Washington DC trip

Kay, Janell and I (Janae) went to Washington DC for Janell’s last spring break. Our hotel was a few metro stops outside of DC in Chevelry MD… free hotel shuttle, breakfast and internet. What more can we ask for? Janell and I arrived a day before Kay and drove ourselves to George Washington’s house at Mt. Vernon. Kay arrived on Sunday so we had the whole week together. We visited and thoroughly went through The Holocaust Museum, Museums of Natural and American Historys, Air and space Museum, The White House, The Capitol, Ford Theater, where Lincoln was shot International Spy Museum,National Art museum, Union station (we had entertainment coupons to eat there). We took the hop on hop off bus for one day seeing ALL the sites in the 90 degree weather. Saturday we took the metro and bus to BWI and dropped Janell off at the airport for her flight home, she is going to San Diego this week for Band tour so I decided to stay with Kay and go to New Orleans on business and then to Omaha for a few days. We got to our Baltimore Hotel and decided to take the light rail into the city. With no plans we visited the famous waterfront, watched a pirate ship fight, visited the great Bambino’s house he was born in and a sports museum, walked to Little Italy for a bite to eat and went to the Orioles second home game of the season which they lost. Kind of a lot for a half day with no plans. I loved watching the Babe Ruth movies and learning about him.

Michael Phelps and Dorothy Hammill are Baltimoreans.

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.