No awards today at the state science fair for Hayley but it was a really great experience! During one of her five judges’ interviews, a judge told her that she swam regularly at the lake beach that Hayley’s research showed was contaminated and that she didn’t think she’d go back there. I told Hayley that’s far better than any award – she did research that impacted someone’s choices in the real world.
Between making honor roll this quarter and all the hard work on this project through three rounds of competition (school, regional and state), we are just so proud of her. I mean its pretty darn impressive to make it all the way to the state level! A lot of the competitors were homeschooled or private school kids who do this as part of their curriculum, where Hayley (and the other two from her school) did it voluntarily, on their own time.
Friday check-in at Meredith College:
Her friends came along before we took them to dinner and the Hunger Games:
Chilling at Meredith’s student center before interviews:
The three kids from Salem Middle who made it to States:
In 2008 I posted about how funny I thought Leslie Hall was. She’d been an internet sensation with her hysterical Gem Sweaters Museum. CNN, Wired and others did stories on her fantastic band, Leslie & the Lys and their videos. (Now the humor of Leslie reaches even further that she’s regularly on the popular kids show Yo Gabba Gabba.)
A year later I happened to notice the band was playing in Chapel Hill and of course Hayley and I had to see that show. Not only did we catch the show, we got to meet Leslie afterwards. When they swung through in 2010, managed to visit with the band a bit before and after the show. I emailed with them every so often and Leslie even called Hayley on her 13th birthday.
This year, the band was back on tour again with opening acts Pennyhawk and Ramona & the Swimsuits. Since NC was about midway on their tour, they sent seven boxes of extra supplies to our house to resupply them. We loaded it all up in the jeep as lots of vegan goodies for the band and headed for their show. We hung out with them for about an hour before the show, helped unpack “merch”, Hayley got on stage to help with sound check and shared makeup with the band. They even hooked us up with tshirts. It was like we were roadies!
They knew we weren’t going to stay for the whole show since it was a school night so after the opening acts but before they went on, they got us from the audience and we took photos up in the dressing rooms. Then they brought Hayley up to dance on stage for a song. Both were unbelievably nice gestures.
Such a fun night!
More photos from this set: Regular view (easiest to find one in particular or print) Slideshow view (easiest to see them all)
This year, the band was back on tour again with opening acts 
