Someday I'll wish upon a star....

Okay, so, since we have never went on a family vacation, im not experienced on blogging them obviously. Bare with me, as I do my best to share in words with all of you,Zoie's Make-A-Wish beach vacation to Newport Beach, CA. Zoie's wish got accepted about 2 months prior to our vacation after going through several steps and an interview process with Make-A-Wish Colorado. Obviously Zoie couldn't tell us in words what her wish would be, but we know she loves the water, she loves textures, being outside, on walks, on runs, and music, so what better place to experience this all than at the beach! We choose Calofornia because it was fairly close, had Disneyland, we knew the temp would be tolerable, and Newport had the Boardwalk. Make-A-Wish was SO accommodating in every way, in helping to make sure first and foremost that Zoie's needs were met! Our family friend, Erin Hoffner threw us a wonderful, beach themed, send off party two weeks prior to our departure. Here, we got to celebrate with family Zoie's wish being granted, get our itinerary and details of the trip, and I think above anything else, get excited and know we had support in doing this all. Erin did so great at getting not only the girls excited, but Derik and I as well. We left on Sunday morning Oct 4th, in a limo, a packed limo at that! Two toddlers, two car seats, two jogging strollers, two diaper bags, and five suitcases later, we arrived to DIA safe and sound! Our limo driver was great! She had balloons for the girls, and when we arrived, she helped us checkin 3 suitcases and get help with a cart and lady to push our cart through the airport for us! That tiny detail right there was key! Derik and I simply didn't have enough hands for everything, and we had to take certain things on carry on with us due to Zoie's needs. Security at the airport went way better than expected! I was so prepared for them to tell me we had too many meds, or that a whole case of Zoie's formula couldn't come on the plane with us. Neither of those were issues, or was her CBD oil, only her tiny metal plate in her chest (VNS) caused a few hiccups. Luckily I had the box with me that described what it was, and after them patting her down we were good to go! Also, why do they not make the scanners that you walk under wider? Our joggers couldn't even fit through them? Sorry that's a random side note. Once we got through security it was easy breezy! We grabbed some Jamba Juice and were greeted by an awesome team by our departure gate that knew we were on our Make-A-Wish! It about brought me to tears how good they treated us! The girls got some Minnie stuff, they helped us load the car seats on the plane, they kissed Zoie's hands and told us to have a wonderful time. As a mama with a ton of anxiety about to put her daughters on a plane for the first time, this was a huge (little thing) that meant a whole lot! The plane ride- We got to meet the captain who flew us to Orange County. Super nice guy. He made a surprise announcement about Zoie being on the plane and going to the beach, and we also got a shout out from the Burringtons since Justin works with the control towers, wishing us a safe and fun trip. I want to thank Jackie and Justin for that. We felt like so many people were "with us" and I think we needed that. The girls did great on the flight! Zoie and I sat in the very front row so we had lots of foot room in case she had a seizure I would have somewhere to lay her. We played with the iPad and read the same 4 books, im not kidding when I say this, about 20 times each. Hey, whatever made her happy is what I was going for! Ivie colored and played with stickers right behind us with Derik, and of course, only these 2 would catch an hour long nap on the plane ride! 2 hours and we were in Orange Coubty safe and sound! We got help once again through the airport and to the rental car place. Then we were finally on our way, and all the hard stuff was over. It was time to enjoy our vacation! We made our way to a cozy and cute little beach house right on the Boardwalk! It had a garage, washer and dryer, living room, kitchen, and 3 bedrooms. If you ever get to Newport, you will see that when I say cute and cozy, this is exactly what I mean. Our alleyway to the front door wasn't made for strollers, but we did it, and the garage wasn't made to get girls in and out of car seats, but we did it. The best thing, was that the back sliding door had a little porch and that porch was on the boardwalk. House, porch, boardwalk, sand, ocean, just like that. When we got there we realized that God had a huge part in this all! Our beach house had a door that divided the bedrooms from the living quarters which is what we needed. Zoie goes to bed early and Ivie stays up and is loud! This gave us some separation when bedtime came around. It was amazing! We quickly learned that no houses here have air conditioning and they all open windows. Lucky for us, it stayed cool up until Thursday! We aren't used to open windows in 80 degree weather, but we got a nice breeze that blew off the ocean and helped! On Monday morning we ventured out about 7am and found a cute little mom and pops coffee shop a few blocks down. Can I just say, for the record, Alta Coffee had THE BEST vanilla Chai! OhMGEE! All I kept thinking of was our sitter Morgan and how she loves chai and how I could send her one! So if you head that way, you have got to find this place! After coffee we got ready for family pics at 9:30! We hadent explored the area much yet, so pictures were one of our favorite days. Cori Kleckner was so generous and drove right to our beach house and did pictures for us as part of our Wish. When I met her, she reminded me or myself. She is the nicest, kindest, bubbly, make-you-feel-comfortable kind of person that you will meet. We did pictures on the Boardwalk, our girls dipped their feet in the ocean for the first time, they touched and played with ocean sand for the first time, climbed some rocks, we threw them in the air, took a walk down to the pier, smelt the fish, saw the birds and Ivie even took a snooze! Picture day was amazing in every single way, and you can look for more of our beach pics in your upcoming Christmas cards! If you are ever up that way, please reach out to Cori. She does such amazing work and is such a kind soul to work with. I found a friend in her. On Monday night, Derik ran across the street to a really good authentic Mexican taco place! For some reason they have a lot of Mexican good (great stuff at that) in Newport. On Tuesday it was our Disney day. We were so excited to see how Disney had decorated for Halloween! I'm such a Fall fanatic, I think I was selfish with this piece! Disneyland was about 30 min from where we stayed and the drive was neat. We ended up using our handicap pass and parking in Downtown Disney which I highly suggest if you don't want to ride trams or shuttles. We cruised through downtown and made our way into Disneyland. We headed straight to the Haunted Mandion because we knew the line wouldn't yet be long. We didn't have to wait with Zoie's disability and we started to go into the house. The Haunted Mansion is just that, a big mansion! You walk into the front door with about 50 - 60 other people and the door closes behind you. It goes extremely dark and then starts the strobe lights and the story of Nightmare Before Christmas. You slowly make your way down a hall before you hop on the carts for the ride. This was where Derik tapped me on the shoulder to tell me that Z was in a seizure. I honestly have no idea how he could tell. I was holding her, it was almost pitch dark, but I believed him. You kinda go into fight or flight mode. You feel like you want to panic, but there's no time for that. We made our way to the side ropes that had stuff blocked off and booked it until we found a worker. She directed us out a side gate that lead us to the outside of the building (at least we could see Z now) but we now had no idea where we were because we were "out of bounds." Talk about bad luck! A nice security guard found us and helped us find our strollers and bags then it took us about 10 min to find a non-crowded place and bench to safely lay Zoie down and give her Diastat and watch her closely. We got a nurse, and a guard to wheel chair us about 15 min to the first aid building. This was my biggest fear. I literally cannot think of a worse place for Zoie to have a seizure! Oxygen on her, a blanket wrapped around her, her in my arms, we finally made it to first aid just in time for her to start to come out of it after an hour. Poor girl! Luckily they had a cot where she napped in my arms for 2 hours while daddy and Ivie went to see characters, get jelly beans, eat a corn dog, and explore Main Street. I wanted Ivie to have fun even if Zoie and I werent! When Zoie woke up groggy and still tired 2 hours later, we booked it to the car and ended up back home so she could keep sleeping. It wasn't thebest situation, and I hope no one else has that happen to them, but I do now know that we can handle her having a seizure literally anywhere! Wednesday was our full out beach day! it was so nice being able to walk out our back screen door for a beach day! We spread our sheet out on the sand, got sand toys, lathered the girls in sunscreen (which sand sticks to horribly) grabbed our camera and floaters and soaked up some sun and smiles! I don't think I have ever seen these two girls so happy. They loved the openness, the freeness, the textures, the breeze; Everything about it was perfect! We took as many pictures as we could, for memories! We definetly hope to get another beach vacation in the next few years, or we may just need to find a "make shift" beach around here next summer. I think my favorite thing was seeing the girls explore, their minds wander, since it was something new. Even though Zoie can't talk, I could totally see her thinking and her little brain working away. Wednesday evening we took a fun drive to Laguna Beach and explored the huge houses and their downtown. I enjoyed the drive and seeing all these fancy ladies in Lexus cars that had permanent smiles, if you get what I'm saying ;) wink wink! We tried Slap Fish (do we even have one of those here because it was so good) for the first time and it was AMAZING! Their fish tacos and clam chowder was delicious, and im not sure if it's because they use fresh fish from the ocean, or what, but I highly recommend it! That was probably the best dinner I had there! On Thursday since the girls were both in great moods, we packed up in the morning and decided to try Disney again. I'm glad we did because we came to a few conclusions. 1: It's okay to only see Disney once and feel like you may never need to go back. 2: We were so glad that we did a beach Make-A-Wish and not a Disney. Disney was very hot, and took a lot of patience, and was very crowded and over stimulating. If I had anxiety I cannot imagine how Zoie felt! Pretty much, we thoroughly enjoyed Downtown Disney, some shopping there, Jamba Juice, dancing, picture taking, and the Elsa and Anna Boutique. It was way less crowded and since the girls could care less about rides, it was perfect! I think we loved that we got to see Disneyland, and walk around, and get the experience, but it definitely isn't made for Zoie :) . We got some really neat souvenirs at downtown Disney too! Thursday we tried to pack in as much as we could since we were leaving Friday, so after Disney, and a long nap, I talked Derik into a long run with me, in 85 degree Cali heat, on the Bordwalk. He about died (lol) but he did it with me and it was awesome. We got to see the Newport school which sits on the Boardwalk (how cool is that) and wondered if they offer surf lessons as a class? And to cool off after our run we stopped for frozen bananas that melted quicker than we could eat them. Luckily I had Ivie to help me! Thursday was a great "last" day in Newport, and it was ended with us getting our photo gallery emailed to us of our beach pics from Cori, sipping on some wine, and crying over how beautiful they were. Speaking of pics, stay tuned for a wonderful surprise and awesome thing for Cori Kleckner Photography, as her work and our session and story are going to be featured somewhere! Friday morning we got our beach house picked up, finished packing, stuffed our life, and our girls back into the car and headed for our last coffee run! I already miss this coffee shop and their Vanilla Chai! The flight home was very easy, and if you decided to peek at pictures, Ivie Mae was having some fun digging for gold in her sleep! It was so nice to be home, yet we are finding that some days we miss the beach. We cannot express enough gratitude to Make-A-Wish, and all of their volunteers and workers for making this come true, not only for Zoie, but for us all. I absolutely do not think that we deserved a vacation at all. It's more, that we deserve to live, to have some normalicy, to experience this life and those simple pleasures that are out there besides the therapy sessions, the blood draws, the doctors appts, the hospital stays, the endless and long seizures, the ER visits; we feel like we got to live and expand our wings this week! Until next time Newport.....