Mentoring meeting

E found out about a summer mentoring at school and took Andy and I to a meeting tonight to hear all about it. It's a partnership between a mentoring program, the library and the high school. She would pick a project and work on it for 50 hours this summer, with a mentor from the library staff. Upon her successful completion, she'd receive a $1,000 stipend for college. We're not sure whether it work for her considering her summer plans with the mission trip to Atlanta. It's something to think about.

Cleveland meeting

We had the final meeting tonight for L's upcoming Cleveland trip with the band. She was pretty excited when they handed out the backpacks. There will be 244 students going and now they all have the same backpack they could bring. What could possibly go wrong with that?

Muffles and E

Togetherness

Bio Club overnight

E returned home this morning from her Biology/Enviromental Club overnight. The kids left after school yesterday and arrived back at the school a little after 9 this morning. She was cold and wet as it rained most of the night. L got up early to go collect more money for Misericordia, but when she got to school she found out the fundraiser was canceled (for the middle school volunteers at least) because it was too cold and rainy. Highlight of the trip? She got humped by a goat.

Collecting for Misericordia

L and a lot of her fellow students volunteered after school today to collect money for Misericordia. I saw her standing on Ridgeland Avenue when I drove to pick B up from work so after I got him, we circled around and found her.

She was trying to cross the street (in rush hour, no less), but then I realized why.

The driver of the car that pulled over is the woman from church who gave L singing lessons. L loved taking lessons but we've been on a hiatus so she could focus on her grades. She wanted to give a donation, but she was on the opposite side of the street.

Fortunately, she had a passenger in the car who could meet L half way. And L was surprised to see it's our neighbor who has L walk her dog. After L got her donation in the middle of the street, I drove L back to the school. All the other kids who were working her area, about two blocks south of the school, were walking back. When she saw the teacher who had been supervising them, she opened the window and said, "I'll meet you back at the school." He was wondering where she was after her mid-street collection. L plans to be back tomorrow morning to do some more fundraising. She also did a double shift last year and earned an award for it.

(The last) field trip

I think this is the last field trip chaperoning I'll be doing. There was some confusion as to whether I was chaperoning (apparently checking the "yes" box on the permission slip isn't good enough) so L had me email her teacher last night saying I'm available to go and he said that would be fine. So, I get to school and he first informs me that I won't be with L's group. Isn't that the whole purpose of chaperoning? To spend the day with your kid and their friends? So I had to pal around with the teacher and watch a group of eight girls. Those girls were divided into two groups to work on a project while at the Museum of Science and Industry, but somehow they were expected to stay together as one group (wanting to constantly go two different ways). Then they started fighting within the groups. Basically I followed the girls around all day as they were supposed to "lead" the visit in order to finish their projects. What a nightmare. I did get to see L a little at lunch and then before we left the museum. We weren't even on the same bus. Never again.

'Carousel'

Allison and I met up with Julie at the Lyric Opera this afternoon to see "Carousel." Here we are before the show.

After the show, Allison and I went to Andy's office to see if he wanted a ride home. He did. Here he is hard at work.

Adult Girl Scout

E attended a Girl Scout recognition ceremony tonight that honored one of her former leaders. E and the fellow girls in her troop were bridged to adult Scouts. E also got a Girl Scout magnet and a gift certificate to a local ice cream parlor. She's been a Girl Scout since Daisies as a kindergartner. I believe she has until the end of September to complete the project for her Gold Award.

I need to vacuum ...

... but Muffles is sleeping.

Leaving Las Vegas

Can't leave Vegas without checking out the "Welcome to Las Vegas" sign. We didn't want to wait in line to get a picture of us with the sign. We had a buffet lunch at the Golden Nugget and played some video poker before heading to the airport.

Here are a few random Vegas shots:

We spent part of Saturday on the Fremont Street part of old Vegas. It's a little wild there. You don't see any girls dancing on bars on today's strip.

Riding through the canyon.

Cactus shot.

In our hotel, we visited the Cosmopolitan Luck Cat exhibit. You touch its paw and it spits out a fortune or a cash prize. We both got fortunes.

We may have gotten fortunes instead of cash, but maybe some of its good luck rubbed off on us. My first win on a $1 bet on video poker was $18.10. This was probably my winnings after putting in a $5 bill.

Andy's scenic shot from our balcony. You can see the High Roller to the right of the fake Eiffel Tower.

When we landed at Midway, it was rainy and foggy. The pilot came in really fast onto the runway and after everyone braced themselves and the pilot got the plane to come to a stop, he came over the intercome and said, "Whoa, big fella, slow down." Yikes.

Seinfeld and the Linq

Saturday night we went to Caeser's Palace to see Jerry Seinfeld perform. The show was really good. We had great seats, but it was still hard to get a picture of him. Andy didn't want to turn the flash on.

After the show, we went up in the High Roller at the Linq. We had pre-purchased tickets that let us skip to the front of the line and get into a car with an open bar. The ride was a half-hour to go around and the bartender told us to make sure we had drinks to go before our ride was over.

A few from the top:

Red Rock Canyon

Andy had a busy day planned for us today. We drove our flashy black Mustang convertible rental to Red Rock Canyon west of Las Vegas and took a 14-mile scenic drive.

I didn't realize there were tortoises in the desert. This one was at the welcome center. We didn't see any in the wild. The desert is also supposed to have wild burros and wild horses running around, but we didn't see any of those either.

These people are a bit crazy:

Andy's scenery shots:

And while our ride was pretty sweet, this would be an interesting way to travel through the canyon:

The Cosmopolitan

Andy and I left this morning for a weekend in Las Vegas. We did a lot of walking around and had dinner at a Brazilian steakhouse restaurant, Samba, at the Mirage. We stayed at the Cosmopolitan and it was really nice. We were on the 28th floor with our balcony overlooking the Bellagio hotel.

Here are a few shots of our room:

A Japanese soaking tub (E was disappointed when we told her we didn't use it.)

Interesting wallpaper inside the closet. The entire hotel had interesting wallpaper.

Alley update

Definitely closed.

Another breakfast

I was a week ahead of myself when I took L to Dunkin' Donuts in lieu of attending the school's Honor Roll breakfast. The breakfast was this morning and L's friends were planning to go, so she wanted to go too ... and she wanted to get her bumper sticker and pencils. I was all set to take her until I was driving E and B to school and L called, screaming that the smoke detector in the living room was going off and it woke her up. I turned the car around and B and I took down the smoke detector, searched the house for smoke and figured it was malfunctioning. We pushed a pause button on the detector and L went with me to take E and B to school because she didn't want to be home alone. When L and I got back, the detector was going off again, and it wasn't the chirping "your batteries are dying" sound. It was a full-blown alarm. Apparently the detector we have isn't one you change the battery in. It's supposed to last for 20 years. We've had it two. I had to pull a sticker off the back to expose a screw then turn the screw to off to get the noise to stop. I decided to stay home from the breakfast just in case, and L's friend A's mom came and picked L up so she could go to the breakfast. What a morning.

Friends A and J with L at the Honor Roll breakfast.

What was she thinking?

In this picture, L was thinking:

A. Muffles needed some fresh air

B. She wanted to see how long she could hold Muffles before he freed himself

C. She wanted to scare her mother.

Birthday dinner

We took E out for her birthday dinner tonight. She chose Flat Top. L had a soda and got a meal from McDonald's on the way home. Asian fusion isn't her thing.

Early birthday cupcakes

Is it possible this young lady is turning 18 tomorrow?

Sunday at the Shedd

Andy and B went downtown to the Shedd Aquarium this morning so he could do a homework project for his upcoming Florida biology trip. B had to observe a marine animal for 30 minutes, noting what it was doing every 30 seconds - eating, swimming, resting, etc.

I'd say the biggest challenge for him was trying to watch his chosen animal through all the tourists.

Bring Your Own Cup Day

E and L couldn't resist walking over to 7-Eleven this morning for its Bring Your Own Cup Day promotion. Here's E drinking her slurpee out of our ice bucket. All of that for $1.49.

Model cat

When he poses like this he's just asking for his picture to be taken.