Kansas City and Omaha with grandkids

Kay and I went to the Great Wolf Lodge in Kansas City with out grand kids. They have a private indoor water just for registered guests. You can go for two days to the water park with a one night stay.

Seth, Ethan and Sean

Grandma Janae and Jenna

Ethan

Aaron and Rachael
Seth scoops up Aaron from the slide, Aaron keeps going and going and going.....

Omaha Zoo with Jenna, Sean and Ethan

Sean





Sean, Ethan, Jenna

2002 Olympic volunteer memories

My daughter Frances and I volunteered for the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics. It was right after 9/11 so we needed to do extra training for security. Here are some picture memories:

We were assigned to the Peaks ice arena in Provo Utah. We took tickets, stood in the vomitory (French for entrance to a ampitheater, we liked the new name) , showed patrons to their seats. Smiled and smiled and smiled.

traded Olympic pins

Janae and Frances hanging out with the mascots

Frances and Janae

My home town newspaper did an article on us

Frances and Janae

Frances and I helped people exit. We were at the handicapped exit and Frances got a kick out of calling all of the guests "celebrities". Two old gentle men from Europe went to practically every game. On the final game we grabbed their arms and escorted them all the way to the street with a real celebrity flair. They loved it. We had a fabulous time. Worst memory: eating over my limit (1) of hot dogs for the year. Best memory: Sharing it all with Frances!

Our friend Steve Frisby was an Olympic torch Bearer. Steve, Janae, Kay, Janell and Caleb.

Imposing on my Mom’s Blog

(copied from Lauren's blog, written by Lauren)

Technically my mom has a blog where she keeps tabs on herself, dad and Janell but she hasn’t posted about Janell’s school dance so I am taking the initiative and doing it for her.

Wednesday:

-Hey Janell, when is your next school dance?

-This Saturday.

–Are you going?

–No.

–Why not? Is it girl’s choice?

–Yes, but I don’t have a date.

– Well (this is where I get to impose sisterly advise), it’s your senior year of high school. No one is in charge of making it fun except yourself. Sometimes you have to be spontaneous and do things you don’t normally do.

This is where Janell should have jumped out of her seat, said “your right Lauren”, grabbed the phone and got a date. She didn’t. I brought it up several times that evening and gave her examples of ways she could casually ask someone. She went to school Thursday still not sure but I texted her a few times and eventually she caved and asked someone. He said “yes”. Once she had the date she took the initiative in finding a group to go with, planning the day date and getting dinner in order (takeout panda express served formally at home on the fine china and Asian dishes, my idea). We went shopping Friday night for a sweater for her dress as well as accessories and arranged for Mirinda to do her hair and makeup the day of. Janell also helped me make a cake with the fresh lemons Bob gave Mirinda and I while we were in California. The cake was AMAZING. Planning was quite an ordeal but Janell handled it really well and she and her date had a great time. On Sunday when I came home from church she was rifling through our library of formal dresses (three sisters later) already planning her wardrobe for Prom.

snow removal in Omaha- we had to get out the big guns

kay wins the grand prize in the ship building contest

Kay, janae, Glen the cruise director, Janell and lauren

in our winning sweat shirts

Kay's funship III won first place. he had the whole cruise to put together this winning ship. We won sweat shirts, a piece of carry on luggage, water bottles, luggage tag and a underwater camera.

the ship had to be constructed to hold 10 cans of soda, it must float and not use anything that the ship could use again. He got a Styrofoam grape container from walmart garbage in puerto vallerta, added candy to it with wooden flute masts, a hot Tub sea shell and many extras. It took up his down time and he had a great time. Lots of attention of course. We also won the marriage game. someone said after they liked us because we looked like we really loved each other. Yes we were entertaining and entertained. Holland America is our new favorite cruise line.

Panama Canal

We went to the  Mira Flores Visitors center of the Panama Canal the night before passage and learned about the construction and the new construction. The best part was the simulator,     I crashed my boat…

The morning of passage we lost Ben and Winnifred but perched ourselves in the Crows nest on the top deck, front of the ship to go through the locks.  We felt very prepared with our reading and movies.  The Mira Flores/Pedro Migel locks took  two hours , then Gaton Lake and the final Gaton locks and we were 8 hours in the Panama Canal experience.

Happy Birthday Kay,  He was kind of mad because he thought he was turning 52 but I had to remind him he was turning 53.

Panama Canal cruise

We are on a Panama Canal Cruise. Six of us.  Me and Kay, Lauren and Janell and Kay’s parents Winnifred and Ben Cope.  After Kay getting Southwest airlines to open the door for me and his mom and Ben in a wheelchair, we didn’t miss our flight.  We did have to kill about 4 hours at LAX.  We left Ben and Winnifred with our luggage and they must have had the cruise people feel sorry for them  as they and gave them some transfers so we got to get to the ship free.

They have great food, good shows, great company.

First stop was unplanned.  There was a medical emergency, appendicitis.  They evacuated a crew member  at Cabo San Lucas and we went onto Puerto Vallerta.  After a visit to Walmart for sea sick meds we took everyone downtown for shopping and Kay, Lauren and Janell ate lunch at a back ally Mexican place. 

Next stop was Huatuclco known for it’s snorkeling.  We just happened to find a nice snorkel and fin set abandoned in our room hidden behind the emergency life jackets. We rented another set on the beach and snorkeled in pairs. The water was great and the snorkeling was great too. 

Chiapas was a little different.  It is a small town that cannot handle the two ships that were in port.  Kay waited in the taxi line for 4 hours.  Everything was backed up for hours.  We really wanted to see the ruins at Izapa since they are the place of the famous Stella (stone) 5. It is significant because it is of the tree of life, Lehi’s dream from the Book of Mormon.  Kay had a copy of it  in his house growing up and we have it now.   Our taxi took us to the ruins but when we asked about the Stella 5 they said it was down the road.  We saw some old friends from NJ, Hal and Kay Gaisford there, from the other ship.  They were told our ship was on red alert and 400 passengers were sick from our ship and not to shake hands with us.  News to us!

We asked their tour guide if we could see stella 5 she said it was too dangerous.  she told our cab driver it was too dangerous.  the grass was too high, over our heads, , there are military guys there hidden and we may get shot.  Kay told our cab driver if he got shot we would pay him extra.  Kay begged our cab driver to take us, the other locals thought it would be fine.  We decided to send one cab back and one cab would go see Stella 5.  We went, our driver asked several people on the way and all of the sudden we were there.  A park.  Our cab driver called the other and we all made it.

For Guatemala I hired a private company to take us to Antigua.  We passed by two active volcanoes on the way, one was smoking.  Antigua was beautiful and a place to buy small souvenirs.