Trying out new clubs

Not the most exciting way to spend an afternoon, but I went with Andy and E to their golf lesson facility so they could try out TaylorMade golf clubs. They TaylorMade rep was telling her how they could be customized to her swing and put women's grips on male shafts for her. They'll even cut an inch off the length if she wants. Anything for a sell. She didn't get new clubs today, though. There's a special running next month.

Here she is looking to see how far she hit the ball and how consistent the swing is with various clubs. I spent the time playing Swipe on Andy's iPhone and looking through his photos. Look what I found - photos from the Bulls game they went to in January that he was going to email me, oh, two months ago.

Funny things along the way

This was the Chicago weather as we left Sunday to begin our spring break mini-vacation. It was snowing before we left at about 6:30 a.m. and got heavier as we got closer to the lake and into Indiana. At least by time we got to Indianapolis the snow was over. And we even saw a sign of spring on the University of Kentucky campus - a daffodil in bloom on the grounds of the university president's house.

We took the University of Kentucky tour the day after the school's basketball team won one of its games in the NCAA tournament. I just had to take a picture of this bra laying on the ground. Perhaps the partying got a little wild?

Our hotel room in Lexington appropriately looked out over this horse track.

At Purdue we saw this to scale model of the university in the school's Memorial Hall. Pretty impressive.

L "won" a raffle at school to bring this stuffed dog along on spring break. Part of her "assignment" was to take a picture of the dog wherever we went. We took its picture at the Louisville Slugger Museum and in a store at Purdue surrounded by a bunch of other stuffed animals. I wanted to get a picture of it in a hotel room so in East Lansing, I tucked it into B's bed, snapped a picture and left it there. He was a little freaked out when he woke up next to the dog with big eyes.

Apparently the only way to keep the kids from bickering with each other is to tire them out so they all fall asleep.

Andy's notorious for making us take long walks, saying most everything is "three blocks" from wherever we are. If you look beyond the kids in this picture you can see the distance of the Michigan State Capitol from the Supreme Court Building, which we were in. It was cold outside and the walk ended up being a lot farther than it initially appeared. I think we were all frozen by time we got into the court building.

And Michigan State

The last stop of our mini-vacation was East Lansing, Mich., to visit Michigan State University. Our tour wasn't until 1 p.m. Wednesday so we thought we'd bore the children to death and take them on a tour of the state capitol. They whined the entire time.

Here, feigning interest, they're all looking at the ceiling of the House chamber. The ceiling included seals from all the states and they were searching for Illinois.

And just to make sure they were really bored, Andy made us all walk across the capital complex to check out the Supreme Court building. Ugh.

I think we were all surprised at how large the Michigan State campus is. We listened to an admissions talk for about 40 minutes before we headed out on the student-led tour of campus. B and L both fell asleep during the talk. Here's the campus bell tower:

I think this is a random classroom building:

In addition to being large, the campus is very wooded. There's even a river running through it. Our tour guide said if a bike gets stolen it sometimes ends up in the river.

This is the dorm we went into on the "north" area of campus. The campus has five, I think, residential areas. Each one has its own health center and at least one food court that stays open until midnight.

This was the lobby area of the dorm building. The room was pretty typical. They told us this building was constructed around World War II.

Of course, we stopped at a bookstore and L found a wig. She also had some ice cream from the school's dairy store. They make flavors to represent all the Big Ten schools. L chose Purdue Tracks - vanilla with caramel swirl and fudge footballs. It has so much fat content that it can't be sold as ice cream outside the university.

We were leaving Michigan at dinner time so decided to stop at Redamak's to have dinner. It's a typical stop for us when we go to our church camp in the fall.

Purdue

Our next stop on the campus tour vacation was Tuesday at Purdue. We liked that the campus is old and all the buildings are constructed of red brick, giving it a cohesive feel. I liked that it's an easy drive from Chicago. The campus is bigger than we thought but everything seems to be within walking distance. Here's E and B sitting in Memorial Union before the tour:

Someone from the admissions office gave an interesting, short talk and the best part was that he was pretty funny. I think I saw B chuckle out loud three times! E loves the idea that freshmen move in a week before the other students and enjoy a week to themselves to learn about the campus, meet new people, play games and takeover the local Walmart store. Here are a few random shots during the tour - the Hello Walk, the bell tower and some classrooms:

They also showed us a dorm room. I think they said the building opened in the early 1970s so it was a typical dorm room. However, it was a bit bigger than the one E has stayed in at U of I for her engineering camp. She also liked the rec center here. Again, it had a huge climbing wall and everything is free to students. There's even a 45-person hot tub. And, of course, she and Andy found the golf course and a driving range.

After the general tour, Andy and E went on a special tour of the engineering department. I think this tour may have sold E on the school. She loved it. Meanwhile, I took B and L back to the union to wait for them to be done. Of course, I had to check out the Greek houses. Students get to ride the city bus for free, but this sorority house was incredibly close to campus (and beautiful):

Here's L getting into college mode - playing on her iPad, feet up, eating ice cream. She's going to like college life. In the basement of the union is the busiest Starbucks in the entire state. E wanted to get a tea, but decided not to wait in the line.

We did find it a bit odd that there were students sleeping everywhere. The one thing B proved to us on this trip is that he can sleep anywhere. Here he is napping in the Purdue welcome center.

Kentucky

We just got back from a whirlwind three university visits in three days mini-spring break. We left Sunday to get to the University of Kentucky tour Monday morning. Along the way we stopped in Louisville to visit the Louisville Slugger Factory and Museum. The museum had bats hanging from the ceiling:

After the factory tour, on which they explained a lot about professional baseball bats, we each were given a mini souvenir bat. Here are the kids posing outside the museum with a huge Louisville Slugger bat:

On Monday we went over to the university for the tour. The campus is pretty and we even saw a daffodil (won't be seeing that in Chicago any time soon). They're doing a lot of building there. The library was pretty new and they're building several new dorm buildings:

This is the lobby of the dorm we went into; it looks like a hotel lobby:

And the dorm room they showed us was spacious and nicely decorated:

A random shot of some classroom buildings:

This was E's favorite part - the rock-climbing wall in the student rec center. It's free for all students to use.

And, of course, we can't stop at a university without checking out the bookstore. L found a blue wig to get her into the Kentucky spirit. No, she didn't buy it and bring it home.

Adorable

King of the hill ... er, chair

Spring break

One sign that the kids are happy they're on spring break this week.

Nice recommendation

E recently asked her English teacher for a recommendation to include in her application for a scholarship toward her Japanese trip this summer. Not sure whether she'll get any money, but if she doesn't it isn't because the recommendation wasn't glowing.

"... she is very open-minded. She seems to have a way to talk to EVERYONE; and while she is extremely smart, she is neither condescending nor judgmental. She has a good sense of humor (which is a must if you plan to study another culture) and she is probably one of my most 'world savvy' students. And by savvy I mean she keeps up to date on the world around her. Locally, nationally and globally she knows exactly what is happening and why. Furthermore, she has a well formed opinion that always appears to be based upon careful listening and observation. She also has a great deal of respect for other students that is reflected in her ability to 'work well with others.'"

New shoes

It's an easy guess which one of the kids chose these new shoes.

A little praise

The village has a new ordinance requiring kids under 16 to wear helmets when they bike (to promote safety or to better identify the kids who don't live here and may be riding on a stolen bike?). L wasn't thrilled with the idea, but she's going along with it. The other day when she rode her bike to school a man in a village car waved for her to pass in front of him then thanked her for wearing her helmet.

First day of spring

Welcome to spring in Chicago ... more snow.

Ready for the Bulls game

Andy has tickets to take the kids to another Bulls game in April and L has already made a poster she plans to take along. She's hoping it gets her on the jumbotron. The cheerleader in the bottom left corner is a woman Andy works with who's one of the Luvabulls. Andy took a picture of L's poster and showed it to her. She liked it.

I found it!

L's morning would have been a lot smoother had she looked for her bike lock key last night. Temperatures reached 50 today so she thought she would bike to school with her friend, J. Her friend came over on her bike and L didn't start getting her stuff together till about 8:15 a.m. The bike lock was no where to be found. Then she found the spare key for B's bike lock and decided she would take his, but she couldn't get it to turn in his lock. Then she found another key and tried that on a U-lock she found in the garage. That wouldn't work either. At this point she was going to be late for school so I told her she could walk with J or I could drive her. Instead, she decided to bike and have J lock the bikes up together. This afternoon I found her old cable lock AND the key to her U-lock. That means the crisis for tomorrow morning is averted. Or, more likely, there will be a crisis tomorrow morning, it just won't be centered on a bike lock.

Spring cleaning

I was surprised to see B doing a job I've been putting off for way too long - cleaning the chandelier in the living room. He was taking down the glass and Andy was washing it. It looks a lot better now.