"What's this?" I asked.
"This is something special for you and Justin. Start opening it up and we'll explain."
We both looked at each other and wondered what this could possibly be. "Do you know anything about this?" I asked Justin. "Nope!" he says. As we start to open the gifts inside the box, we start to see a theme. Each individually wrapped gift had something to do with San Francisco. A mini 49er football. A cable car ornament. A ghiradelli chocolate bar. A SF tour guide book. A 49er lunch bag. an In-N-Out Burger gift card. What's this? For a split second I thought to myself..."Are they sending us on a trip?" Then I immediately dismissed the idea because no one in my family could afford to do that! As we got to the bottom of the box, there was a note card. I open the envelope, open the card, and out falls a Southwest Airlines gift card and a check written out to us for a substantial amount of money. I immediately burst into tears! Is this really happening? Are we really being sent on a vacation?!?! Yes, we were. And all of this was caught on video :) My sisters were video taping on their phones and face timing with Erin from California. All of them were crying and I had no clue why! Then it all made sense :)
As we read the card, we couldn't believe what was happening. Here's how this whole thing started...
Back in September of 2014, when we found out about Luke's condition, there was a secret Facebook group started called "Blessings for the Bays'". It was created by my sister Erin as a way for people to connect and ask questions about how they can pray for us, how could they help us, etc. At first, someone had an idea to try and collect money and send us on a weekend getaway after Luke was born. They thought this was a great idea, so my sister started collecting money. More and more people were joining the group, and more and more money was coming in. Because of this, a weekend getaway turned into a vacation! My sisters told me that money was coming in from all over the country. People we knew and also complete strangers. Justin and I couldn't believe it. We were shocked, thrilled, humbled, and felt so completely loved that people would want to do this for us. So, since September, all of this was going on and we had no idea! Once we found out about this Facebook group, we got on the secret page and were able to read all of the posts, comments, prayers that had been going on. It was amazing!
So, shortly after Luke was born, we started planning this much anticipated trip to California. Justin had never been to San Francisco, and I hadn't been back for 13 years. We planned and booked our trip for June 3rd-15th, 2015. We spent the first two days in my hometown of Fremont, CA. I showed Justin where I grew up, where I lived, my High School, where I played hundreds of soccer games, my favorite places to hang out....it was so neat to share that with him. After a couple days in Fremont, we headed to San Franciso. We spent 4 days there and we had a blast! We made a list of "must see's" and we got to do each one! After our time in the city, we rented a car and drove down to see Erin, Jordan and our nieces in southern California. We spent the remaining time of our vacation with them. We all went to Palm Springs for 3 days. It was great!
This trip was a time for Justin and I to reconnect and gave us something to look forward to after going through such a painful time. We reflected on how gracious and good the Lord has been to us as we walked through the most difficult time of our lives. We wished more than anything that our boy could be there with us, but at times we felt like he was :) So, to all of you who contributed to this special vacation, thank you. We love you and are so thankful for you all.
