I arrived at Lora’s at 7:30 A.M. took Meadow to Easter Seals at 2:00 P.M. came home at 3:30 P.M. to eat dinner and to pack.
We loaded everything we would need for several days into Lora’s Red Truck, loaded the kids, and left her house at 9:P.M. We are traveling to Wheeling, Illinois, staying at the Westin Hotel for The Magic Foundation Convention.
The cost to attend the Convention for Non-members is $160.00 per family and for members $125.00 per family.
The hotel cost is $103.00 per night, and we stayed on Friday and Saturday nights.
MAGIC’s 13th Annual Education Convention is the only program of its kind in the world!
For parents, grandparents, caregivers, and medical professionals & affected children.
About Medical conditions/growth disorders.
When? July 19-22, 2007
Where? Westin Hotel, Wheeling, Il
Sponsored by: The MAGIC Foundation 6645 West North Avenue Oak Park, Illinois 60302.
We traveled 72 east to I-65 north through Nashville, Tennessee, through Louisville, Kentucky, and up into Indiana.
Day 2: Thursday, July 19, 2007
We stopped at a rest stop in India at about 2 P.M. where we slept in the truck until 5 A.M.
I drove for a couple of hours on I-65 north, while Lora and the kids slept.
Lora took over driving around 7A.M. and the kids never woke up.
We stayed on I-65 north until we neared Chicago where we took I-90 north.
We arrived in Chicago, IL, at about 10:30 A.M. and stopped at Grandma's Waffle House for breakfast.
For breakfast, I ordered a pecan waffle with peaches and Cool Whip, Madison ordered blueberry pancakes with coffee, and Marcus ordered a waffle and coffee.
Meadow ate an egg and Lora ordered a waffle with blueberries on the side.
Our bill was $29.95.
We arrived at “Westin Inn” around 12:00 P.M.
The hotel was prepared for the event, there were door attendants everywhere waiting for cabs, cars, or other forms of transportation to help unload the people's luggage and help them carry their luggage upstairs.
Lora went inside and checked us into room 332.
The room had a Heavenly plush king-size bed, a cot, and a crib.
Some of the amenities were: an indoor swimming pool, hot tub, wireless internet, hair dryer, mini bar, iron board and iron, coffee maker, and in-room safe.
The Westin is located on Chicago's north side 601 North Milwaukee Avenue Chicago, Illinois 60090. The telephone number is 847-777-6500.
After we unpacked and were settled in, we all took showers, changed clothes, went downstairs to the conference room where we registered and Lora was given a packet containing all the schedules and highlights for the entire weekend. We are given name badges (which are required) that are color-coded according to the medical condition of that child. Your leader will be wearing the same colored tag as you.
Then we went into the Ballroom / Exhibit Hall where there are display booths set up with information about their products and samples to help our kids.
Booths are manned by professionals who can answer your questions about growth hormones, and the pituitary gland.
I took a survey about growth hormones and the vendor gave me three white towels.
One vendor gave Meadow a giraffe which she threw down.
A picture of Meadow’s face was put on a magnet.
There was a man airbrushing tee shirts with the child’s face and name onto the t-shirt.
Other vendors were giving out pens, pencils, magnets, balloons, and edible treats, there was one doing bobbleheads on DVD.
There were booths for face painting, magicians, and many fun activities for the kids.
Not sure that all the vendors were mentioned.
Lora and I went in two different directions and we each talked to different people about their families.
I talked to an oriental woman named Shirley; she was helping with the conference.
Shirley had one perfectly healthy son.
Shirley was helping greet guests and pass out sombrous to everyone attending the Mexican event on Friday night.
Marcus waited in line to have his picture sketched.
There was food set out on a snack bar and it was full of watermelon, mush melon, cantaloupe, cookies, candies, and several different kinds of drinks.
We all had collected different items from the vendor and everyone started piling them upon Meadow’s stroller.
I asked one of the vendors for several bags to organize the items on Meadow’s stroller.
Lora and the kids went swimming in the indoor pool down on the first floor around 9 P.M.
I gave Meadow and myself a bath, put on our pajamas, and we went to bed.
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| Registration night |
Day 3: Friday, July 20, 2007
Lora paid a chaperone for a Kid’s Day Trip, for Madison and Marcus.
They will be taking a bus to the Lincoln County Zoo for the entire day and will be leaving at 8:30 A.M.
Lora, Meadow, and I went down to the lobby for breakfast where Lora ordered Meadow an egg.
We walked next door to the coffee shop where we ordered an oatmeal cookie, a slice of chocolate cake, a cup of dried fruit, and two glasses of unsweetened tea.
There was no charge for Meadow egg because the restaurant took too long to cook it.
It was a large serving, enough egg that would serve Meadow for several meals.
We were late to the first seminar which started at 9:00 A.M. We arrived closer to 10 A.M. because he had to take Meadow to the DayCare Center.
The seminar was about the pituitary gland which began at 9a.m. and ended at 5 P.M.
The class is an intro to Pituitary speaker is Dr Gaffer
Dr Gaffer also seeks breakouts for congenital and acquired.
The next speaker is Dr. Perry and Dr. Burt Solozano on Intro to Hypothalamus.
The last speaker is Dr Lustig on Emergencies.
Questions & Answers by Dr Gaffer.
We had a lunch break from 12-1p.m. and Lora and I ate outside.
Lora and I split a turkey sandwich and to drink Lora had water and I drank a diet Coke.
The prices were outrageous, candy bars were $2.00, potato chips were $2.00, and it cost $18.00 for one sandwich, two drinks, two candy bars, and two chips.
After the class, we picked up Meadow and headed to the front lobby to wait for Madison and Marcus who had just returned from visiting the Lincoln County Zoo.
At the zoo Marcus bought a gorilla, Madison bought a fan, and both had their faces painted.
Lora took the kids to our room on the third floor to freshen up while I went to a grandparent's meeting that lasted until 7:00 P.M.
After my grandparents meeting, I went to the lobby and waited for Lora and the kids.
The community for The Magic Foundation had prepared a Mexican Fiesta for everyone attending the conference.
We entered the conference room at 7:30 P.M. and each one of us was given a sombrero to wear for the fiesta.
The tables were covered with white tablecloths and we could choose where we sat. We stood in line to choose from the long buffet of many different styles of Mexican dishes that had been prepared.
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| Mexican Fiesta |
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| Mexican Fiesta |
Different groups were doing Mexican shows and Mexican dances.
At the end of the show, a piñata was hung from the ceiling which many children had a chance to hit until the candy started falling onto the floor.
After all that fun Madison and Marcus still wanted to go swimming, I lasted about an hour at the poolside then I took Meadow upstairs and we went to bed.
Day 4: Saturday, July 21, 2007
Lora and the kids slept soundly until 11:30 A.M. but not me I was up, took a shower, and went outside for a morning walk outside the hotel.
I walked along the hotel’s sidewalk trail that led to a garden filled with flowers, shrubs, and a pond that had two fountains of water spurting from the middle. I got several great photos of the hotel from the garden. I walked along the front of the hotel along the highway where I took a picture of a red and white water tower that read WHEELING and I took a picture of the sign that read WESTIN. I walked back inside the hotel and back to our room Meadow was awake by that time so I dressed her.
The Magic Foundation had a silent auction the night before and all bids had to be in before Saturday morning.
Lora bid on a pair of jeans and six pieces of clothing for Meadow and she was the highest bidder on the items she bid on.
I bid on a radio and a paper shredder but was not the top bidder.
Lora bought every one of us a white sweatshirt.
Marcus wore his to bed and spilled coffee on it.
We rode Target for dippers, and snacks and ate lunch at McDonalds.
Then we rode to downtown Chicago to Navy Pier.
We rode to Navy Pier in Downtown Chicago, IL.
We took East Lake Cook Road for 5.5 miles to US-41 for 4.9 miles, to I-94 east for 16.2 miles, we then took the East Ohio Street exit number 50b and turned right onto North Orleans, to left to West Illinois 1.3 we then turned to right onto Grant Avenue and it goes to Navy Pier.
We parked in the Navy Pier parking deck cost $20.00 a day.
A woman greeted us as we entered the Mall and she said we should pay for our parking or vehicle.
Lora paid for parking, and we went looking for a restroom and had to wait fifteen minutes to use it.
In the middle of the mall, there was a show going on it was located just outside of the restrooms and near McDonald's Restaurant.
And we stopped to watch after everyone finished in the restrooms.
We saw a man dressed in a shaggy dog suit wearing a pirate costume and he was dancing around on the stage.
He picked Marcus to come onto the stage and follow him around with the other children.
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| shaggy dog |
We walked into the Children’s Museum gift shop where we rode the elevator to level two to the Children’s Museum where the kids did crafts, worked in the tinkering lab, walked through the skyline, climbed in the treehouse, played in the Allstate Foundation play it safe, dug in the dinosaur expedition, and climbed the wall, made show pictures on a big green screen, played dress up of a grasshopper, butterflies, skunk, they climbed though tunnels and finally they tried to keep a hula hoop around their waist.
We stayed at the Children’s Museum for about two hours.
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| Children’s Museum |
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| Children’s Museum |
Everyone was getting hungry so Lora called Bubba Gumps Shrimp Company to make reservations they said it would be a 40-minute wait.
So we walked over to the largest ferries wheel in the world, which Lora wanted to ride but no one else wanted to ride the ferries wheel.
Meadow was trapped in the blue train car where she rode around several times with three other children.
After the train ride, we purchased tickets for the 6:30 P.M. Skyline Boat Tour.
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| Navy Pier Chicago |
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| Navy Pier Chicago |
We arrived at 4:30 P.M. and were led to a table outside and greeted by a server who asked questions from the movie Forrest Gump.
We ordered Cajun peel and shrimp, and a sampler platter.
Lora and I both ordered unsweetened iced tea.
Madison ordered a peanut butter smoothie, and Marcus ordered a smoothie.
The peeling and eating of shrimp was very messy, I think we used a roll of paper towels.
Our server asked us some more questions about the movie Forest Gump.
One of the questions he asked was, which leg did Captain Dan lose?
I replied he lost both legs.
Another question he asked was about the Hurricane, none of us knew the answer.
The cost of our meal was 49.00 dollars I paid $40.00.
At 7:00 P.M. we took the Skyline Boat Tour on the Shoreline Boat, Meadow and I rode upstairs, and Lora and the kids sat up front but later moved downstairs.
The cost for adults was $15.00, for children $6.00, and no charge for Meadow.
As we were leaving on the Shoreline boat floating out into Lake Michigan we could see a panorama view of Chicago and the Sears Tower. We passed a water taxi, a lighthouse, and a chartered boat, we could see the lights from the ferry's wheel as it turned and many people sitting along the pier dining.
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| Skyline Boat Tour on the Shoreline Boat |
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| Lighthouse |
Sitting behind was a couple that had come with a church group, Jamie and Donna Root.
They were with the “AWANA because kids matter to God.”
She gave me her business card that read:
Jamie and Donna Root Missionary Appointees 417-777-6178 jdroot@alltel.net 670 North Russell Avenue Bolivar, Mo. 65613-3367
Sitting next to me was a woman named Sandy, she said that Meadow was a very special little girl and God gave special children to special people and Meadow held her hand for thirty minutes.
Meadow looked up at me with her loving smile and with those loving big brown eyes “ like she was saying Granny I love you and kiss me.”
Sandy said our family moved to Chicago when our children were little and they could still remember their lives in Georgia.
They could also remember growing up in Chicago with the bitter cold winters, snow everywhere and enough for them to ski, and frozen lakes where they could ice skate.
Sandy and her husband were with a church group of about 40 non-domination Christians.
When the ride ended we said goodbye and went back inside Navy Pier Mall.
We walked back to the stage of the pirate boat where we watched a show called “The Box Tiger Man.”
He was a dark-skinned man dressed in a yellow and black striped tiger suit.
The lanky man took on the shape of the tiger as he bent down, curling his body into a ball climbing into a square box and closing the lid.
He was amazing to watch!
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| “The Box Tiger Man.” |
We went to the Amazing Chicago Funhouse MAZE it was tons of fun inside.
This is the city's first full sensory funhouse and maze.
During our 15-minute walk, we navigated our way through 4,00 square feet of exhilarating mirrors mazes, and tunnels, which were set in a twisted Chicago landscape.
I pushed Meadow in her stroller once and Lora went threw two times while the kids went through three times.
The cost for the Family package for the MAZE was $29.95, you could walk through as many times as you wanted to.
We ended the day by walking through the Richard Driehaus Gallery of Stained Glass, admission is free to the public.
- There are eleven Tiffany Studio’s stained glass windows which are breathtaking.
- We saw an 1890 three-panel window of Christ and the Apostles.
- We saw an 1890 three-panel blue, green window of ecclesiastical yellow Angels holding a torch.
- We saw 1910 Landscape hues of green, red, and blue.
- We saw 1910 Fields of Lilies where a woman dressed in a green, yellow, and purple robe with her hand crossed across her chest standing in a field of lilies. Hues of orange, blue, yellow, green.
- We saw an 1890 Girl with long red hair surrounded by Cherry blossoms. Hues of yellow, green, and red.
- We saw an 1890 guiding angel with a large on his back guiding a young woman with hues of yellow, green, blue, and red.
- We saw a 1920s Landscape with a waterfall with hues of red, green blue, and yellow. Blue-green water flowing with red flowers blooming and grapes hanging from above with blue-green sky and yellow clouds.
- We saw to the left the annunciation window and an angelic being holding a rod. Hues of yellow, green, blue, and red, and to the right we saw the annunciation window woman with her hands crossed across her chest and feeling a bible placed on a table next to her.
- We saw The Nativity 1910. Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus. Hues of blue, red, green, and yellow
- We saw the Edward Brooks Memorial window in 1892, an angel leading in singing, Peace on earth good will toward men.
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| Tiffany Studio’s stained glass windows |
There was another show going on outside the stained glass museum so we stopped for a few minutes.
Lora’s friend Michelle, was waiting for her back at the Westin Hotel.
We missed the 10:00 P.M. fireworks show at Navy Pier.
When we got back to the hotel the kids put on their swimsuits and went downstairs to the swimming pool where we stayed until 11:30 P.M.
When the kids finished swimming we went upstairs and we all went to bed.
Lora and Michelle went to one of the restaurants inside the hotel and talked until 1:30 A.M. in the morning.
Day 5: Sunday, July 22, 2007
Everyone slept late because we all stayed up late the night before.
We checked out right before 12P.M.
We called for a bellhop to help us with the luggage.
We checked out loaded the truck with all our belongings and rode to Burger King for lunch.
The Magic Foundation had arranged for everyone who had attended the conference to go to the Wheeling Aquatic Park Center for a free day of fun.
Lora and the kids went down the tube, Meadow and I played in the swimming pool.
Wheeling Aquatic Park Center is located at 327 West Dundee Road Wheeling, Illinois 60090 and the telephone number is 847-465-7665.
It is an outdoor aquatic center with amenities:
Volcano Valley has tube and body slides, the Paradise Falls has two drop falls.
Willie the Whale has a toddler slide, and there are lap lanes in the swimming pool.
Kana Courts have sand volleyball, a Grassy area for tanning,
Willies Coconut Café for food, a picnic area for eating, and a diving board, aloha beach has zero depth in the entry of the main pool.
Kerki Island has a sand play area, locker rooms, and lockers for storing valuables.
Tsunami Splash has a water playground with tipping buckets.
Lily pad lagoon has a splash pool with water basketball and a monkey bar activity pad.
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| Wheeling Aquatic Park Center |
We stayed at the aquatic center until 4:30 P.M.
Lora then drove us to downtown Chicago to tour the Sears Tower “sky deck”.
The Sears Tower was finished on May 3, 1973, and was the tallest skyscraper in the World until 1996.
It is still the tallest skyscraper in the Western Hemisphere and was sold in 1997 to Toronto-based Trizerhahn for 804 million dollars.
It has bronze tinted glass and stainless aluminum because of 911 there were a lot of security and uneasy workers in the Sears Tower.
You can see most of Chicago from every angle from the top lever and there are 103 stories to the top.
We took many pictures it was an AWSOM view.
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| Sears Tower |
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| View from the Sears Tower |
We walked to Giordano’s Pizzeria, which was just across the street from the Sear Tower.
We had to wait 40 minutes for a table and another 40 minutes for our food.
We ordered a deep dish stuffed medium pizza with sausage, pepperoni, and mozzarella cheese and covered in marinara sauce the pizza was as thick as the size of a medium cake.
Madison enjoyed the stinging mozzarella cheese.
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| Giordano’s Pizzeria |
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| Giordano’s Pizzeria |
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| Giordano’s Pizzeria |
Articles about Giordano’s: Today Shows said,” best pizza in America.”
Fox Chicago: “Giordano’s deep dish is by far the best pizza in Chicago”.
The New York Times said, “The ultimate pizza”.
Efren Boglio said, “My brother and I both own and cook for Giordano’s we opened in 1974 in Chicago just across the street from the street from Sears Tower.”
Lora drove us out of downtown Chicago leaving about 9:00 P.M. I took over driving for several hours.
Everyone fell asleep except me and when I got sleepy we stopped at a Motel 8 somewhere in
Louisville, Indiana near I-70E.
We were so sleepy that we did not ever inspect the room which we should have because the beds were falling apart.
I guess that does not matter when you are too sleepy to drive.
It was late I was very sleepy and drove seven miles in the wrong direction.
Day 6: Monday, July 23, 2007
The next morning we loaded up the truck, stopping the eat breakfast at Cracker Barrel.
To break up the monotony of driving we stopped at Mammoth Cave National Park in Bowling Green Kentucky where Lora and the older kids tour the cave.
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| Mammoth Cave National Park in Bowling Green Kentucky |
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| Mammoth Cave National Park in Bowling Green Kentucky |
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| Mammoth Cave National Park in Bowling Green Kentucky |
People in strollers or wheelchairs could not go inside because of the many steps that led down into the cave.
I had visited the cave before so I stayed behind with Meadow.
Meadow and I crossed a bridge that led us up a path to the Mammoth Cave Hotel, and then we took a paved trail to the right passing the lodge, at the fork we took a left which took us to the Old Guides Cemetery which graves dating back to 1842.
Two historic markers along the fence surrounded the gravesite.
Old Guilds Cemetery and the other sign read World Treasure Saved.
I walked a little further down the paved trial pushing Meadow in her stroller until we came up with a sign that read River Styx Springs .6 m, and below was written Echo River Springs 1.3 m.
I pushed Meadow back to the museum where we met up with Lora and the kids.
It was getting late when we stopped for supper at Logan’s in Brentwood, Tennessee.
We arrived home at 11:00 P.M.
