! I am new around here, but I thought I would jump in and follow! Your family is beautiful. Looks like you are ready! What amazing BIG GIVE gifts!!

I'm so sorry for all of the struggles Phoebe has endured. I can feel for you on the no diagnosis thing, as we are the same way. But, we just go one day at a time, one problem at a time, one doctor's visit at a time. We have had our share of genetics "negatives", and I have pretty much given up on an over all answer. It's all about living in the moment and loving every day, blessed with whatever we are given.