Off to College!

Hi, again--

I had to come home and post!  We just took David to the airport, and he's in the air flying right now.

Ready or not! (David is ready...Mom? maybe not)

Our alarms went off at 3:45 a.m., so we could be in the car driving at 4:15 a.m.  His flight was at 6:00, and we got him there on time.  Yessssss :)

The only thing was, they changed the flight, to one that left at 7:50, so we could ACTUALLY have slept another hour or so.  Ugh! :(

Cheering Squad to send him off :)

one big suitcase...that is all.

But that's okay.  David amazes me just a little...I went into his room last night, as he was finishing packing, and I looked around.  He had ONE big suitcase with him! And a rolling carry-on, and a messenger bag with his laptop in it.  That's all.

Telling a story?!

We did ship one box of bedding out, ahead of him a week ago, so he can make up his bed and sleep there tomorrow night.  But he fit all of his clothes, shoes and jacket included, plus a desk lamp, into that one big suitcase.  I mean, we even told him he could take two big suitcases.  He didn't need them.

Early smiles -- a little groggy maybe

Teresa opted not to have the early wake-up call.  She said her goodbyes the night before.  So Frank and I, Kara and Angela got up and drove with him to the airport.  After David checked in, the man at the counter said the other counter would give us a pass to go to the gate with him.  It turns out, they would only give us ONE pass.  So we went closer to the security line, then we parked ourselves on a row of benches to wait awhile.

Gourmet Breakfast, Airport Style

Some of the waiting included breakfast, and of course his last breakfast in Boston, for awhile, should be from Dunkin Donuts, right??  (They're everywhere here!)  We had bagel sandwiches and donuts.

Frank and I have so many great memories of college.  It's a transition time for all of us, but exciting for sure.  Good Luck David, and have so much fun :)

Kari

P.S.  He just called, and the day went off without a hitch!  No delays, and he took the Skytram in Dallas to catch the second leg of the flight.  Landed, retrieved his luggage, and found Suzanna.  He'll stay at their house tonight, and check in to his dorm tomorrow.  A good day for him!

I Blinked

Hola, Familia!

The month has been a whirlwind, but that's what summer is all about, right!  (The post title, "I Blinked," means that the month flew by.  "I blinked, and August was over!")

Never mind those relaxing-sitting-on-the-beach commercials for tropical vacations...THIS summer, at least :)  We still have 1 week of summer left until school starts, and we're milking every second for all it's worth!  A few things August had going for it:

SOCCER CAMP.  Kara had not one, but two soccer camps.  One of them was in Cape Cod (I know, Poor Girl, right...)  Almost her whole soccer team went.  2 team members have family summer houses on "The Cape," so the 14 girls who w
ent split up between those houses.  Soccer Camp was from 9a.m-noon each morning, and the rest of the time they spent at the beach, eating, sleeping, playing.  A week-long slumber party, more or less.  She had such a good time.


YOUNG WOMEN's CHURCH CAMP.  Both Kara and Teresa look forward to church camp each year.  This year Teresa was a "YCL," or "Youth Camp Leader."  Kara was a 2nd year camper.

I spent roughly 2 of the camp days on the "cook team," prepping meals, serving them, cleaning up, and starting over again for the next meal.  I have new respect, now, for the people who plan and prepare meals for 100+ youth at a time!  It is quite a process.

FOSTERING a PUPPY.  Teresa puts in hours of volunteer time with Save-A-Dog, a dog rescue organization about 5 miles from us.  We fostered a puppy for a weekend, until her adoptive family was ready to take her.  A good reminder to me, how nice it is to enjoy someone ELSE's dog, and then give her back to them!  "Eden" was a cutie.  She was some kind of a lab mix.

Teresa serving, taken last fall

VOLLEYBALL.  High school volleyball has started up for Teresa.  Tryouts were last Thursday, Friday, and now Monday and Tuesday of this week.

GETTING DAVID READY FOR BYU.  The time has come!  David finished up his internship last week, and has had a few days to see friends and say goodbye to them as they head off to school.  His big day is tomorrow (Tuesday), yes, now less than 24 hours away.  We asked him, if he wanted Frank or I to fly out with him, and he thought about it briefly.  "No," he said, "you don't have to go."

So we will get up at a ridiculous time Tuesday morning to put him on a 6 a.m. flight!  We sent out a box of bedding last week, and our friends Lee & Suzanna who live just 2 towns away from Provo will pick him up in Salt Lake City.  He'll stay with them for one night, then go to BYU to check into his dorm on Wednesday.  He is pretty excited.

furnace...  water heater...

LAST UPGRADE.  Today and tomorrow we have a crew here, changing over the house's heating system from oil to gas.  (This photo is from the Internet. You get the idea...)
This concludes about 5 big projects, starting last March, which have made up "Round 2" of our home improvements.  I'll highlight them in another post.  Round 1 was five years ago, right when we moved into the house.  Two rounds is enough, I think.  Forever.  Bleh.

The calendar marches forward!  Have a wonderful week!  Kari

Quebec, Canada

Bonjour!

We returned a few days ago from Montreal and Quebec City, in Canada.  Actually in "Quebec," which is also the province.  They speak more French there, we found out, than they do in Paris-- (what?)  Yes, they actually cater more to English-speakers in Paris than in Montreal.

(NOTE: if you single-click on the photos, you can see them bigger.  Much better, if you can get it to work on your computer.)

Beautiful, beautiful.  What a nice place!  And for the most part, there ARE a lot of English-speakers.  We attended church Sunday, and listened to the service in French.  It's kind of cool, though, when you see it in print or hear certain words, you can find similarities to English words, and "kind of" figure out what some things mean.

BASILICA.  Montreal has a grand and ornate cathedral downtown.  Downtown Montreal does feel European, with cobblestone streets and outdoor markets.  Here is one of the Notre Dame Basilica in Montreal.

OLYMPICS 1976.  They had the Olympics in Montreal.  Remember this gymnast?

BOTANICAL GARDENS.  Now they have turned the whole Olympic complex into beautiful botanical gardens.  Here are a few of the things we saw there.

INSECTARIUM.  Next to the Gardens was an Insectarium.  Thousands of insect specimens, some of them live.  Here are some of the non-live ones.

1 in 4 living creatures on this earth is a beetle!!!!!

 

Rhino beetle.  Wild, huh!

TOWER.  They also have this cool elevator-ride tower you can take to the top of the world, or close to it!  You can see great views of the city.

TEMPLE.  We stopped by the temple on our way out of town.  It wasn't open that day.

QUEBEC CITY.  This has a really pretty skyline and "old town" feel, again with the cobblestone streets.  We ate dinner at a cafe-type place, and our server offered to take our picture.  The photo itself turned out dark and grainy (I had taken it off of "automatic" and the settings were wrong for the lighting).  But I'm including it because I just noticed the guy at the table behind us.  HE wanted to be in our picture too!  See him?

Photo Bomb, I suppose... :)

 CIRCQUE du SOLEIL.  The unexpected surprise of the trip was to be told by the lady at the information booth was that the Cirque du Solei does a show every night in Quebec City.  Ticket holders get seats in this outdoor theater.  But if you're willing to stand in line and roll the dice on getting in or not, they let people stand and see the show for free.

So...there were a ridiculous number of people waiting for the free-standing-room-only spots.  Like 4,000. Really.  But we were amongst the first 1000, I would guess, that were allowed in.  The whole show was either up in the air over your head, or high on the stage in front of you so your view was awesome, no matter where you were!  So we stood.  It was a very fun show.

MONTMORENCY FALLS.  We hiked around and down the side of a pretty waterfall.  Their "Claim to Fame" is that it's 30 feet taller than Niagara Falls.

Also of note: Kara has braces now! Round 3 for the Whitesells.

Bonus: rainbow in the mist!

In the winter the spray freezes, and forms a huge ice-mountain.  We saw pictures of this.  But of course in August it's just spray.

ARTWORK.  Oh, and here is a great painting on the wall of a building, in downtown Quebec City!  Go ahead, click on it to enlarge it.  It's amazing. :)

 

So, that gives you a taste of our trip.  It's always a treat to have a change of pace in a different environment.  I am not a huge fan of loooooooooong road trips, but this was a good hop across the northern border.

Have a great week! Kari