Games and games

Friday night was Dylan's "bachelor" party --

... it was at Dave & Busters.

The guys at dinner (minus Carl who was taking the picture)

Racing...

... racing...

... racing.

Dylan and his dad at Space Invaders

Even though it was a Friday evening, Carl said that neither the restaurant or the gaming area was very full. But, when they were leaving at about 10:30pm when they were leaving, all these folks were coming in, many with young children!

Saturday morning, grandson Thatcher had his last baseball game...

... up to bat!

Swing!

He had quite the cheering party!!!

Attentive to the game from the dugout

Thatcher playing first base

The coach had an awards ceremony at the end of the game. He had something specific to share about each individual, how they contributed to the team, particularly outstanding plays, and positive characteristics - I thought that was really great! Each got a trophy too.

So the boys/guys got to play games!

Artwork? or functional?

In the campground, Paul Wolff, in Elgin, Illinois, the water hydrant for the sites are often rather far from the site and often shared with another campsite. For the site that we've had while we're here, the water spigot is on the "wrong" side of the rig, so we need to run our hose underneath Gracie and then across several feet of grass to hook up. It is one of the few campgrounds we stay at where we often need to use an extension hose. When we were doing our reservations for this stay, I noticed that the information about each site includes not only the length of the site and type of electric hookups (20A, 30A, 50A), but for each site, it also lists the distance to the water hookup!

When we were on a walk one morning, Carl took a picture of one of the water spigots...

Is that abstract art?

No, it is a water hydrant with 5(!) spigots on it for 5 campsites! Needless to say, it isn't particularly close to any of the 5 sites, so they all need to stretch their hoses over a long distance.

We also think that the water pressure may be less than optimal with so many rigs using the same water hydrant.

Museum of Science and Industry

Friday was the day for the "guys" (and me!) to visit the Museum of Science and Industry...

Front of the museum -- we got there just before it opened and were able to find great parking in the garage underneath.

Grandson Thatcher particularly wanted to go to the tsunami exhibit/experiment -- Scott and the boys had come to visit on a free day a few weeks ago and they didn't have a lot of time, so there were things they wanted to re-visit.

We started in the Science Storms room...

Selfie!

Son Steve working on creating a tornado!

Grandson Blaise examining an exhibit/experiment on string motion.

Scott, Blaise, Thatcher, and Roman experimenting with different wave lengths and heights in the tsunami experiment zone.

Grandson Roman, son Steve, and Carl working on an experiment to focus light to heat water.

Passing through the rotunda heading to the Transportation Gallery

Trains, planes, and other forms of transportation!

Son Scott and grandsons Thatcher and Blaise examining the *big* toy train set!

One of the draws to visit the museum at this time was to see the 007 (James Bond) Science special exhibit.

All the guys at the entrance to the 007 special exhibit!

The exhibit highlighted the real and pretend science that has been used in Bond movies...

Case for holding plutonium for a bomb

Aston Martin DBS V12 that was wrecked in Casino Royale. The "Science behind the stunt" explained that the original plan for the stunt was that the car would drive, at a high rate of speed, up a ramp on the passenger side and that would cause the car to flip. They had tried it with another vehicle and it worked, but when the Aston Martin DBS was delivered, they found that it was too heavy and would not flip, even with a ramp at 18". They instead exploded a charge under the car and the result was a 7-time rollover -- the most ever in a movie production. The neat thing was that there was a video beside the car showing the shooting of the scene (in which you could see the explosion) and then the video showed the scene as it ended up in the movie. Very interesting!

Another movie vehicle -- you can see the boat as it appears in the movie showing on the screen behind.

Classic type of saying by Q, this one to James Bond in Spectre

Goldeneye

Car that became a submarine in The Spy Who Loved Me

Jaguar XKR, Die Another Day

One of my favorites -- downhill sledding in the cello case (the "Lady Rose") in The Living Daylights. (I looked up the film clip and the still picture that they had behind the case has them on opposite sides from the video! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QZuOQZ1HC4)

Dog robot in A View to a Kill

After enjoying the 007 special exhibit, we visited a few more areas in the museum... we went inside the Boeing 727 that was in the Transportation Gallery and saw a video about how it was brought to the museum. We visited the Chemistry area...

... there was an area with scents to identify...and this interesting sign about the composition of the different branches of science!

As we were on our way out, we went down a stairwell where there were all sorts of machines that could be made to work with push buttons...

Carl working a machine. He had told me before we came that his dad would bring him and his brother, Steve, to this museum on the day after Thanksgiving -- his dad had that day off from work, and not many other people did. He and his brother just enjoyed pushing the buttons and moving on to the next exhibit -- they asked to return to "the museum with the push buttons".

All of the guys were at different points in the display enjoying pushing buttons to work various different machines!

By this point, it was well after noon, and we were all hungry and a bit tired...

... we headed over to Portillo's for Italian Beef sandwiches.

What a nice day!

What? **Another** Birthday Celebration?!?!?

A couple of weeks ago, Carl's son, Scott, contacted me and let me know that Carl's family wanted to celebrate his birthday on the first evening that all the siblings were in town (for Pamela's elopement party). Carl had wondered why there weren't any plans to get together for his birthday (I said, "Oh, we're staying out at Pine Country, it's a long drive...") and then why there weren't any times that he was invited to be with the family this past Thursday during the day after his kids were all here (I said, "Oh, I'm sure they are just crazy busy over there where everyone is staying..."). I knew that birthday celebration plans were in place, but I couldn't let on.

On Thursday evening, the plan was to get pizza from Roberto's in Elmhurst and to meet at Eldridge Park (a park near where Carl grew up) to have a place for the kids to play and for us all to gather as a family. Scott had texted me and asked that I make sure that Carl didn't get to the park before 5:30pm... he is always one to arrive early, and he really wanted to get together with family -- I didn't think I could keep him away much longer. Daughter Kim and granddaughters were going to ride with us to the park, and I whispered to Kim, "we need to delay!" She said that she was pretty sure that everyone else was getting there early, and we would be fine to head on down.

As it turned out, I had put in "Eldridge Park" in the GPS, and it took us to a different part of the park -- so we didn't end up getting there very early anyway!

When we got there, the kids were all lined up and blowing noise makers -- Carl said that he thought they were there to welcome Kim! Suddenly they were running up to him saying, "Happy Birthday, Papa!" He said, "That was a week ago!" He couldn't believe that they had put together this whole surprise event for him!

The kids had drawn special wishes on the sidewalks.

Unfortunately, at about the time that we got there, the rain that had been threatening started to come down...

We moved under a couple of small structures...

... we were ordering pizza from Roberto's, so we didn't think we'd find a place that would let us bring in food...

... the grands still were enjoying the playground equipment, regardless of the rain.

"Papa! We love you" (in chalk before the rain washed it away!)

Usually, Roberto's will not allow folks who are eating inside to order from their pizza menu, but when Scott and Joel explained the situation (we were at a park, it was raining, birthday, etc.) when they were picking up the 6 large pizzas, Roberto's said that we could sit in their annex tented area! What a blessing, because the rain was starting to pour!

We had two large tables... table 1,

... and table 2.

Kim had flown in on Thursday morning and then baked the Almond Poppy Seed cake that is Carl's favorite. He particularly likes if it has a bit of raw spot in the middle, and this did! There were also chocolate chip cookies!

Scott got to hold Addi for a bit.

Carl's card reminded him of all that happened in 1954.

Carl and his children

Carl and his grand children

Carl and youngest granddaughter Addi

Carl and his brother, Steve

It was so great for Carl to realize that his family had *not* ignored or forgotten his birthday, nor had they been avoiding getting together with him! Happy Birthday (again), Carl!