September 1998 Moms - Florida Shopping Trip

Florida Shopping! :)

On Friday, 26 February 1999, the Florida September moms decided to gather in Vero Beach's new mall for our first-ever meeting. We were all excited at the prospect of being able to put faces to names and to also see if our mental images of one another were even the slightest bit correct. All were able to attend and it was amazing that not only did no one get lost, but we all managed to make it on time, too! Thank goodness for cellular phones.

Photos

LISA:
"I, for one, had a wonderful time. It was so nice to be able to see living, breathing people...not the one-dimensional images on the computer monitor. The first mom that I met was Kelly with her daughter Morgan, who were down from New York on holiday. They were visiting Kelly's mother in south Florida and drove up especially for the trip. Unfortunately, I met her for the first time in the bathroom at J.C. Penney's, but I do suppose that there are worse places to make a first impression! So, after making our exchanges and potty trips, we went out and met up with Meg and Emily. And, I must say that poor Miss Em was not thrilled! Shortly afterwards, we phoned Maureen and Anita only to find that they were following each other on the highway and it did not take long for everyone to finally meet."

"We mainly spent the time chatting away in both the centre of the mall, and in the food court. The only problem was with the noise level in the mall itself and then the noise from my little ones, it was difficult to hear everyone at times. Still, I found them to be kind, interesting women to converse with. The babies were all just so adorable...and big! It was great to see what "normalcy" looked like. We were all sorry to see Meg leave just before lunch, but she and Jason had wanted to go to a few more places on their way back home. I followed shortly afterwards since we had a 4 hour drive so, I had no idea as to what happened after lunch..."

KELLY:
"I had a blast and it was absolutely wonderful meeting that mommies & babies! We had Meg & Emily (along with Jason & Cate), Lisa L & Bekah (along with the other 6 children), Anita & Jarrett (along with her mom), Maureen & Alex (along with Michael) and then myself and Morgan. We met at the mall in Vero Beach and spent a good deal of time sitting around talking, then wandered around the mall, sat around drinking smoothies from Orange Julius, having lunch and then wandering around shopping...all the time talking away and playing with babies."

"Emily and Bekah were the tiny baby girls and Morgan and the boys were about the same size. All of them so cute! Lisa's children are so cute and VERY well behaved. We were all very impressed at how she manages to get 7 children out & about... especially a long trip. The older kids help with the babies and they are great. Good job Lisa! :-) We didn't see much of Jason and Cate. Jason took Cate to the arcade and then wandered around the mall seperately. We did meet them though and Cate is as cute in person as she is on the webpage."

"I can't wait to meet more mommies & babies!! This is so cool! I have to say, everyone was pretty much as I had them set in my mind."

MEG:
"We get there and he decides to take Cate, the stroller and the little diaper bag, so I get Emily, the huge diaper bag (just ask Maureen's husband, the sweetie, how big it was!) and the sling. So, I get there and take a screaming bloody murder Em into the family room to change her. Well, she yacked all over both of us, so off goes her cute sailor outift and she looks like a bum in an extra onsie I thankfully packed. The first people we saw were Kelly and Morgan and Lisa and her kids! Well, she did not like that at first, but then she spotted the babies and was ok. Emily was actually very good the whole afternoon and even took a nap in the sling (which is ODD!!! Sleeping Morgan and Bekah must have had some influence on her). Lisa's children are so well behaved! I couldn't believe it! They all held hands and walked and talked so nicely!! And they matched!!! They were all so cute!"

"Now, as for Anita, her mom and Jarrett, what nice people. Anita, your mother is very special :) She was snapping pictures like crazy ! And does Jarett have the legs! I just wanted to squeeze them (in a good way of course*G*). Alex has CHEEKS! I wanted to pinch them so bad but figured Maureen would get me for child abuse. And Michael was so nice! While you were all in the family room changing the babes he and I had a nice little chat about all sorts of things, mainly about how great I thought it was that he was there when I was 'abandoned' by my husband."

"Everyone got to meet Cate for about 30 seconds, so they didn't get to see the real Cate. She did spend the whole day dry though."

LISA (again):
If I may add at this point: Emily did not look like a "bum" in her Onesie! We all understand that babies have accidents and, besides, both Meg and Maureen used these adorable slings. Em's outfit was completely covered and we were all looking at her gorgeous, large eyes anyway.

And, we just could not get over the uncanny similarities between Kelly and her daughter Morgan. For anyone who meets her in person, demand to see Kelly's baby shot! They are (save the "Brooke Shields eyebrows") the same baby. Anita and her mother were such nice people, as were Maureen and Michael with their son, Alex. Looking at the boys there made me long for another son...both were just adorable babies. They all were! I hope that we can all do this again some day and I promise to leave the others home then!"

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