Snowball Express sends fallen soldiers families to Disneyland

Long journey, brief respite
8 area families suffering from wartime losses set out on a holiday vacation to Disneyland
By LINDSAY WISE
Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle
Dec. 17, 2008, 1:22AM

At the American Airlines check-in counter, 3-year-old Hailie Leonard wrestled with a suitcase almost as big as her.

Undaunted, she tugged the bag a few inches closer to her goal and took a little skip-jump.

"Mickey Mouse!" she squealed. "Tinkerbell!"

The blond toddler from Katy was at Bush Intercontinental Airport on Tuesday to fly to Disneyland, where she hopes to meet her favorite cartoon characters. Giddy anticipation of the all-expenses-paid trip has brightened a tough time of year for Hailie, who faces the second Christmas without her dad.

Charles Leonard, 29, died in Iraq last year when a rocket-propelled grenade hit his Bradley Fighting Vehicle.

"She tells everybody her daddy's in heaven fishing," said her mother, Katrina Leonard, 27.

Hailie and her mother joined more than 500 families across the country — including eight from the Houston area — on charter flights to California, where they will visit Disneyland and Universal Studios Hollywood.

The event is organized by Snowball Express, a nonprofit group founded in 2006 to benefit children whose parents died while serving in the U.S. military.

Costumed volunteers in Houston decorated Gate A29 with tinsel and passed out cookies, sunglasses, baseball caps and backpacks full of toys. A chorus of Heritage Elementary School students wearing reindeer hats sang Christmas carols, accompanying themselves on xylophones, recorders and sleigh bells.
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