Grad Nite and Garden

Verb Chaperones do DisneyLand

Circa 3am

In our kitchen, we have a bucket list of things to see and do in LA. We’ve managed to cross many things off the list, but I always assumed that one thing would evade us: Disney Land. Disney is expensive, and we would spend an entire month’s stipend on just one trip. But Disney is magical, right? The magic happened for me one day a couple weeks ago when Verb’s senior class moderator popped her head in my office and asked me to join her, Zach, and Julie in chaperoning Grad Nite 2011. 

Unbeknownst to me, Grad Nite is Disney’s annual program to open the park – overnight – to graduating high school seniors from, well, everywhere. Along with our 40-odd students, we departed Verb at 10pm last Thursday evening. Sometime after midnight we finally entered the park. For six hours, we dodged crowds of teenagers and dance floors and made our way through the rides in the park. It was BLAST. I think we had more fun than many kids and definitely had more fun than most chaperones. WE enjoyed the free food in the chaperone dining area, and noted that we were all probably closer in age to the students than to the majority of the teachers and parents who were spending their precious sleeping time at Disney.  By 4:30 am when we emerged from Indiana Jones, the park had essentially cleared out, leaving us to run – literally – around at will and enjoy the attractions.

Urban Compass garden!

This week I was also lucky to spend some quality time with my good friend Matt from BC. He lives just outside LA and is home for the summer after studying abroad. He volunteered at Urban Compass in the afternoon when we were working on our garden (see pictures) and joined us at DK for dinner. On Saturday, Zach and his girlfriend who was in town joined me on a little trip out to Matt’s neck of the woods. We hiked Mt. Potato which is right near his house and actually found a potato at the top! No joke. Then Matt took us on a tour of the Claremont Colleges (beautiful) and his town AND hosted a little BBQ for us! It was great. I’m excited he’ll be around this summer!