Our Lucky & Magical post holiday trip to AKL AND CR - UPDATED 1/22 About This Page:

[Cam22]

Sounds like the pre-packing is going well! Packing on the way!

[Ariel&Alice]

I just wanted to drop an update by tonight. We did our ‘give A day get A day’ volunteer work tonight, and it was so much fun! We
participated in A Saturday sacks program at A local church. It’s actually something that was started by the rev. at that church, & is such a GREAT cause. It benefits any child under the age of 18 who qualifies for ‘free lunch’ during the school week, to take a ‘bag’ home with them on Friday’s so
They will hopefully have some food to eat thru the weekend, in case the parent has little to no food to give the child, till they can get back to
school on Mondays, so they don’t starve. Its components are made so that the Child can eat any of it without having to actually ‘cook’ A meal, in case the parent isn’t home to cook for them.

We didn’t Know what to expect...maybe putting sandwich’s together or something? But all we had to do was take pre-packaged foods, like tuna, danish, Trail mix bars, peanut butter crackers, Vienna sausages & ‘bag them’. We worked in an assembly line, each person manned their own side of
the table on one station, like I was on the trail mix bars station with my DD (who did an excellent job, btw) & my DH was on the crackers
station beside us and the tuna station would pass to cracker station, then to trail mix station then finally on to the bag tie-rs, then to pple who
would distribute the bag to the right school station we had set up in the gym. Like 80 bags would go to school ‘A’ & 118 bags would go to school
‘B’ & so on. It was so much fun & just so easy and best of all, my DD got to participate.. lots of the volunteer places around us were only taking
16 Y.O. & up to volunteer at their places, like blood drives, etc. Its no wonder the Saturday sacks filled up so quickly where volunteers were concerned. Everyone was really sweet & the Regulars were just so helpful!

The Rev. told us that a few pple last week had traveled from Nashville, TN. About 2 and a half hrs. away just to come b/c their area had no
Availabilities for children under 12. A lady tonight that we met came from Atlanta, about 2 hours away. It was great! We asked our 7 y.o. DD what
She was doing with her ticket after we explained what donating it meant or the other options she could use it for for our trip next week (ours is
Paid for with A package) , & she said she wants to donate hers so another kid could use it & have fun at Disney like she has before…that was just so
Sweet! I was very proud of her for being so selfless. It’s a good thing, too b/c I don’t think we’ll get ours in time for our trip. I think we’re all donating
Ours. We enjoyed the time of giving and plan to go back again to help. If you have a volunteering time near you, I recommend giving it a try with your
Family. You’ll enjoy it!

[Ariel&Alice]

Originally Posted by Cam22

Sounds like the pre-packing is going well! Packing on the way!

Thanks for the pixies.. I have A feeling I made need them! That's really sweet of you!

[chezp]

Congrats on the volunteering!

[islandgirl]

Great plans so far! and Congrats on the volunteering!

[Colexis Mom]

Glad you had a great time volunteering!

[debrabrown]

Good for you to have done the volunteering!

[lazanya]

Congrats on volunteering!

[Cam22]

Congrats on volunteering! We have several churches in our area that provide food backpacks to our school kids on free lunch. It is a truly marvelous program and we teachers are grateful for it as well.

[Nick and Ryans Mom]

Originally Posted by Ariel&Alice

We asked our 7 y.o. DD what
She was doing with her ticket after we explained what donating it meant or the other options she could use it for for our trip next week (ours is
Paid for with A package) , & she said she wants to donate hers so another kid could use it & have fun at Disney like she has before

What a sweetheart!

[Ariel&Alice]

I Know we cant control the weather, but it looks like its going to rain or be really cloudy the whole week we are there. I am hoping that the weather changes to atleast only half the week being rainy and the other half really sunny! It rained a bit the last time we went! Darn-it...

I still am behind in getting all our stuff rounded up & my boss wants me to work 6 days next week!!!! Maybe I can get him to let me take a short day friday or just be off:O)

And I also read that the AKL ppool is under fefurb.. we were NOT planning on swimming, but I was planning on looking out at the pool from my balcony the 1st morning.. thats why i paid the extra...it wasnt much extra, but i have really been looking forward to seeing that beautiful pool from our balcony, now we get to see beautiful construction...YAY! I am calling the travel agency today to see what they can do for me.

[Colexis Mom]

Sorry about the weather and the pool!

[B.M.]

Hope the weather cooperates!

[Cam22]

So sorry about the forecast and the pool refurb! for sunny weather. Hope your TA can work something out about the room, too.

[chezp]

Sending some weather your way!