Sjoggie-Mates,
My husband and I own a small business. Our business is a member in a bartering network. The bartering group holds what they refer to as a Tradeshow night every November. Members can visit all of the vendor booths and make holiday/other purchases. They have giveaways, etc. This year the network had a handful of charitable organizations present. The charities were selling chances to win a trip for $50.00 each.
My son, Jon, is an active-duty Marine and is currently deployed in what I can only refer to as a "heck hole" in Pakistan. He literally lives at the consulate behind large walls. They cannot leave the compound without armed escorts and are routinely shot at. Jon is engaged and going to be married next September. He and his fiance had been discussing where they would like to go for a honeymoon. My mom owns a few timeshares & she was discussing with me a plan of how we might take one of her timeshare weeks & split the costs of giving the kids a trip for their honeymoon.Jon had indicated that they thought they might like to go to St. Lucia in the Caribbean.
Of course when I saw these charity chances for a trip, the lightbulb clicked. We bought one $50.00 chance for one charity who was offering a trip to St. Lucia. We bought one other chance for a trip to Antigua (in the Caribbean also). The event happened last Thursday night on November 10th. All day on Friday, I hoped the phone would ring telling me that we won a trip, but it did not ring (at least with that good news). We both felt that even if we did not win, that we were supporting some great causes.
On Monday morning of this week, the phone rang..we won one of the trips!! ;D The trip we won is for 7 nights in a premium Oceanview room in Antigua. When I received all of the paperwork, I called the resort contact to inquire as to how much per person, per day that Jon could pay to upgrade the trip to an all-inclusive trip (including meals, recreation, entertainment, etc.) Imagine my utter surprise when the contact explained to me that this $2800.00 value trip included 2 rooms for 4 people OR 2 separate trips of one week each for 2 people!!! Also, we have 6 resorts to choose from (including St. Lucia, Barbados, Other resorts in Antigua,The Grenadines or Panama).The trip certificates are good until Dec.20, 2018
What a fabulous AMAZING news day this was for me. We are able to give our very deserving son and our future DIL a wonderful honeymoon trip for a wedding gift. They are beside themselves with excitement and we are as well.
So this was my most amazing, good news story of the year! The funny part was our discussion on the way home from work yesterday..Me with all of my gushing enthusiasm about taking a trip to the Caribbean..and I was ready for it, deserved to escape Sjogren's..blah blah blah. My husband with his wonderful dry wit (who sits under the umbrella in bright sun because he hates heat & easily gets sun poisoning) said what we would do there? I launched into my list of all of the outdoor recreation...well we could scuba dive..oh wait you can't do that because of your afib and I can't because of my one lung..well the paddle boats..that wouldn't hurt our knee joints too much would it...this went on & on. I don't know about this aging thing ya'll.
Anyway...this is a huge blessing for us. All of my medical bills would not have allowed us to give them a wedding gift like this otherwise.
SjoDry is still grinning!
Take Care.
S
That's fabulous news, SjoDry! Congratulations on your win and many thanks to Jon for his service.
Even if you and your husband find you can't participate in some outdoor activities, it is always nice to see and hear the ocean and have feet in the sand and water.
Even better, you won this on the Marine Corps birthday! A hearty Semper Fi to your hard charging, devil dog son, and congrats on the good news!