A curling iron and $35.00. That's about all I have ever won in my life, at least as far as contests or gambling go. Maybe a few $2.00 scratch off lottery prizes were in there too, but certainly nothing to get excited about. To my knowledge, Matthew hasn't won a lot of big prizes in the past either. So when he told me a few months ago that they were doing a contest for the supervisors in his department, and the prize was a trip to San Diego, I didn't think much about it....until he called me from work today and asked if I remembered him mentioning it. When I said yes, he said "Well, I just got an email saying that I won". I was so shocked I made him repeat it twice :)
We got so excited, but didn't know any details because he had to wait for the HBO rep to tell him more (they are the ones sponsoring the giveaway). We found out a few hours later that the trip was for 2, with paid airfare to and from San Diego, a hotel paid for two nights, and admission to the premier of "The Pacific", a new HBO series directed by Tom Hanks. As soon as we had learned we won, we wanted to figure out how we could take the kids with us. I have wanted to go to the San Diego Zoo since I was a little kid, probably about the age Killian is now. I didn't want to pass up the opportunity to take our kids there, and I was so excited about the thought of exploring San Diego together. We did think briefly how neat it would be to take a grown up trip by ourselves (something we have never done), but our kids are still too young to be away from us for 3 days, and we felt like most of the fun of going down there would be experiencing everything with them.
The original plan from HBO was to fly us down Wednesday and home on Friday. We decided that we wanted to stay an additional day, and come home on Saturday. Since they are only providing two tickets, we had to buy the other two tickets on our own - and with only a week and a half notice, we paid more than we should have. We also had to cover the rental car, and the extra day of lodging. It made us pause for a minute, adding it all up, and we wondered if we should actually do this. Matthew and I talked it all over, and decided there was no way we could NOT do it - its not every day that an opportunity like this falls in your lap. Plus, HBO was offering to pay for more than half our trip! We decided to go for it!
The kids are really excited, and we spent today looking up places to visit on the computer, and talking about everything we are going to get to do. I have a friend who grew up in southern California, and she gave me some great ideas on places to see and things to do. Searching around online, I found out that February is 1/2 price museum month in San Diego - which means we could see even more things without having to spend a ton of money. Things have really fallen into place for us, and I feel so blessed that we are able to take advantage of this opportunity. Matthew put in a lot of hard work to make sure his team came out ahead of all the other teams, and I am so incredibly proud of him. He works so hard to provide a great life for our family, and prizes like this are just the icing on the cake!
Pictures and stories from our trip will be coming soon!
We got so excited, but didn't know any details because he had to wait for the HBO rep to tell him more (they are the ones sponsoring the giveaway). We found out a few hours later that the trip was for 2, with paid airfare to and from San Diego, a hotel paid for two nights, and admission to the premier of "The Pacific", a new HBO series directed by Tom Hanks. As soon as we had learned we won, we wanted to figure out how we could take the kids with us. I have wanted to go to the San Diego Zoo since I was a little kid, probably about the age Killian is now. I didn't want to pass up the opportunity to take our kids there, and I was so excited about the thought of exploring San Diego together. We did think briefly how neat it would be to take a grown up trip by ourselves (something we have never done), but our kids are still too young to be away from us for 3 days, and we felt like most of the fun of going down there would be experiencing everything with them.
The original plan from HBO was to fly us down Wednesday and home on Friday. We decided that we wanted to stay an additional day, and come home on Saturday. Since they are only providing two tickets, we had to buy the other two tickets on our own - and with only a week and a half notice, we paid more than we should have. We also had to cover the rental car, and the extra day of lodging. It made us pause for a minute, adding it all up, and we wondered if we should actually do this. Matthew and I talked it all over, and decided there was no way we could NOT do it - its not every day that an opportunity like this falls in your lap. Plus, HBO was offering to pay for more than half our trip! We decided to go for it!
The kids are really excited, and we spent today looking up places to visit on the computer, and talking about everything we are going to get to do. I have a friend who grew up in southern California, and she gave me some great ideas on places to see and things to do. Searching around online, I found out that February is 1/2 price museum month in San Diego - which means we could see even more things without having to spend a ton of money. Things have really fallen into place for us, and I feel so blessed that we are able to take advantage of this opportunity. Matthew put in a lot of hard work to make sure his team came out ahead of all the other teams, and I am so incredibly proud of him. He works so hard to provide a great life for our family, and prizes like this are just the icing on the cake!
Pictures and stories from our trip will be coming soon!