January 9

Woke up about noon today at Claytons. Took us a while to get going, but I wrestled out of bed and drove home. I told them to meet me at my house for lunch at 1, thought we could cook up some grilled cheese or something. By 1 I was dressed and they arrived. We each took our turns making lunch. It was good and I think we had a good time in the kitchen. No one got burnt...so that's a good thing.

Hopped in the car and started our full day of adventures. First on the list was to show them our high school back in Chatham. We circled it and told them some stories then we decided to drive into Springfield and take a walk in Washington park. I parked the car by the golf course and then we got out and explored. The botanical gardens were close so I suggested we take a tour through there. Eh, it kinda sucked haha. They were renovating and only had a handful of plants. It's normally pretty impressive during the summer. We explored the park and made our way to the lake where a woman and her child were feeding the geese and ducks. Hopefully some of those shots turn out.

Up the hill we found a massive playground so we messed around for a while. The swings were fun and I found this big 'fake' rock wall I conquered. This place had a bunch of little contraption I had never seen before, some worked and some sucked haha. Overall it was definitely fun, but our hands got pretty cold. Sometimes I forget it's January. COLD.

We got back to the car and then decided to get coffee or something. We made it downtown, but got distracted by the idea of going in the Capital. So we parked and entered. I think they were impressed by the rotunda and all the colors. Hell I was; haven't seen that in a long time. We left and walked around downtown like last night, but this time most of the shops were open so we shopped and explored. I wanted to show them the inside of the courthouse because I knew my Dad could've given us a tour, but he had a meeting in Peoria. By 5pm everything was closed down and we were freezing so we made it back to the car and drove back to my house for dinner. For dinner we ordered some Chinese from right up the street. 10min later we went to pick it up and said hello to Clayton's dad in the restaurant to the right of it. Small world!

Back at my house dinner was good. My Mom interrogated Caitlin and Karen about my life at college. I think she's just interested how other people tell her what goes on. And that she's just being a Mom. After dinner we didn't know what to do - but later settled on seeing a movie, 'Children of Men'. The movie was definitely intense and graphic, but I loved the interpretation of the future and the long war shots. At the climax, I don't think the director cut the film once for almost 10 min - so impressive.

We stopped for a bucket of ice cream at Meijer and then chilled at my house until sleep. We tried to play a board game, but it failed horribly. I watched a bit of Apple's unveiling of the iPhone. Oh my god...looks so slick. Later we watched a movie and then got to sleep. They said they're going to leave tomorrow at noon, so set the alarm for 11!