My 2nd son! We received the call on vacation that Zechariah was a winner for the 2nd time. Several years ago, he actually happened to win the grand “gold” prize for the kids division. That included a box at the Salt Dogs as well as him getting to throw out the first pitch at a game.
So to find out what he won this year, Z and I went to a dinner at the Lincoln Chamber of Commerce, along with all of the other winners.
We were both rather excited about the evening and the Fazolis dinner that we would get to enjoy. Z especially liked the breadsticks and the fact that I let him have a Mountain Dew at suppertime (that RARELY happens).
A distant shot of the winners – my son is near the left. I did not take too close of a shot on purpose since I did not stand on top of the table to ask permission to publish the picture or anything. 🙂
Well, right after dinner, they got right down to handing out the prizes to all the winners. If you completed 6-10 Passport stamps, you were eligible for a “silver” prize; 11 or more: a silver OR gold prize. 30 or more stamps: the grand prize (A box at a Lincoln Saltdogs game again). (Close to 250 people turned in passports that were eligible to win a prize. But, only 8 people completed 30+ stamps – possibly represented by only 2-3 families – you had a good chance to win if you went to over 30 places!)
The Lincoln Convention and Visitor’s Bureau Executive Director, Jeff Maul, explained the program and then enjoyed “fist bumping” all of the winners.
One of the adult gold prizes – a huge basket from Hillis. Plus I think that winner also got a gas gift card -something we all can appreciate these days!
My son won hockey tickets, Champions Fun Center game bands and a licorice gift certificate. Plus, he was sweet and asked if he could bring home a breadstick for his sibling and Dad. That was the winning moment for me – when he thought of others. (Although we did deplete what would have been a nice lunch the following day for the Chamber staff – sorry again!)
I was impressed again with the Lincoln “Be a Tourist in your own Hometown” program. We will definitely continue to participate and hope others will join us. Maybe next year we will try for the grand prize … Thanks to Lincoln Convention and Visitor’s Bureau staff and especially a BIG thank you to Tracie Simpson who coordinates this program. She has done a great job with it!
P.S. You have less than 2 weeks to complete your Nebraska Passports if you want to be eligible for their prizes. I am glad that these two passport programs exist, as well as the Nebraska Great Park Pursuit. They definitely motivated our family to get out and experience more of what Nebraska has to offer. Even if we do not win any more prizes through either of the other programs, we definitely won with the experiences that we had. (I should go into PR 🙂 )
How fun! Congratulations Zeke!
Thanks, Miss Kari!
Congrats! From your blog, it definitely appears as if he is a worthy winner.
What a kind thing to say – thanks! He is a great kid!
I didn’t know he won again! Congrats! How fun!
[…] was definitely hopeful to have a winner. Twice my youngest son has won a prize. I posted on his experiences last year. This time, our oldest won! Tonight we went to the celebration dinner downtown at the […]