Recipe for Disaster - Almost!
Gherkin and I spent part of Valentines day making these cute cards for the ladies at our lunch group. He loved having the paint on his hands and was more than willing to spread it all over the world!
After all the excitement of lunch with the ladies, leftovers with Mom & Big D (gee what a romantic Valentines - just wait it gets better) Gherkin helped us pack for our trip to Ithaca. He has found that if Big D moves his work shirts he has a great vantage point from the shelves to pull down more ties.
So now for the reason for the trip. Big D, as the advisor of the Asian Pacific Islander Club (Council, whatever it is now) at the Academy, was asked to go to the ECAASU conference at Cornell University. Now first of all I can't quite figure out the point to the town of Ithaca, it's a two college town in the middle (yes middle) of nowhere! 6 hours of driving later we were there. We left after dinner in the hopes that the Gherkin would sleep for the trip and then contine sleeping once we got there...DREAM ON! Once we arrived at 1AM Gherkin decided that unless he was in constant motion/being held he did not need to sleep. He finally crashed around 3:30.
The next morning Big D slept in while I played with Gherkin and got breakfast done. At 10 Big D took Gherkin to the pool. *Lesson 1 - Never believe when the hotel says they have a heated pool...pool yes, heated no. They contined to play in the lobby (I'm sure the staff loved that) while I took a nap. Big D headed off to the conference in the afternoon and Gherkin and I wandered to the library. *Lesson 2 - Always check the library hours before going...we left at 4:45 to go to the library... it closed at 5. Not to mention the fact that it was snowing. We continued on our little journey through town and found a great toy store. We found a set of Boomwhackers. I have been trying to find a set for a while, begged for them for birthdays/holidays to no avail. Sometimes a woman must take things into her own hands! 
Gherkin thinks they are the best thing since buttered toast. He actually cried when I had him put them away the first night. That night we learned the biggest lesson of them all.
*Lesson 3 - When attending a conference, primarly for college students, don't register in the suggested hotel (even if it is a good deal) you will have screaming, running, yelling college students in the hall from 11:30-4 AM. Don't bother trying to sleep!
The next day we checked out of the hotel, got lost finding the university (should have turned on the GPS sooner) and went to the Sciencenter. WAY COOL! Maybe even a reason to drive 6 hours into the middle of nowhere.
As usual Gherkin had a blast with the water.
They had a special area for kids under 4, so he wasn't getting trampled by the big kids, though he did enjoy some of the larger science experiments as well.
He of course had to check out the train, he hasn't quite figured them out yet though.
At nap time we headed back up to Cornell because it was almost time to hear Big D speak!
Big D did very well and he enjoyed listening to the rest of the speakers while Gherkin and I did laps around the auditorum waiting for it all to be over. A quick photo op with the cadets who attended, dinner and off to home!
It's a good thing this all took place over President's weekend so we had Monday to recover!
Lessons learned, some fun had, and just another adventure to chalk up to completion.
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