Indianapolis Trip

Hey guys, I'm back! I got back late last night after a long bus ride. Here are some of the highlights of my week.

Tuesday

We left Springfield at 9:00am and drove until 7:00pm ET. We then checked into our Hilton and ate pizza with the rest of the group. Savannah, Kelsey, our roommate Rebecca, Ladybug, and I went to view the downtown area. It is BEAUTIFUL! I never thought of Indianapolis as a good scenic/tourist location, but I was pleasantly surprised. Some pics are below.

Monument Circle

LtoR: Kelsey, Savannah, Rebecca, Me
Capital from the Monument

Wednesday

We went to walk around the downtown with the big group, and then went to the Historical Society, very cool. I researched my paternal Grandpas name and it came up with a man who in 1920 was 58. While it wasn't my grandpa, he lived in Garden City MO! :O My moms parents live in GC so it was pretty cool to find an unknown connection.
We then headed to the Convention center to register for the Leadership Institute. I was put in 7 classes, with 2 on Wednesday. The topics this day were Deskercize and Spa Day, Everyday. lol they were interesting. Nothing I didn't know anyway. Hey but I did get a massage, it was wonderful!

We ate dinner with the girls at the Institute, and headed to a KeKe Palmer concert. (If you don't know who she is, she is a Disney actress/singer, I didn't know either) It wasn't my style of music, and our seats were not good, and it was cold. But I did get her autograph, lol it goes into my scrapbook.

After the concert they had a girls party with food, music, more spa stuff, and lots of freebies. I was exhausted so we didn't stay very late. Rebecca, Mary, Savannah, Me

Thursday

We went back to the Institute and had 5 more workshops. I had 1 on Domestic Violence Awareness, Safe Dating(whoo hoo...), Stress Address, Obesity Awareness, and one called Hello Beautiful. When we first crowded into the room, the black lady had a red-dreadlocked-mohawk, red eyebrows, a sock on one arm, and one of those large buttons on her ear. I was getting a little concerned...then she started chanting "Girls with no makeup, boys with no clothes!" I got really worried, I was thinking,"How can I get out of this room!?!?" It turned out to be a fairly good workshop on being aware of other girls fears/concerns and how to reach out to find and give help. It was also an eye opener for me, the amount of abuse and fears and enormous burdens girls are carrying is awful.

After we listened to a couple other speakers, the Institute ended. We then headed into the huge exhibit hall, there were tons of booths giving away a bunch of free stuff! I brought home several bags of things, great fun!

We then headed into the opening ceremony of the National Convention. Lots of little girls singing a really annoying song. The session did not end until after 9:00pm, so we didn't get dinner until 10:00. Lol really late, but you can't imagine how packed Steak & Shake was at that time on a Thursday! It took forever, but we ended up getting 1/2 our meals for free because of the wait.

Friday

Because we had been out so late the previous night, we were granted the privilege of sleeping in and we did...til 10. :D Afterwards we went shopping at TJ Max where I got an awesome purse and a pair of boots. We then walked down to a mexican restaurant, got food-to-go, and went to sit of the stairs of Monument Circle. It was beautiful and sunny, very nice!

We yet again returned to the Convention center and spent the rest of the afternoon in the sessions and the Exhibit Hall.

Since it was Halloween, although I do not celebrate it-which by the way was very entertaining to explain to the girls:D-some of the girls were going to go to Haunted Houses. whoo hoo... We ate dinner at the Hard Rock, creepy, and the remaining girls took a carriage ride around the downtown area. We then returned to our hotel room to watch "Mamma Mia". I was not impressed with the movie, no real plot and kinda sad morally. It was well after midnight before we went to bed.

Savannah, Kara, Kelsey

We went up into the observation tower of the monument, cool view!

Saturday

This day we spent more time at the Convention center. Around 3:00 we headed to the mall for more shopping, we then went to the Indiana State Museum, and then to a mexican restaurant that can't even began to compete with El Rodeo.

Rebecca trying to climb up on the Elephant(we didn't see the "Do not Climb" sign until afterwards...) The beautiful Canal and Indianapolis Skyline

Our model Mary, she's so cute!

Sunday

During the closing ceremony I got to hear Geena Davis speak, that was pretty cool. Lol it was defiantly a girl ceremony, I feel sorry for the 10 guys that were there. :D Ok there were more than that, still. Yet more girls singing and it was over. We left the city and headed to a Cracker Barrel where we waited for 30 minutes to get seated. We finally left at 2:45ish. Lol it was funny, I checked the time before we finished a movie. After we had finished the 1st and was halfway through the next, it said the time was 3:00. I was like what?!? 15 minutes!?!? Then I remembered the time zone change. I arrived home at 11:00.

Sorry this is kinda crazy and rambling, it is hard to organize all of the events in my head. I will post some pictures on here, enjoy!

Kara