TJ’s Children’s Miracle Network Trip – Day 2
Hello all, Today was a very full day. We all slept pretty hard last night. I did get up at 6:00am, got a shower and took a walk around the resort. It was still dark and very peaceful. The fountains were all off but their lights were still on. It was very nice out and no breeze. Woke up Linda and it took forever to get the kids up. We had to be at a get together breakfast by 8:00am. The resort has huge meeting rooms and exhibit halls that would put the Qwest Convention Center to shame. The breakfast was in a junior ballroom that had a stage, two large screens, light trees and huge CMN banners around. They introduced representatives from Walmart/Sams Cluband the Foresters Insurance Co. who are huge sponsors of the CMN Celebration. Many thanks to them. After that John Schneider (of Dukes of Hazard and Smallville fame) talked about why he helped co-found CMN 26 years ago. Mark Wills, a country music star was also working the crowd as well as Miss America 2009, Katie Stamm . Kaitlyn just had to have her picture taken with her, TJ would have nothing to do with that. The breakfast ended with a grand entrance of Disney Characters including, Mickey, Minnie, Donald Duck and Goofy. We did get a few pictures of the kids with some of them. I also enjoyed watching the younger kids respond to them. It was a great breakfast and a good way to start meeting other Champions and their families. You really do have an unspoken but fully understood bond with them.
The rest of the morning and early afternoon are designated as free time. The kids just wanted to swim…and that they did. The weather is just beautiful and at this point I started to think about being back in Omaha, that I should be working. I just felt guilty. It feels so weird to not be wearing a beeper. I have had a beeper on me for one job or another for over 30 years now. It still feels so surreal to be here. But it is great to see the kids having a blast. Linda even had her first margarita @ 10;30am. Linda and the kids ate poolside while I went back to the room and finished writing the blog for yesterday and trying to convert some of the video files from my HD camera so I can add them to the blog. Unfortunately, I just brought a netbook and it doesn’t have the processor power to do all of that. The kids have been shooting their own video with a flip camera and will try to see if that will work. Otherwise I will have to wait till we get back home to add video files to the blog. Pictures will have to do for now. About 2:00 we convinced (which took a lot of convincing, believe me) the kids to take a nap because we knew it was going to be a very busy night. We all actually slept till 4:30 (and Kaitlyn could have slept much more) and had to rush to get to the dinner @ 5:00pm. The dinner was in the same room as breakfast. At his time, kids from other states started making the rounds of the tables and swapping things representing their states. One thing I forgot to mention was in addition to kids representing all of the states in the US, there were also 12 kids from Canada, 3 from the UK, 1 from Ireland and one from Australia. The kid from Australia, Conor , has an amazing story and we had a good time talking to his mother. We were lucky because our Children’s Hospital and Medical Center in Omaha was nice enough to supply us with pins with their new logo to represent Nebraska. Both TJ and Kaitlyn got some neat pins, cards, candy and many other things from the other kids. The neat thing is the kids starting autographing the other bio books that CMN handed out to each family. It was fun to watch them do all of this. It was a great icebreaker. All of the Champions and their families were then moved to this huge exhibit hall where tables were set up with placards with the kids name and their home state. Then there was a parade of hundreds of the sponsors that make it all possible. This event is designed as a way for the sponsors to meet the kids and share pins and even some neat necklaces. It was amazing to talk to them and they talked about any connection they may have had with Nebraska, or because of what they had read about TJ, and about his love of the Green Bay Packers. The other thing that was smart was that early last fall in correspondences with CMN considering TJ’s selection we were asked to submit TJ’s autograph. From that a stamp was made and all TJ had to do was stamp his”autograph” in the sponsors books. He is looking forward to taking it to school and using it on the papers he turns in, He will have to discuss this with his teacher. It was actually smart, otherwise we would have been there till midnight . Actually, the whole event took 2 hours (but it didn’t feel like it)and we still didn’t get to see everyone.
At this point, we were once again moved to yet another larger ballroom and as the Champions came into the room as a parade they were multiple cameras putting them on two large screens and to lots of cheers and applause we were led to the front of the room and got great seats. The first part of the event was hosted by Steve Young, retired quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers. He did a great job of a skit with Jim Hensen’s Pajanimals. The kids were invited on stage and it was pretty cute. Steve ended his segment by saying that they got official confirmation from the White House that we do get a full tour of the White House and we do get to meet President Obama next Tuesday the 24th. It was always on the itinerary but was always subject to change. Then a great video was shown on the earlier mentioned Conor from Australia and a report done on him by their version of 60 Minutes. Then the event concluded with a concert by Julianne Hough of Dancing with the Stars and a great country artist. Very pretty I might add. TJ shot a lot of the concert with his flip video…not sure how that turned out but he was very determined to shoot what he could. With each song, the kids kept moving closer to the stage and Kaitlyn and TJ ended up sitting on stage by the end of the concert.. TJ even got to dance with Miss America. He didn’t want to put she forced him and I think he actually loved it. I would and I HATE to dance. It is almost 1:00am as I write this and the kids and Linda are sleeping very soundly. Tomorrow is going to be another busy day. We are going to need a vacation when we get back home. Tim
Hello all, Today was a very full day. We all slept pretty hard last night. I did get up at 6:00am, got a shower and took a walk around the resort. It was still dark and very peaceful. The fountains were all off but their lights were still on. It was very nice out and no breeze. Woke up Linda and it took forever to get the kids up. We had to be at a get together breakfast by 8:00am. The resort has huge meeting rooms and exhibit halls that would put the Qwest Convention Center to shame. The breakfast was in a junior ballroom that had a stage, two large screens, light trees and huge CMN banners around. They introduced representatives from Walmart/Sams Cluband the Foresters Insurance Co. who are huge sponsors of the CMN Celebration. Many thanks to them. After that John Schneider (of Dukes of Hazard and Smallville fame) talked about why he helped co-found CMN 26 years ago. Mark Wills, a country music star was also working the crowd as well as Miss America 2009, Katie Stamm . Kaitlyn just had to have her picture taken with her, TJ would have nothing to do with that. The breakfast ended with a grand entrance of Disney Characters including, Mickey, Minnie, Donald Duck and Goofy. We did get a few pictures of the kids with some of them. I also enjoyed watching the younger kids respond to them. It was a great breakfast and a good way to start meeting other Champions and their families. You really do have an unspoken but fully understood bond with them.
The rest of the morning and early afternoon are designated as free time. The kids just wanted to swim…and that they did. The weather is just beautiful and at this point I started to think about being back in Omaha, that I should be working. I just felt guilty. It feels so weird to not be wearing a beeper. I have had a beeper on me for one job or another for over 30 years now. It still feels so surreal to be here. But it is great to see the kids having a blast. Linda even had her first margarita @ 10;30am. Linda and the kids ate poolside while I went back to the room and finished writing the blog for yesterday and trying to convert some of the video files from my HD camera so I can add them to the blog. Unfortunately, I just brought a netbook and it doesn’t have the processor power to do all of that. The kids have been shooting their own video with a flip camera and will try to see if that will work. Otherwise I will have to wait till we get back home to add video files to the blog. Pictures will have to do for now. About 2:00 we convinced (which took a lot of convincing, believe me) the kids to take a nap because we knew it was going to be a very busy night. We all actually slept till 4:30 (and Kaitlyn could have slept much more) and had to rush to get to the dinner @ 5:00pm. The dinner was in the same room as breakfast. At his time, kids from other states started making the rounds of the tables and swapping things representing their states. One thing I forgot to mention was in addition to kids representing all of the states in the US, there were also 12 kids from Canada, 3 from the UK, 1 from Ireland and one from Australia. The kid from Australia, Conor , has an amazing story and we had a good time talking to his mother. We were lucky because our Children’s Hospital and Medical Center in Omaha was nice enough to supply us with pins with their new logo to represent Nebraska. Both TJ and Kaitlyn got some neat pins, cards, candy and many other things from the other kids. The neat thing is the kids starting autographing the other bio books that CMN handed out to each family. It was fun to watch them do all of this. It was a great icebreaker. All of the Champions and their families were then moved to this huge exhibit hall where tables were set up with placards with the kids name and their home state. Then there was a parade of hundreds of the sponsors that make it all possible. This event is designed as a way for the sponsors to meet the kids and share pins and even some neat necklaces. It was amazing to talk to them and they talked about any connection they may have had with Nebraska, or because of what they had read about TJ, and about his love of the Green Bay Packers. The other thing that was smart was that early last fall in correspondences with CMN considering TJ’s selection we were asked to submit TJ’s autograph. From that a stamp was made and all TJ had to do was stamp his”autograph” in the sponsors books. He is looking forward to taking it to school and using it on the papers he turns in, He will have to discuss this with his teacher. It was actually smart, otherwise we would have been there till midnight . Actually, the whole event took 2 hours (but it didn’t feel like it)and we still didn’t get to see everyone.
At this point, we were once again moved to yet another larger ballroom and as the Champions came into the room as a parade they were multiple cameras putting them on two large screens and to lots of cheers and applause we were led to the front of the room and got great seats. The first part of the event was hosted by Steve Young, retired quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers. He did a great job of a skit with Jim Hensen’s Pajanimals. The kids were invited on stage and it was pretty cute. Steve ended his segment by saying that they got official confirmation from the White House that we do get a full tour of the White House and we do get to meet President Obama next Tuesday the 24th. It was always on the itinerary but was always subject to change. Then a great video was shown on the earlier mentioned Conor from Australia and a report done on him by their version of 60 Minutes. Then the event concluded with a concert by Julianne Hough of Dancing with the Stars and a great country artist. Very pretty I might add. TJ shot a lot of the concert with his flip video…not sure how that turned out but he was very determined to shoot what he could. With each song, the kids kept moving closer to the stage and Kaitlyn and TJ ended up sitting on stage by the end of the concert.. TJ even got to dance with Miss America. He didn’t want to put she forced him and I think he actually loved it. I would and I HATE to dance. It is almost 1:00am as I write this and the kids and Linda are sleeping very soundly. Tomorrow is going to be another busy day. We are going to need a vacation when we get back home. Tim
No comments:
Post a Comment