Dear Evan,
I arrived in Lansing today. Thank you for packing me so well. I had a nice trip. Kendrick is my new friend. He helped me to get out of the envelope. He was so excited to see me!
At Home
The first thing we did was start rocking out some tunes on the guitar at my new temporary residence.
Later Kendrick and his sister Rosalie and their dad Sam took us on the "Flat Stanley tour bus."
MSU 4-H Children's Garden
We first tried to visit the Butterfly house at Michigan State University, but sadly it was already closed for the day but we had fun in the MSU 4-H Children's Garden.
Do you see the bridge back there? It's supposed to look like the bridge and pond in some of Monet's paintings.
He was a French painter who liked to do a lot of paintings of nature. His paintings were called "impressionist" because he painted how things made him feel or appear.
He, and the other impressionist painters, did not paint to make something look like a photograph where the picture looks exactly like the thing being painted.
Eeks! Do you know how spiders keep from getting stuck in their own web? I'm really glad this web is not sticky.
I rode a sheep! I am glad that I am here and not with the Sheep in the Jeep. This is a much smoother ride.
Rock kid meet Paper kid. Has anybody seen Scissor kid?
Hey, we did get to see a butterfly after all! I guess Rosalie really likes butterflies.
Mmm...smell the tulips!
I'm king of the world!
Downtown Lansing - City Hall
Then our crew "motored on down" to downtown Lansing to meet Kendrick's and Rosalie's mom Melissa. Lansing was called a motor city like Detroit since both places have made cars for a long long time.
Melissa told me that your great great Aunt Cia's (married to Great Grandpa Roth's brother Chuck) uncle sold some property in Lansing to R. E. Olds to start his car factory in Lansing. Have you ever heard of an Oldsmobile car? Guess who it is named after?
So here we are in front of City Hall where we met Melissa. She was just leaving City Hall where she participated in the city council meeting. I guess it was kind of a silly meeting. The adults were acting funny there.
The mayor's office is in the Lansing City Hall right behind us.
Melissa tells me that your Great Great Grandpa Roth was mayor of your town. Do you know where his office was? Can you find this building in your town? Once you find this building, can you figure out where Great Grandpa might have eaten his lunch?Lansing City Hall is right next to one of the five police buildings in the city.
Melissa tells me that the city is considering consolidating the five building into one to help save money. That was one of the things they talked about at the City Council meeting tonight.
There is also an informative sign in front of the City Hall building to help me learn about the city of Lansing. Did you know Lansing was platted in 1847 as the state capital and at that time it was still quite the wilderness. Do you know who was president at that time?
Gee, from what I read it looks like I could have been visiting a place called Pewanogowink, Swedenborg, or El Dorado instead of Lansing!
While we were at City Hall we met some of the family's favorite security guards. They know Sam very well since he visits City Hall for his job, and Melissa, Sam and Kendrick go there for various city meetings.
These guys are very nice and they also help to keep people safe. They look through all our bags and stuff when we visit and make sure we don't have anything dangerous with us that could hurt anybody.
Rosalie tells me that she found out from the nice security guys that she can't bring her safety scissors to meetings here. I guess they are considered weapons. I would agree with that. They can really do a lot of damage to a paper kid!
While I was at City Hall I decided to give a speech. There weren't too many people there to attend my press conference though. Too bad. I was hoping someone would give me a key to the city.
Downtown Lansing - State Capitol
From there, we visited some historic sites, including the State Capitol. It sure is big and beautiful. Do you know who designed it? The architect made capital building for three other states. Can you find the two that look like this one?
Downtown Lansing - Comerica Bank
We also visited the very old but beautiful and gold-trimmed majestic Comerica Bank (where Melissa temped for a summer). Kendrick and Rosalie pretended to withdraw money from the ATM. We all said "hi" to the security cameras.
Here are some of the art deco style details.
Moon over Lansing
I looked at the beautiful moon in the sky amidst the tall buildings downtown as it turned to night. Brr. It's a little bit chilly. I should have packed a coat.
Then I went with everyone to the downtown Library to help return books.
After that we went home. I was pretty tired. But it was a good day! More later.
Love,
Stanley
Sounds like a great, and busy day!
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