Dear Cohorts, Friends, and Family, (and visitors to Little Toot, too)
What a week! We have been on cloud nine ever since we got back from NYC! I have a lot to tell and share with you, if you're interested! I would love to tell specifics about our encounter w/Justin Bieber and pictures of things we did! If you don't have the time now, that's cool, but know that in this email I'm including the video that I took when meeting him/and him answering the wish girl's questions, the Fox 4 segment that ran this week, and one of the newspaper articles from this week.
When we arrived at LaGuardia Airport, there was a limo waiting for us!
MAKE-A-WISH & Justin Bieber Help Sydney Hicke
Sydney Hicke, is Tommy Meyer's granddaughter, from his daughter, Kerry Hicke. Below is a stoty of the adventures written by Kerry.
The next morning (Friday, November 18th), we met down stairs at 7:30 AM to take a bus to Hard Rock Café (4 blocks away) to meet Justin Bieber! When getting on the bus, a Make A Wish representative handed Sydney a note card and told her to write ONE question she has for JB. Sydney was shocked that she could only ask ONE…
but the fact was, there were 30 girls there and they each had a question, which means that most questions would be addressed! Please know that Sydney's teacher helped me with an on-line survey (that I created) within Sydney's class to vote on the "Top 5 Questions to ask Justin Bieber" and I presented the survey to my 130 - 8th graders as well! Therefore, we only had 5 questions to really choose from/narrow down. Sydney said to me on the bus, "This is easy Mom, I want the piggy back ride!"
Not thinking that she would even receive anything like that, we progressed into Hard Rock Café where they fed all 30 families breakfast while we waited for JB! You will see in the video how 2 NYC DJ's came out to get the girls hyped up. Then the CEO of Make A Wish came out to announce that Bieber is receiving an award for granting the most wishes. Watch the video and you'll know the rest!
After questions and answers, we got a family picture with JB and presented a "friendship bracelet" that I had made from a teacher's husband, here at Lamar. He was excited to receive it and stuck his arm out, like a kid, anxious for me to put it on him. Know that they had a professional photographer there and warned us that we could take pictures but they won't be as good because of all the lighting they had around. In the mean time, we can't wait to get those pictures and see how great they are!
Here is a family picture and me putting the bracelet on JB.
We stayed at the Roosevelt Hotel (Central Manhattan) just 3 blocks away from Times Square! We immediately went out and ate at a pizza joint and toured up and down Times Square! That night, we (Sydney, Zane, and I) went to our first Broadway musical, The Adams Family with Brook Shields!
It was Excellent!
Justin Bieber was sweet. He's just a kid…still at the age of 17!
He even had make-up on! :
After meeting JB, it was 12:00 PM and we set out to see the FAO Schwarz store,
Nike Town, and then Sydney, Zane, and I went to another Broadway musical…
OMGosh…it was soooooo good! My favorite!
The next day we took a tour bus to The Statue of Liberty and visited China Town where we went to secret places to look at particular items! People walked up on the street and lifted the arms of their coats up to show "special" bracelets, etc. It was hilarious!
That night, Sydney, Zane, and I attended our third Broadway musical…
The kids loved the man swinging over the audience! That was pretty cool!
The next day…we took the tour bus again and went to the Empire State Building, saw Ground Zero, and Rockefeller Center.
(The new World Trade Center)
We ended our trip exhausted and sad to leave NYC. This city is safe, fun, and has plenty to do!
Thanks for being such great cohorts, friends, and family along this opportunity/journey. Life is good!
NEVER SAY NEVER!
We showed up at the American Airlines gate to get on our flight on Wednesday, November 17th only to find that they had the gate decorated in "Make A Wish" paraphernalia. They even said her name a couple times over the intercom in front of passengers waiting to get on. On the airplane, they gave her food (which, they NEVER do now days) and let her and Zane sit up in the cockpit!
