Senior Day

Yesterday I spent the entire day going through photos.  I got all the way through mid-2017, but I have the rest of 2017, 2018, and 2019 to get through.  Kaylee has a huge project here.  Cathy did up one tri-fold board and it looks great!   Kaylee and I have two more to do, which is what I'm going through pictures for.  We'll have more photos than we do board space, but that's okay, we can hang the rest up on twine around, at least that's the plan.  The girl likes to go places and do things and I like to take pictures.  ;)

Today was the Senior "walk", where they went through the halls in their caps and gowns and high fived the littler kids.  It's kind of an inspirational thing, for the kids to look up to.  And they did their practice graduation, and finally, their class picnic that the officers were in charge of.  Kaylee did a great job organizing, getting food, coming up with things to do, getting her dad to help her with tables and all sorts of stuff.  It looked like it was going to rain today, but it didn't, it was beautiful, and they got to do their picnic.  It went off like a charm, and the kids had a great time.

Tonight was Kaylee's "Seniors Honors Night".  The Seniors who were getting awards, scholarships, academic awards, etc. came out, along with their parents, and had a really neat program.  The people or groups who donated scholarships also represented.  They would name off each student, in alphabetical order, who would stand at the front of the stage while they listed off their various achievements.  When they listed a scholarship, whomever had awarded it would also stand in the office, as would the parents of the student.  It's a good thing Kaylee's last name didn't start with "A" because I didn't know we were supposed to stand until other parents were doing it.  (Steve says he heard them say to do it.)  One of the scholarships that was awarded was awarded by two parents whose son who went to Eastern died in a car accident his Junior year.  When their scholarship was announced, they stood, and listened to the lady up front who talked about their son, what he loved and did, and how this was in his memory.  They wiped tears, and the young man who was being awarded the scholarship was humbled too.   Kaylee won several scholarships as well.  One of them was for the music at the fountain group (I have to look it up).  They want her to play her saxophone Monday evening for their group.  It was an impromptu request, the night after graduation, but she handled it gracefully, which was good, because they'd just awarded her $500. They also asked her to come perform for them July 25th, but she is going to be gone.  So they want her to come back next year and do it, and submit a copy of her grades to them after her first semester of college.  So she's working a little for that one.  ;)

Kaylee has come down with a cold, which is the bummer.  She came home and took a nap before Awards night, and is up there sniffling.  Which stinks for all of us, including her.

We almost didn't go to this, because she wasn't sure she wanted to go, because she didn't think she had much to "award".  Well, she ended up with a lot of good things, a list of some of them is on the video and the pictures I'll post too.  At least one other scholarship was announced there, that she didn't know she'd won until right then.  The Marine Corp award was given to her by the same guy who tried to recruit her, who told her that she scored so highly on their admittance exam that she could get any job she wanted within the corp.  She declined, but she had mentioned he was intense, and when I met him tonight, I could see what she meant.  He was pretty intense.  lol  But what a shame it would have been to have not gone.  Cathy and Ann were able to come too, and I'm so glad. 

As we were going in, a big rainbow appeared off to the west.  I tried to get a picture, but it never does it justice.  (I need to research how to take rainbow pictures.  I see some good rainbows from the air and never get a solid shot out of it.)  A promise.

So without further ado, here are the pictures and video (thank you Cathy!) from tonight.

Peter Heck on the left, the honors students in the middle, the faculty and Valedictorian/Salutatorian on the right. 

Rainbow I

Walking onto stage

Having all her scholarships and awards announced.

The whole rainbow.  Apparently I got out of order here.

From the handout for the evening.

Kaylee with the Marine

Kaylee & Grandma

She slapped me in the back right here.

Was supposed to be a photo of her and we photobombed

Kaylee & Aunt Cathy

Friends Laura O, Kristina S (who went right before Kaylee and had a whole page of stuff lol), Molly H (valedictorian), Adrienne S (this is the first time I've ever heard her dad NOT yell "YO ADRIENNE" at any public event where she is), Kaylee S, and Meredith M.  Good group of friends to have.  :)

These are the four class officers for the Junior and Senior years, along with their adviser, Peter Heck.  Meredith, Morgan W, Peter, Kaylee, Molly.  These four did a great job organizing and running their class, along with a great adviser!

Then they had to do a goofy one.

Kaylee, Laura O, Meredith.

Acceleration

Things are moving along!

Cathy and Ann are working on Kaylee's boards.  I have more photos to print out but I'm done for today, I'm pooped.  I didn't sleep well for no good reason last night, and had to get up at 6 am to go to Maryland, the Washington DC area.  There was some weather out there, and in the Aerostar you can't get above it, so I spent some time dodging build-ups, but it wasn't bad. The timing worked out perfectly, so one big wad rolled through and then we landed, while another big wad was off in the distance.  When I got on the ground there, I had to top off the plane.  It's self-serve only, and the pump is on a very small ramp.  I pulled up as close as I could, and went to fill up, but the hose would only reach one side.  So I filled up the center tank and one side, and then had to start up and taxi all around and come back in and face it the other way to get the other wing.  Then I had to start up and taxi around and try to get out of the way on the small ramp so other planes could fuel up if needed.  It's hot and muggy over there, so I'm sweating pretty well.  I go inside to pay for the fuel, and am informed that there's a $100 landing fee.  I'm like....WHAT!?  I said "For a piston twin??"  She said "Yes, anything over 4000 lbs."  I said "Well, it is over 4000 lbs.  But the 76 gallons of fuel I bought doesn't waive the fee?"  She said "No, you have to buy 100 gallons of Jet A."  Now I'm speechless.  1) That is outrageous. Even Huge Class B airports don't require 100 gallons of fuel from piston twins. and 2) That is outrageous.  I can't even BUY Jet A.  I burn 100LL.  3) That is outrageous.  Nobody else, anywhere else that I have flown into has that kind of landing fee for piston twins other than like Chicago, and even they waive the fee with like 30 gallons of fuel.  I've never, ever seen such a huge fee out of some nowhere airport with a short runway at an uncontrolled field with no courtesy car, no fuel truck, and no good reason to charge me $100.  Well, not me.  MBros.  They seemed to take it in stride.  I'm not.  I think that's nuts.  I said I wanted to speak to somebody about it, but nobody else was around but the line girl who has nothing to do with the rules.  I still think I'm going to talk to somebody.  That's just wrong.

Anyway.  While I was there, I pulled out my laptop, got into their wifi, and systematically worked on pictures.  I found all the travel ones, from Florida, Puerto Rico, New York, and her two overseas trips,  chose the ones I thought she'd like, and I sent them all to Walgreens to be printed up in three separate batches so I could keep them straight.  It took the whole time I was on the ground, to do.  I sent the last batch off to Walgreens while the guys waited a minute for me.  When I got back, I picked them up, Kaylee went through them and chose the ones she wanted on her boards, and took them next door for the next level of management to take over.  We are SO grateful for the help, too.  I still have her music pictures to go through and collect and print.  I'll try to do that tomorrow too.

The trip home was more interesting.  We were IFR for a lot of it, and there were a lot of buildups happening.  It was rough, bumpy, and hot.  Fortunately nobody threw up.  There was a big ole cell right over Kokomo, with a lot more big uglies building all around.  There was a hole right in the path to Kokomo, but that hole was in between a whole line of storms.  So I went the long way, all the way around the cell to the south, rather than try to hit the hole.  Some days you can safely do holes, other days you look up at what's around the hole and you think....nah.  This was a "nah" hole.  lol

When I landed, I made the run to Walgreens, stopped at Five Guys for the only real food I'd had today other than a muffin at the airport out there, came home, and kept plowing out stuff.  I did three loads of laundry, two loads of dishes, fed the cats, asked Kaylee what picture she wanted to use for some stuff and then sent those off to Walgreens to be printed and sent it off to another printer for her thank you cards.  I reviewed, signed and submitted my student's application for his checkride tomorrow for Private Pilot.  I set up an "Event" on Facebook for Kaylee's open house.  I downloaded an app I may need to be able to get ADS-B weather on my iPad in the Aerostar.  (An app that requires a username and password from something or other).  That doesn't seem right, another app, you should just be able to get it on ForeFlight and I don't get why it's connecting fine but not weather and traffic, just flight plans.   Frustrating--I've never been able to get good weather in that airplane, and on longer range trips you need it on more than the little avidyne screen that you can't see when it's zoomed 200 miles away.  Now I finally have ForeFlight, and it's still not working in there. Grump.  I'm sure it's my own user error, but still, they're apparently making it a little extra complicated or something.  It just pops up automatically in the Cheyenne and the 340--with Garmin products.  :p

What else did I do today.  I got a new case for my iPhone, broke my sunglasses and bought new ones, I talked to the people delivering the adult sized tricycles for the Spring Fling and have that almost completely set up, plus I got 1 out of the 2 cake places totally ready.  She said she couldn't wait until I saw the finished product.  Now I have to figure out the sheet cake, and then I'll be done with that.  I've talked to students, helped the guy with the checkride straighten out his logbook and his form, and I'm losing track of what else.  In other words, I was a very busy girl today.

It rained like crazy today.  Cell after cell rolled through.  Our yard flooded, which it doesn't do much.  I'm glad we got home from our trip when we did.

Anyway, I'm fading, so here are some recent photos.

Our backside

This is from the airport.  Read the two signs. Cracks me up.

It's someone's birthday!

Happy Birthday Cathy!

Bumpies

The mountains down there

Cumulogranite.  Clouds and Mountains

The thunderstorm that continues off to the right which I did not go into or in between.

Sunday Musings

You know, my Mom emailed a quickie that said something like "Nobody is there for the cake. It will be fine."  Secondly, there was a thread on the Mom board I'm a part of that's been there for the last 19 years.  It started with woman all due the same month, and has been around since.  Some of those moms, and not just one or two, are dealing with all sorts of issues this time of year.  Several have teens who have left the house and are barely to not speaking to them at all.  Some are not graduating from highschool, or are not sure they're going to be able to graduate, as they are failing out.  Some are not sure of their gender, their future, OR their present.  Some are addicted to drugs, or having kids, or living with abusive boyfriends.  And here I am hoping a party goes off okay.  Talk about first world problems.  My daughter is healthy, and smart, and funny, has good friends, a great relationship with her family, and her main addiction is junk food, just like mine.  We are blessed indeed, and it WILL be fine.  Even if it rains and we have to shut the big doors and it ruins plans.  Even if the cakes look lame.  As long as people come, which would indeed stink if they didn't, lol, everything will be Fine.

Lon and Cathy are here for a wedding up in the Ft. Wayne area, and will be here this week before Kaylee's graduation.  Cathy has been helping with the party, and will help this week too, which I hugely appreciate!  Steve has been working outside on yard and house upkeep stuff, and Ann is out working on the gardens and yard, after being able to go to church today.  It's great for everyone to be able to get to it!

Kaylee has two days of high school left.  Tuesday, their Senior Prank Day (and start of their final Finals), and Wednesday, their last official day of school and their Senior Picnic/cook-out.  She's been going to Open Houses, hanging out, and enjoying life while mostly letting school sort of slide.  She dropped down to mostly B's on her grades until I poked her, and now they're all back up to A's except for one B+.  She only has a few finals left and then she can quit altogether.  lol  We all still have a ton to do, but she's up there watching a video or movie and lying on the couch, and I'm on the computer not doing a lot of work myself.  Have you ever had so much to do that you just looked at it all and decided to watch TV instead?  Yeah.  ;)

On the other hand, I feel pretty good about a few things.  Some of the best put-together moms I know have done less than I have towards these events.  That'll make you feel good.  I've seen at least three other moms whose Open Houses are less than a week away and they haven't done anything but pick the date and plan on cooking some food for however many say they'll show up.  I couldn't sleep at night if that was me, literally could not sleep.  I think we're actually in decent shape here.

I have one student going for his checkride on Wednesday, and this is all a bit of a mess.  His written exam expires at the end of this month, which means he HAS to get his checkride done by May 31st, or he has to redo his entire written for another $150 and more studying.  He's in his 80s, and a very nice man.  He's doing Kaylee's printing, thank you cards and such, for free, as a donation.  He's in his own plane, which has posed its own issues.  I went to look through his Airworthiness and Registration, only to find no legal registration in the plane, just a print-out of the FAA site saying it's registered.  That makes it unairworthy and you can't take a checkride like that.  So he had to find/hunt down the real registration the other day.  It could have been a show-stopper, as replacements can take weeks to get.  He apparently found it.  The logbooks have to be gone through as none of us knows if it meets all the requirements for that yet.  I get around to checking his logbook for all the requirements, and he's missing over an hour of solo cross country time.  So yesterday he shoots off an emergency cross country.  His checkride is in 3 days, he needs to fill out IACRA, and our last flight didn't go well, but it was windy.  But he botched a landing in a way I haven't seen him do.  I think he'll be fine if it's not gusty.  But now the weather is calling for a 70% chance of rain...and high winds.  If he can't take the ride Wednesday, he only has until Friday before he's out of time, and I don't know what the availability of the examiner is for Thursday/Friday, and then he has to pass the first time, or again...out of luck on a retest.  So. Much. Stuff.  Poor guy has got to be stressed out.  I'm a little stressed for him.  Here's hoping for decent weather on Wednesday, plus him to be calm and focused, and everything else to work out smoothly!

I think I'm going to work on compiling pictures tonight, for the Open House, and work on picking a world map to put on her cake, plus picking a picture to send to Dave for her thank yous, and to Ann for the missionary cards.  I think tonight is a Picture Working Night.  Get more stuff DONE.  :)

Cakey

I barely got to the last cake lady in time.  When I walked in there and said I was ordering a cake for 6/7, she said "we're cutting off orders for that week".  I said "I talked to her on the phone yesterday and she said if I'd come in today she could take care of me on the sheet cakes."  She went to the back and came back out and said "okay".  I almost missed the last chance in town.  It is a new place, they aren't really set up yet.  They had a photo book of their work, and the pictures were not good.  They need to have someone else take photos of their cakes, who knows how to take attractive photos.  It's not confidence-inspiring as is.  But I don't think they have to do anything too fancy anyway, just two sheet cakes together decorated up however I can figure out how to decorate them. I've contacted J Edwards to try to get a closer idea of how that one's going to look, so I can hopefully match up my sheet cakes from Place #2.   It'll be okay one way or the other, I'm sure, I just want it to be really nice.  If we're doing this on our own, without additional local assistance, I want it to look good.  Ya know?

Tomorrow is Senior Skip Day.  The girls are going to Cheesecake Factory (which is such a waste since Kaylee hates cheesecake and I love cheesecake), and going shopping at Goodwill, where she's hoping to find a dress to wear for graduation.  I'm not sure what all they're going to do, but I'm sure it will be a fun day.

Our friend Judy Rider could use some extra prayers.  She had lung cancer that metastasized to the brain, or brain cancer that metastasized to the lung, I don't remember which way it went.  But the doctor said this one was easily fixed, with just a pill chemo.  It seemed to be doing the trick.  The spots in the brain were disappearing, and the one in the lung was shrinking.  Until this last scan.  There are new spots in the brain.  So they are going to do radiation on those spots in the brain.  Judy, as you can imagine, is scared, and so is Chuck, although he's more stoic in front of people.  They're doing the best they can.  So pray for them, for the doctors to make good decisions, for as much peace and calm as possible for those two, and if possible, for the radiation to take care of it.

Band

Kaylee's Ball State class is over and done with as of the last paper she turned in at midnight last night.   She's working with the Seniors to do a series of Pranks instead of just one, and got them all approved by the officials today.  There's one teacher who is a bit of a party pooper about pranks who already tried to get one of them stopped (it's just twine in the hallway, nothing huge), but the principal said just to go for it anyway.  It goes down next Tuesday, and then they have finals, and then Thursday is their last day of high school, ever.  I would feel weirder about it except I'm so worried about getting everything else done that I haven't had time to dwell on it.

Last night was Kaylee's last band concert.  She was featured as the top Senior performer, and played "Moon River" with the band's backing her up.  She also won the John Philip Sousa Award, which is "The Sousa Award is the pinnacle of achievement in a high school band.  Introduced in 1955 to honor the top student in the high school band, the John Philip Sousa Band Award® recognizes superior musicianship and outstanding dedication. It was created with the approval of Helen Sousa Albert and Priscilla Sousa, daughters of the famous composer and bandmaster."  So every year, the top student in the entire band is chosen for this nationally recognized award.  It's pretty cool that Kaylee got that award, and she was really happy too.  In previous years she won "Outstanding Freshman, Sophomore, and Junior", so partly she was hoping to win it for Senior year too, but she didn't...instead she won the big one.  She then said she was kind of glad that the boy that won Outstanding Senior did, because she said he always lost out to her and Zach for awards in previous years.  So she was glad for him, which was nice.

We were sitting there in the audience, and Steve said "Boy, my dad sure would have loved this."  He was a real musician too, and he'd have been so proud.  Ann said she thought the same thing last night.  Maybe Richard was able to see or know anyway.  :)

I had a Spring Fling meeting this afternoon.  This thing is coming up SO fast.  It seems to mostly be coming together, but So Much Stuff.  Some of Kaylee's Open House stuff just arrived today, I'm getting ready to open up boxes and see how it's looking.  I tried to get Kaylee's graduation cake the other day, and they were booked up on cakes for that time frame.  So I went to the other cake place in town and they were booked up until June 17th.  Who knew?  So there's one more cake place in town that we've never heard of that's in the back of the strip mall, and they had availability.  How bad can you mess up a cake, right??  So tomorrow morning I'll be stopping in there to talk to her about what we're looking to do.  Here's hoping for the best.  Hopefully I'm just able to help support a new small cake shop.  :)

Now, off to do some research stuff, and sending a message to the tricycle people in Indy.  In the meantime, here are some photos for you from the Spring Band Concert.


First up is Kaylee's award

Kaylee getting ready to perform Moon River

When Kaylee was announced as the winner of the John Philip Sousa Award

Coming up to get her award

Kaylee & Caitlyn

The band's final song.