Wheeler Farm & Splore

Saturday was packed full of fun...Owen's party was that morning, and then that afternoon my mom came down. We hadn't seen her for about a month (since she's been helping to take care of her parents), so it was nice to see her. While Lincoln was napping we took Noah to Wheeler Farm. While we were there, he sat on a tractor...

...and on a horse saddle. Here he is giving a loud "yeeeehaw"!

Cool cowboy.

We brought two cars since I had to leave early to come home and get ready for an event that night. So, my mom stayed with Noah for another hour or so and played. She told me later that when he figured out that it was time to leave that he kept running away and up into this playhouse where she couldn't come after him. Turkey.

My mom watched our boys during the event we attended that night (thanks so much, Mom!). The event was a benefit, held at the Fine Arts Museum, for an organization called splore. Splore is a local non-profit that provides recreation programs for people of various ability levels (meaning people with and without physical or mental disabilities). My friend Claire was able to go on a rafting trip of splore's and was enthused about their cause, so as we were winding down working on the Ebony & Ivory Gala this summer - she started working on this event. She ended up taking on most of the event herself (as a volunteer), and her mom kindly came to her rescue and moved in for a few weeks to help with the kids and things at the house as Claire put in 50+ hours a week of volunteer work for this event. I explain all that for a couple of reasons. One, because although I did volunteer several hours of my time to package items for the live and silent auction, it was nothing compared to the time that Claire spent on the event. So, even though I was excited to attend the event (since I knew it would be fun and to see the fruits of some of my labors), I was also anxious to go as support for my friend who had poured herself into this event.

Here is a photo of Claire and her husband Ryan at the event. Claire is always super resistant to having her picture taken, so I insisted that she had to that night...both because she looked so pretty, and also because I feel like it's important to document aspects of your life that occupy your time and your passion - and this was one of those for her! The event was fantastic, Claire - so hip, hip hooray for you...they really could never have pulled an event of that caliber off without you.

Tickets to the event were sold at $65.00 per seat, and Mark & I were lucky enough to have somebody sponsor our seats! They wanted to donate to the event, but couldn't attend - so we were able to. We sat with a couple that recently moved to Utah for the husband's (Darren's) cardiothoracic residency. Sarah is actually a practicing physician herself (they met in med school). We enjoyed sitting next to them at the dinner and had fun getting to know them better.

I didn't take any pictures of the meal (which was delicious), but I did take this photo of the dessert. How cute is this? Chocolate canoes and paddles with chocolate mousse (and the blue "water" was even a tasty berry sauce). The dinners were an eclectic combination of things cooked in actual dutch ovens - stew, macaroni & cheese, spicy shrimp, chicken gumbo, etc. Very unique and really delicious.

The entertainment for the event (besides the silent and live auctions, which I thought were a ton of fun) was provided by Rosi Galan. She is an up and coming star who lives in New York, but is spending a good amount of time traveling and touring right now to promote her music. Her music has been featured on such shows as "Grey's Anatomy", "The Practice", "One Tree Hill", and the film "The Notebook". I'll be honest that I hadn't heard about her until through Claire while working on the event, but I think that she's really great. I enjoyed her show, and was even a big enough of a nerd to ask to get my picture taken with her afterward.
Not only was the event a great success down to the little details of the table centerpieces, but it was a financial success as well (which I'm sure goes hand in hand). It was the most successful Harvest Moon benefit that they've ever held (per guests & staff alike) over the 27 years that they've hosted it! So, hurray for that too!...now, splore, I really think that you should offer Claire one of your paid positions :)