All of us at the ball.
Annette Quinn and Grandpa Harold giggling yet again.
Quinn and Daddy
The program
The Heart Ball is over! Quinn and I are wide-awake in bed at 8:30 in the morning now, on this lovely Sunday morning, and the rest of the house is still sound asleep. Which goes to show how much fun we had last night.
We started the night at the Cornhusker Hotel, and walked into the lobby to be greeted with Red Roses in vases all over the place. They were beautiful, as were all the folks who attended. Seeing everyone in black tie attire was beautiful. Especially the 10 of us who went. Quinn, John, Quinn’s cousin Kaleb, Grandpa Steve, Grandma Vicki, Quinn’s caregiver, Chrissy, Quinn’s 2nd caregiver, Annette, Grandma Martha, Grandpa Harold, and me. We got to walk around for a bit to start, looking at the auction items, and there were lots of them. Not a single one of us won any of the auction items, in fact I don’t think any of us bid on any of them. I can say there were a couple of beautiful pieces of art that tempted me, until I saw they were already bid up to way over 600 bucks, so I guess I’ll make my own. Good for the American Heart Association though, that money funds so much research.
When the doors were opened up to the ballroom, we were greeted with even more red roses and a lovely red hue was glowing over the whole room. Dinner was started and we had salad, and a nice dinner, along with lovely little cupcakes. They even brought Kaleb a kid’s plate, which was very nice. Quinn got to eat watermelon, and seems to do OK with that. I think she was having even more fun when Annette was holding her and leaning her backwards, when she would see Grandpa Harold making his silly faces at her, and as I watched her giggle, I was once again reminded how good we have it! Kaleb did a great job staying on task and playing with a few things we brought along for him to play with.
During the dinner I got to give one of the 5 toasts. I got the honor of toasting the Survivors. Survivors like my husband John and our Mighty Quinn. The microphone was very loud, but the toast went well. Next up was seeing all the Heart Ball Sweethearts, who are girls in high school who were all in beautiful red dresses and their job is to help spread positive energy as they volunteer for a few different causes. Good for them.
At this point I think most of my table was starting to get a bit frustrated with me, because they were tired of all the pictures I was taking, but I wanted to get the night captured for Quinn’s journal, this very journal, that I keep a paper copy of. I have to say that I did not get any pictures of our video or any of that portion of the evening, so that kind of stinks, but oh well.
Next up was a live auction, and it was starting to get loud, and you could not really hear what was going on. I started thinking, our video is up next, are these folks going to talk through it too? Well, as I was holding Quinn, she popped the stiches holding the top of my dress together, and I was in trouble, I was not sure if my dress was going to stay folded down nicely without showing off my undergarments, luckily Annette had a safety pin and Annette and Chrissy and I went out to the lobby to fix it. We were going to go to the restroom but it was to crowed, so they had these old phone booths you can step into, so we stood in there to get pinned and rearranged. It was kind of like a Superman moment in that phone booth! We don’t have any pictures of that either, thank goodness.
We had not sat down for more then 5 minutes and our video started. Those 7 minutes went by so fast. It started off with my statement in big dark letters.
Life is Good.
Then went into our story. I can thankfully say that the room was quiet enough to hear a pin drop as our video went on. I started talking about Quinn’s 4-month checkup when we found out about her heart disease. Going through the hospital stays, and therapies. It was followed up by talking about John’s heart attach, and finished with my better u exercise experience. I’m not actually sure how it ended because I was getting Quinn adjusted, because I knew we were going to be asked to stand, so the group could see that we were all there. So as planned after the video, Alexis came over to ask us to stand. We did and the applause started. I actually made it through the video without crying, a big deal for me, who is an emotional mess when it comes to watching our story, but I didn’t cry, well now as I stood there, listening to the clapping, getting this big hug from Quinn, standing at the table with family and friends that love Quinn so much, and I was toast, I could feel the tears coming. I looked out over a sea of people, clapping for us. Then it happened. I kind of expected the clapping, what I did not expect was the standing ovation. Wow, that is when I lost it. Quinn’s head was on my shoulder and I was trying to get her situated so she could see what was going on, and when I looked back out over the crowd of folks in their tuxedos and dresses, I saw a handful of people start standing up. I had to blink the tears out of my eyes, and when I looked again, everyone was standing. Wow, that was an emotional moment. I felt as if love had enveloped the room, and it was then that I knew that our story touched a few people and that was all I wanted, to give out some hope and inspire just a few folks. I’m pretty sure that happened, so the night was a success.
To top it off there must have been 5 to 10 people who came over and talked to us after the video, when the dance was going on. Each person’s story was different. One gentleman talked to me about how the American Heart Association did a story about him awhile back, and he knew how emotional it was for us to get our story across. I agreed with him, but also added, how cleansing it is as well. Another woman talked to me about how thankful she was that I was an art teacher, and how her sons would not have made it through school without the arts. Finally a waitress stopped over and talked about how she was bawling during the video and how it impacted her so much to see us tackle life with such a positive attitude through everything and how she was taking so much of how our story impacted her home with her. Wow, that was powerful to hear. My cup runneth over, and my heart was full, by the time we left. Before we left we did a bit of dancing, and Kaleb was by far the best dancer. John tried to get a bunch of us to dance, and finally he succeeded and got Quinn and I on the dance floor for a bit.
We ended the night when Quinn fell asleep in my arms, and as I put her into her chair, she woke up and told us the night was over, by screaming and crying. I can’t blame her, I hate that feeling of being exhausted and not in my bed to go back to sleep. I ‘ll take every bit of her grouchiness, and so we started for the car. We told Grandma and Grandpa Nelson goodnight. Got a picture by our poster, with Quinn screaming and all. Gave Chrissy and Annette hugs, as well as Alexis, and took our tired grouchy baby, who is not so much of a baby anymore, home. The rest of us crawled into our SUV and headed home, feeling so good. Thanks to the American Heart Association for the night. Coming home with our cups full and hearts happy, what a fun night. I think I will be getting a copy of the video sometime and will post it when I get it.
Thanks for reading and supporting us!
Blessings,
Susan
Now for a short video of the night. Enjoy!
If you can't see this one very well, you can also click here.Then click on heart ball.
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