School's Out...

(for 2 weeks)
Hallelujah!

Soo glad to be out (and even more excited that I only have 6 months until I am DONE with this school forever. My district divides the high schools up 9th-10th graders and another school for 11th-12th graders). I did well on all of my exams; even better than I expected. I'm leaving in a couple of days to fly up north (all by myself!) to visit a very dear convention friend. Super excited!

After kicking off the break with an ugly-Christmas-sweater/White-Elephant/gingerbread-house-decorating/Christmakuh party on Friday night, I went to the Dallas Hearing Foundation's Sounds of the Season Gala/fundraiser. This was the first year I have attended; I wasn't sure what to expect, but it was absolutely wonderful!

My older sister and I

 A while back they asked me for my cochlear implant story for the gala and had me get my picture taken. I wasn't quite sure how it was going to be used..

 Well, I had "my" own table! It was named after me, and each place setting had my picture with the story on the back. Pretty cool!

 My picture/story was also turned into a poster board that greeted all the people as they walked in.

Please excuse the fuzziness- this was taken from my sister's phone.

I really wish I had gotten pictures of my favorite part, which was the presentation by 5 kids who had been helped by DHF. All of of them had cochlear implants, enjoyed the benefits of speaking and hearing, and were absolutely adorable! I was too busy enjoying it to snap any pictures. By the end there wasn't a dry eye in the house. If I had brought any money with me, I would have dumped it all right into one of the donation envelopes right then ;)

There was Meghana, the junior emcee, who hosted the event along with her sister. She's in second grade, and was implanted when her family moved from India to Texas when she was four. She had a precious performer personality, and did a great job. Some of the other kids included:

• A little girl, whose entire family (including herself, her parents and brother) were born deaf and wear cochlear implants. She spoke beautifully about the miracles of Hanukkah and described the miracle of her cochlear implants.
• A 12 year old boy implanted when he was 5. He got up and sang a pretty awesome rendition of "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer". He even got everyone to sing along!
• An eight year old bilaterally implanted when he was one. He wowed the crows with his breakdancing skills!
• A boy who has bilateral implants, as do all of his siblings. He thanked his mom, describing how she checks 6 processors and 18 (!!!) batteries every morning to ensure each of her kids can hear. He told of his struggle to learn to hear and speak for the first time when he was implanted, at age 8. It was clear he had worked hard and had made tremendous progress, and hearing him exclaim "Just look at me now!" brought on a flood of tears.

I had a great time, and I hope DHF was able to raise plenty of money. I also got to enjoy catching  up with old friends, some girls my age who also have bilateral implants.

Happy Holidays!