Building Dreams,Friendships & Memories Part 3

Wheeeeewwww!  I, my fellow chaperones and a majority of the kids have now made it through this trip all the way till December 31, on the amount of sleep most bank in 2.5 nights.  How do they figure they can wake us up?  Toss us all into an amusment park for more FUN!

The weather was California cold! 

We layered up

 (except for our manfriend who sported shorts no matter the weather). 

We rode everything time would allow. 

Which wasn't enough time. 

Of course we did some eating between rides.

  All that eating can give the girls gas.

Nothing was passed in public, just a lot of talk. 

 Our manfriend/ride buddy was slowly becoming one of the girls. 

The only thing he couldn't grasp was our constant need to visit the restroom.  

I made the ride buddies stop for photos with characters

 While we waited in line for the back lot tour

We got some devastating news--an F3 tornado had hit our community.

The text starting rolling in with pictures attached showing the devastating damage.

The night before my father-in-law who lives in Branson was hit. 

 His boat dock was demolished by the twister. 

 Two boats in the slips sunk to the bottom of Table Rock Lake. 

 His house, well the roof got kissed by the fierce winds as well. 

I text my friends who lived in the areas that were affected...

the same area many on the trip live.  

Many of our chaperones and families on the trip depended on their neighbor's

 kind heart to board up their homes--windows blown, roof totally gone. 

King Ralph was enjoying his day off when he was summoned to work.

Princess A and D starting sending me pictures of the city that he protects and serves

downed power lines up and down the main road. 

Sad and scary! 

This is how one of the neighborhoods down the street from the school I work at looks

(ten of the families in the school have been displaced)

there we were on the back lot tour and the

War of Worlds set didn't look much different than our Sunset Hills neighborhood

When you are hundreds of miles away there is nothing you can do but continue on with what you are doing.  The kids knew to call home and if they needed to talk with us we were there to listen.

We just kept on having our Grinchmas fun.

 My favorite ride was 

and

We took one of the other male chaperones on the Mummy. 

We ride buddies rode it twice in a row. 

So the extra had to ride twice.

It made him green...he ditched us after that.  

We found the kids in line behind us on Jurassic Park

 

I snapped a final photo of M and her senior class/band mates

Then it was time to cut the fun short.

It was after all New Years Eve

and

when in California to march in the Rose Parade

you have to celebrate the New Year on New York time

M and her roomies bought these fun glasses

at the Universal gift shop

to ring in the New Year

 

(which they are  planning to wear to graduation--so they say)

Wait, here's a a closer look at the light-up spectacles

Then when the bellies of 208 teenagers

 had been packed with ice cream sundaes

(since there was no bubbly to toast for the adults we too got drunk on the sugared treat) 

 The California clock struck 9pm...

which meant in New York it was midnight...

which meant in the ballroom of the Warner Center Marriott

it too was midnight

and the kids, all 208 of them blew their party horns

and hugged and high fived

You know I am still curious about...how the kid who got a

full comic book character face paint job

at the amusement park got the stuff off.  

Then we sent those sugar charged teens to bed with their alarms set for 330am.

To be continued...