Keeping Up With The Smiths

This is What Happens after Two All-Day Meetings

2011-02-16T11:45:00.001-05:00

I've always been a doodle-er.

A New Room!

2010-07-25T15:58:00.011-05:00

R and T used to share rooms, but now they don't. They each have their very own rooms. Each was given a budget ($100, but was supplemented a bit) to decorate their rooms any way they wanted to. Today's blog is about T's room.

He is very proud of his room and is very comfortable in it. I love his sense of style -- and he has a definite sense of style. He is quite sure about what he wants and what he doesn't. I've shopped with him on-line and off quite a bit and I have a pretty good feeling for what he's going to like. He likes clean, modern lines. Nothing old fashioned, nothing with too much going on. But he does like bright colors. I took a bunch of pictures so you can see what I mean.

First, his wall color. It's orange. Really, really orange. I was opposed at first and tried to convince him to just have an accent wall of orange. But, if you've ever tried to convince T of something, you know that this didn't work out so well (especially if you initially told him that he could do whatever he wanted in his room!) He paid for the first gallon of paint out of his 100 bucks, and M and I paid for the second gallon when the first coat didn't cover up the previous color so well. (By the way, T is in M's old office. M moved his office to the basement.)

I still am having trouble uploading images that I have rotated, so you'll have to tilt your head to the side to see this one correctly. T picked out the bedding at Target and immediately fell in love with it. He loves how it incorporates his nice orange color "without being too girly" like some of the other orange-ish comforters. Notice the nice poster on the wall? That's a $12 IKEA purchase from when we went to Chicago a couple of weeks ago.

T picked out the lovely bright green curtains to compliment his walls and comforter set. I just love these bright colors. He got the curtains out of his budget, but supplemented it to get the cute black mini-papazon chair. He just discovered the green blanket in our garage this morning that he draped over the chair before our photo session. In the corner is that tall Japanese light that he got at IKEA for something like nine bucks. The boy knows how to work a budget.

M and I bought him the dresser. This was a garage sale find, after many, many garage sales. This is a good example of the clean lines that he likes. He bought the Beatles poster online. He was just going to pin it to the wall because he ran out of money, but I wanted it framed to look like art and to protect it, so I popped for the frame. The light fixture on the dresser was back in a corner in his old playroom, and was never used. He was pretty stoked to find it.

Tilt your head for viewing...Finally, his storage unit. M and I were going to buy each boy a bookcase, but T wanted this cube unit, so this replaces his bookcase. You'll see the caricature of him fencing that he bought at an amusement park as well as his prized pine wood derby trophies (right next to his big jar of plastic army men). His school supplies for the fall are in the bottom right corner. I have no idea what's in the colorful boxes because I didn't look.

Here he is in his favorite corner. You may notice notice the electric guitar. He saved up his money (most of it from a garage sale that he had) and bought it with his own money. I'm trying to arrange lessons for him that will start soon. I mentioned that his shirt matched his room. He said that he didn't plan to match, but it would look good on the blog.

T paid attention to every detail, including his alarm clock. He picked this one out because of the black and white art on it. The design is a replaceable card that can be exchanged with four different prints that came with it.

Despite his grownup room and his great sense of design, it's good to remember that he's still a kid, or a "tween" as he likes to call himself.

Poetry Slam Finalist - The Poem

2010-05-27T20:17:00.005-05:00

Here's the poem that R recited at his Poetry Slam, in which he was a finalist.

Iron Chef America

Iron Chef America,

You really can't be serious

The secret ingredient isn't sooo mysterious.

Iron Chef America,

I really don't care

For the Chairman's flipping out

In his sleek black wear.

Iron Chef America,

It's really kind of freaky

How all of your judges

Are all so food-geeky.

Iron Chef America,

What's wrong with this world?

You make cooking so bizarre, twisted, and swirled.

Although he makes fun of this show, it's one that he really likes. He even records it each week. He loves the competition and the interesting dishes. (He does think, however, that the Chairman is a bit dramatic...and he can't believe that there are so many non-chef, cooking experts in the world to judge.) If you've never watched Iron Chef, you should check it out....and think of R.

Haiku Time

2010-05-19T06:51:00.000-05:00

If you recall, when R was in 3rd grade, he studied haikus and we had a little poetry slam here http://keepingupwiththesmiths.blogspot.com/2007/04/spring-haiku.html on my blog. Well, T is at that point in his education too. Here is his haiku:

The Sea

Dolphins jump and play

Sting Rays gracefully glide by

Pretty coral reefs

So, your assignment is to write a haiku in my comments section. Go for it. It's fun !

Mother's Day Poem

2010-05-11T18:46:00.002-05:00

The boys baked a frittata using a recipe that they found in R's Star Wars cook book. They were so cute, working together. They didn't need any help from M or me. They're growing up so fast!

We're going to see a BNL concert this week, which is my mother's day gift and M's father's day gift. They boys get to go with us - luckys!

T wrote this at school for me for Mother's Day:

M most pretty
O outstanding in every way
T talented at everything
H honestly fun
E exciting
R really cool
S smart

D de best (you gotta love his creativity on this one!)
A awesome
Y you are great!

Blue and Gold 2010

2010-03-05T20:15:00.006-05:00

Last Sunday was the Blue and Gold dinner for our Cub Scout pack. This is held every February to celebrate the birthday of Boy Scouts in the USA. We also give awards to the boys who have earned them and "cross over" our older boys to be Boy Scouts (from Cub Scouts.) This was a big day for boy R and T, especially for R because he got some very special awards.

Gramma and Grampa Smith drove in, as did Uncle D, Uncle D, and Aunt J.

R called the color guard, but I couldn't get a good picture of him. Here are the boys in his den saluting the flag.

T also got some awards -- silver arrow points, his bear badge, and six belt loops. We're so proud of him!

R was one of three (very serious) boys who got a very special award. It's called the Super Achiever award and is given to Webelos who have earned all 20 Webelos pins. What an achievement -- one that took them two years to complete.

R also received an award that has not been given out in over a decade in our pack -- simply because no boy had ever earned it. It's called the God and Me award. R worked with our pastor and had weekly homework over the first semester this year. That's Pastor Matt giving him the award. It's pretty cool and looks like a medal. R also gets to wear a special patch on his Boy Scout uniform and as an adult (if he helps out in scouting when he grows up) signifying his hard work.

During the Arrow of Light ceremony, moms and dad were asked to stand behind thier Webelos. That's the top of my head that you can see behind ever-growing R. Notice that neat wood Arrow of Light candle holder? M made that a couple of days before the ceremony. He's handy with wood like that!

Then the cross-over ceremony began. M asked the Boys Scouts to do the full-blown Native American ceremony. The Boy Scouts walked in to drums - it was cool. They then put blue and gold "war paint" on each boy. The blue is for virtue and the blue sky and the gold was for the sun, warmth, and loyalty.

Then R waited his turn on the bridge to cross over.

On the other side of the bridge were the Boy Scout adult leaders, ready to give him the Boy Scout neckerchief and the Boy Scout handbook. Conrats big guy! We're so proud of you!

Uriah Jones

2010-03-05T19:44:00.006-05:00

During Black History month (February) T had to design a cereal box that featured a famous African American. He had to research his person on the internet and then design a box that told of the person's accomplishments.

Since T is into fencing, he chose Uriah Jones, an olympic fencer. Here he poses with his creation. Notice the big white foil (sword) going across the whole box with a small picture of Uriah Jones in the middle. I like the graphic way that T did Uriah's name on the box.

This is part of the back of the box with T's summary on it.

T also did a timeline of his life on the side of the cereal box.

Good job on a neat project, T!

Viking Ship

2010-02-28T08:20:00.001-05:00

T studied the Vikings in Social Studies and had to replicate a Viking Ship as a class project. He had fun with his dad making the ship. Here, it's almost finished. He just has some clips holding the shields onto the side of the ship. T wanted me to tell you that the ship has nothing to do with Cub Scouts. He was just working on it before a scout meeting, so he had his shirt on. Of course you noted that T is growing his hair out. My rule is that I need to be able to see his eyes. M's rule is that it needs to look neat. We'll see how it goes...

2010-02-26T08:00:00.002-05:00

T spent about an hour creating the "tablescape" as he called it, for our Valentine dinner. He even polished the silver platter that the candles are sitting on. He was very proud, and I was too.

M hired R and T to be our waiters for Valentines dinner last week. M did the cooking (fabulous!) Both boys got dressed up and served us dinner. R explained what we were eating: "You will be having a tri-tip steak marinated nicely. You'll also be having warm dinner rolls and twice baked potatoes. For your wine, I am happy to serve you a 2006 zinfindel, which I think you will enjoy."

What an awesome dinner.

Sorry for the sideways picture, I'm having a terrible time getting them to stay rotated when I import them to blogger!

By the way, Today is T's birthday -- 9 years old! Happy Birthday!

Snuggle Buddies

2010-02-23T09:00:00.001-05:00

The other night I found Mackinaw sleeping on her blanket with her head snuggled with her pet teddy bear. Too cute, huh? She opened her eyes when the flash went off, but didn't move. She just closed her eyes and went back to sleep.

Skating on Gramma's Lake

2010-02-21T13:05:00.010-05:00

Let's get caught up a bit, shall we?

During the first part of our Christmas vacation, we had a nice visit at Gramma and Grampa Smith's house. Fortunately for the kids, they have a lovely lake that was nicely frozen over. M took the snow blower and made a nice rink for T and R to skate on. R helped with the snow blowing too. He could go really fast because he had skates on.

T, who hasn't skated for more than a year, did really well. He loved being out on the ice outside without a bunch of other people around.

Of course, R had a great time too; being on ice is second nature for him since he's been skating for five years. They had a great time for nearly two hours on their own when good old uncle D showed up to join in the fun.

Uncle D and R played a little one on one. Forgive the fuzziness, I guess I didn't capture the action shot that well, but you get the picture.

After playing hockey for a bit, all three of them skated around the lake and continued to play until it was nearly dark. They were out there for over six hours before they came in for some hot chocolate. What a great day!

Let the Snow Days Begin

2009-12-11T21:00:00.002-05:00

10:00pm Wednesday night:
Blizzard and gale warnings for our home town.

6:00 AM Thursday morning:
Phone call from the school saying it was a "snow day"

6:30 AM Thursday morning:
I see T rushing in the house with his pj and boots on, carrying a ruler: "Mom, we got eight inches of snow last night. I measured in three places, not counting near the house. 'Cause it's warmer near the house and all the snow doesn't stick -- there's only six inches there."

The beginning of a great day.

November in a Nutshell - H1N1 Attack and a New Sport

2009-11-17T17:53:00.006-05:00

That H1N1 virus grabbed a hold of my family. Everyone except T got it. R had it for four days; I had it for 7 days; and M had it forever, then got pneumonia plus another virus on top of that. He's been sick for five weeks. M was feeling a bit better last Saturday -- he was almost like himself. He was so excited to feel better that he volunteered with the Cub Scouts and went to church with us. It was great! The bummer was that the next day, he felt totally cruddy again! So, he's recouping again and will hopefully feel better soon!

R is having fun with hockey and has his first game on Saturday. Hopefully he can play. You see, the poor boy has a sore back. His back has been hurting on and off for about eight months or so. We've been taking him to a chiropractor for three months now. X-rays show a misalignment in his lower-middle back and his neck. His neck is a lot better and we expected to see progress on his back by now. He was in so much pain yesterday that he was in tears when M picked him up from school. So, we kept him home from school today, got him a massage and adjustment. He also has a MRI appointment on Friday and an appointment with the pediatrician tomorrow. We need a referral from the pediatrician to see a specialist, so we're getting that going. Please keep this poor boy in your prayers.

It isn't ALL pain and sickness, though. About four weeks ago, both boys were honored at school. They each, individually, were given the Moral Focus Award for the month by their teachers. Each teacher gives one award per month. This month's moral focus is Wisdom. I'm so proud of them! Also, we had parent-teacher night and saw that both boys are getting nearly all A's (one B each.) Not bad at all! All that we ask is that they do their best in school. And they definitely are doing their best.

Another new thing going on in our house is that T has a new sport. He's taken up lacrosse. I know, strange sport. The only thing that I associated with lacrosse before a month ago was the polo shirts! He has practice every Thursday and loves it! Here he is all in his gear, giving me a fashion show in the kitchen.

I don't know if you've ever seen lacrosse in action, but it's quite physical...almost like football, but with sticks. I can assure you that I didn't realize the physicality of the sport before we signed him up for it. I pictured something that sophisticated, rich people played, after which they had a spot of tea. Anyway, he's just learning the skills right now -- like how to catch a ball with a basket on the end of a stick. He loves it!

Dances With Squirrels

2009-10-13T08:37:00.000-05:00

There are a few things that really drive our dog crazy. Specifically, I'm talking about the Lady with the Schnauzer (or probably just the Schnauzer itself) who walks past our house four times a day (twice up and twice back); then there are the deer; and finally, in the Fall, her arch-rivals, the squirrels.

Mackie's gotten a bit used to the deer. After all, they are in our yard nearly daily and definitely nightly. If they get really close, she runs back and forth from one window to the next. But, in general, she realizes that they are a part of her life. They are here to stay.

The annual surprise are the squirrels. They show up mid-October and scour our backyard for nuts (I suppose) and anything else that they can hide away for the winter. These animals drive our dog CRAZY. She stands at the window and whines. She moves her feet up and down, back and forth, trying to magically get through the window.

If we let her out the door, she rushes down the stairs of the deck and onto the lawn. She always thinks that she has a chance. She's so busy rushing out that she doesn't see that they are out of the backyard before she even gets onto the deck. When she gets outside and sees that they aren't there, she sniffs around and follows their tracks throughout the yard.

I wonder what she plans on doing if she catches them? Bite them? Play with them? Run around with them? Or maybe she wants to show them her little dance that she practices at the window?

I guess it's not summer anymore

2009-10-10T21:01:00.009-05:00

I'm just going to pretend that I have been blogging every week and haven't really missed six weeks...

As I was driving to work yesterday, I had the heater on in the car and the seat warmer. It was 44 degrees outside. I've always thought that October seemed like the coldest month of the year in the midwest. After the warm summer, your blood is still thin and you're not ready for cold weather. Today had a high of 48 degrees and sunny. The sun made it seem warmer, but I still wore my "fall coat." (Growing up in California, I never had a Fall Coat. I just had a coat. Now I have a Fall Coat, a Winter Coat, and a rain coat. I've had my eye on some pretty, bright colored Spring Coats.

So, here's some highlights from the summer...

We never saw the balloons go up in the air because there was either no wind or too much wind, but we did see the Balloon Glow. So beautiful.

While my mom and dad visited, all the men and boys began to build a wooden sail boat. They didn't get it finished, but got a good start.

R, Dad, T, and M enjoy a nice ice cream break.

One of the highlights of going to Shady Shores on Labor Day is watching the moon rise. This night had a great reflection on the Lake Huron.

I can't believe how big my baby is getting. He grew 4 and 3/4 inches last year. He's such a great boy-- so caring, smart, funny, creative, and compassionate. I'm so blessed to have him as my son.

T has done a lot of growing up this past year also. Tonight he looked at me and said, "I like spending time with you mom." I've definitely been blessed with this one too! R and M are camping with the Boy Scouts tonight, so it was just the two of us. We made fondue for dinner as a treat -- cheese fondue with Italian bread and apples for dipping. And, of course, chocolate fondue for dessert with pound cake (my favorite), donut holes (his favorite), strawberries and raspberries for dipping. Yummo! We had a great time, talking and laughing. What fun!

Two Digits

2009-08-20T19:51:00.010-05:00

The birthday boy...

For R's big 10 year old birthday celebration, he had a few friends over for a water fight, nerf gun fight, and a camp out. He had a great time. He grinned from ear to ear all night long.

Silly string became a part of the water fight. Of course, the most fun was to attack the birthday boy, who quickly dunked his head in one of the tubs of water to "hide" from the silly string.

R is preparing to get more water to throw at his buddies.

After the fun fights between friends, the boys each made their own dinner - something that M made in Cub Scouts when he was a boy. He calls them Chief Tinfoils. We had ground beef, onions, potatoes, and different seasonings for them to wrap up in the aluminum foil. Then, we all went to the back yard to cook them over the hot coals.

We also roasted biscuits on sticks over the coals. I think that each boy had two or three of these biscuit snakes before they ate their dinner.

Going along with the camping theme, M and I did our best to make a cake with a tent on it. We thought that we'd somehow be awesome after all of those Ace of Cakes and Cake Boss that we watch on TV. Apparently, the skills didn't brush off on us, but the kids loved the cake.

Blowing out all ten candles on his cake. R requested red velvet cake. It's not my favorite, but he loves the intense colors.

The boys all got glow swords and glow necklaces in their goodie bags. T had fun with the sword

One boy had a great time putting on as many glow necklaces as he could.

All in all it was a pretty great birthday for my big boy.

Pack Campout

2009-07-18T08:00:00.000-05:00

M plans an all-pack camp out each June. I help set up on Friday and then go back all day on Saturday to help out. The theme was outer space (that was the theme all year -- remember the cake auction?) There were four activities to do: Frisbee golf, Rocket launch, Nature Hike (look for alien life), and Fishing (not space related, but a whole lot of fun.) They all wore their "class B uniforms" which means that they didn't have to wear their regular uniform, but could wear their Cub Scout t-shirt that they all received at the end of the year.

When I arrived on Saturday morning, I was greeted by R, happy, healthy, and filthy. (You should have seen his FILTHY feet after two days of wearing Crocs!)

Each boy decorated their own visors. (The pack was divided up into four teams, with matching colored visors for identification.) R's visor above says that he's the Commanding Officer of Cosmic Blast.

T used scissors to decorate his visor and wrote on it that he was the King of Cheesecake for the Neptune team (don't ask me, I just really don't know.) In this picture M is teaching the Neptune team how to play mini frisbee golf, with the flying saucers (frisbees) that they decorated themselves.

Here's an example of one of the frisbees --this one is decorated by a friend.

M proudly shows off his "flying saucer" with a big CM for "Cubmaster."

M designed and R helped him make all of goals for the mini golf course. R gets ready to send his saucer flying through the fourth hole in the 14-hole course.

Each team decorated a rocket ship to identify their picnic table -- this is Neptune's rocket.

R had a good time fishing, trying out his new bamboo pole. He actually won the award for catching the most fish. He caught fish. Too bad I didn't get a picture of any of them! He won a fishing pole for a prize. Since he already has two fishing poles, he gave his prize to a boy who loved the fishing and doesn't have a pole.

T is working on building his rocket. He's pretty excited to launch it.

Ready for takeoff. T minus 5-4-3-2-1

Take off!!

I tried over fifty times during the day to get the rockets coming down, finally I got one!

R gets ready to set his rocket off. He loves doing rockets!

Another successful blastoff!

Here's some of the tents all set up.

Campfires are always great.

We made "candy apples" which were apples with raisins, brown sugar, and marshmallows.

Here's the whole group with all the kids and adults.

After dessert, the boys brought down the flag. At this point, I went home and slept in my comfy bed, while M and the boys stayed the night in the tent. They were home after breakfast on Sunday, just in time for church.

Sand and Water - Good Old Fashioned Fun

2009-07-16T19:24:00.000-05:00

R dug a big hole in the side of his sand pile and decided to stick his head in it. T thought that it was a good opportunity to pour water all over his brother. Evidently, the water was pretty cold. I just call this good old fashioned fun.

I just love good old fashioned fun!

Crazy Hair Day

2009-07-10T13:53:00.006-05:00

I was cruising through my photos from the year and saw these from Crazy Hair day at the kids' school. I could name the pictures "Fun with Hair Gel."

T went for the spiky clumps effect.

R said that he had "bed head" to begin with, so it wasn't that hard to add the hair gel.

Too funny, huh?!?!

Sailing Solo

2009-07-10T12:53:00.012-05:00

This is the first year that either of my boys are able to handle a sailboat by themselves. R has been crewing for M for two years now. T has reluctantly crewed for M a few times, but he's never really liked sailing. It all goes back to that unfortunate capsizing incident a few years back. For some reason, though, T decided that he does like sailing if HE is in charge. Sailing solo is the perfect thing for him. We have a little Sunfish that is perfect for the boys.

A few weeks ago, we borrowed another Sunfish from our sailing club and the boys were able to compete in a regatta. They were the only two Sunfishes racing (there was also another type of boat racing in the regatta. It was great to watch from the "Committee Boat" where I had the job of being the race official who signed the boats into the race and recorded what place they got when they finished. Being in the middle of the lake made for some good photo opportunities.

Earlier in the day, T said that he wanted to go sailing. Now, he had never sailed completely by himself before. His dad was either on the boat with him or out on the lake with him in a different boat nearby. M knew that T was ready to go solo and helped him rig the boat and sent him off to "learn how the boat worked with the wind." My baby out on the lake by himself? My mama bear instinct kicked into high gear and I stayed way out on the dock keeping an eye on him while M smiled and shook his head. M knew that there was hardly any wind and that T would be fine. I didn't take that for granted an watched him and I got a lot of pictures.

Here is T trying to get out of the marina area. He's pumping the tiller so to try to get some movement out of the boat since there was no wind.

He's making some slow progress. He sure looks like he knows what he's doing.

The boy who doesn't like sailing looks like he's having a pretty good time after all.

Here's his bro coming out to race!

They catch some wind and begin the race, neck and neck.

T got an early lead in the race and kept it for more than half of the race. He even rounded the mark ahead of R. How good that must of felt for him, to be ahead of his older brother! I hear from R that T kept turning around and shouting "tips" to R the whole time that he had the lead.

His lead didn't last the whole race. Here is where R is taking the lead. It looks like T is looking back wondering why R isn't still back there. R did win the race.

In the end, both boys were thrilled with their own performances. T was so proud to have the lead for so long, and R was so proud to finish first. What a great race!

Taking the boats back home, R stands up like he's seen his dad do.

This and That - T's Patriotic Concert

2009-06-14T15:22:00.005-05:00

Life has been crazy around here.... a flooded basement, mold in the basement, six weeks of flu-like symptoms because of the mold and the actual stomach flu, aunt Shari's visit, mold removal, oral surgery, gramma's death, T's patriotic concert, boys' first individual sail boat race, trip to California for gramma's memorial, end of school. So much has gone on. Over the next few blogs I'm going to give you a taste of it in pictures.

We shouldn't have, but we let T sing in the patriotic concert even though he was sick. We thought he was pretty much better since he had been sick for four days and seemed so much better, but he continued to be sick (fatigue and fever and no appetite) for another five days after this concert. He was all psyched up for the concert, but then must have gotten tired -- I think he may have fallen asleep a few times. He missed eight days of school in the previous two weeks. I think those were the days that they taught all of the hand movements to the songs.

They made these Statue of Liberty crowns in school out of paper plates. I asked how he made them and he said, "oh, it's simple, really. You just paint the plate, then cut out the spikes from the center, staple them on, and you have a crown!"

There were three classes that performed and each class wore a different patriotic color. As you can see, T's class wore blue.

Here's all three classes in their patriotic glory.

I attempted to record some of it, which I'll share with you here. Be forgiving of me in my feeble attempt at this and just pretend that you don't know that my husband was in the video business for years. We can just blame the blurriness on the fact that I had to zoom in so far from the back of the gym and we can blame the quick cuts from one place to the other on some guy elbowing me which made me jerk the camera (this never happened, of course, but I'm gonna place blame there anyway.)

See what I mean about the nearly falling asleep part? Poor kid!

Each class took turns playing these sticks. They'd whack them against their hands to make a tone. Each kid had a different tone. T said, "we were going to play the hand bells, but these were easier for us."

I love this Yankee Doodle. You can tell that they don't quite know all of the words in the second verse -- there's some mumbling and then you hear "hasty pudding!."

Don't you love patriotic kids? Gives me goose bumps...

Menus

2009-05-19T20:01:00.002-05:00

M and I have a deal. I plan the weeknight dinners and he cooks them. On Sunday night I make a list of dinner options for the week based on what's in the pantry and freezer. M then chooses what to make each day, using the list for inspiration. See, he HATES planning dinners. He hates trying to figure out what to make. I don't mind at all. I make sure that we have the food in the house by doing the grocery shopping and then he cooks the meals Mon-Thurs. I cook Fri-Sun. Not bad.

Here's the menu options for this week:

Polska kilbasa with onions and green peppers, green beans
Pork roast, asparagus, crescent rolls
Spaghetti and meatball caserole (left overs) and salad
Chicken Parmesan (chicken in freezer), green beans
Breakfast for dinner (eggs, sausage, toast)

Yum!

Mother's Day Notes from the Boys

2009-05-11T17:55:00.002-05:00

I was showered with gifts (flowers, homemade cards, Wii Fit, cupcake carrier) and cards for mother's days. Below are the notes that R and T wrote me at school.

T's:
My mom is special because she helps me with my home work, she is nice, she buys me clothes, she takes me places, she helps when I'm sick, she makes me meals, she gives me chores, she keeps me safe, and she loves me.

R's was a fill in the blank:
My mom is special because...she helps with homework and cooks great meals.
I like it when my Mom...cooks, she has the best chocolate croissants.
My mom can do many things. I think she's best at...helping. From homework to chores, mom's the best!
My mom has a pretty smile. I like to make her smile by...making a joke.
My mom is as pretty as a...tulip.
My mom is smart. She even knows...advanced algebra.
I 'd like to tell my mom...that I love her and want to thank her.

Ahhhh...I love my boys!

Building a Bridge

2009-05-03T20:12:00.008-05:00

R has to build a bridge that exists or has existed in the state where we live. He didn't want to take on a bridge that is too big or complicated, but he did want to make his bridge realistic. M remembered that there is a park near our house that has some historic bridges there (that have been relocated from their original sites when they were upgraded.) So, I helped R Google the park and we saw five great bridges from which to chose. He chose a bridge that was built in 1892 that was over a river two towns away.

R and M printed pictures from the Internet to use as a template and began to build. I was surprised to see that graph paper was not involved in the building of this bridge. But, as R pointed out, he had a picture right in front of him and didn't need the graph paper.

R used the pneumatic nailer and wood glue to adhere the bottom of the base to the top of the base. He also glued all of the pieces together and painted the whole thing.

Here it is in pictures:

I realized midway through the project that I hadn't taken any pictures.

R got very good at using the Gorilla Wood Super Glue, which is great for this project because it dries fast.

He just has to hold the piece of wood in place for a few seconds before it takes hold.

Gluing a bridge is very hard work...it takes lots of concentration.

You have to hold your mouth just right.

It's also hazardous to your hands. R says that he'll be picking the glue off his hands when he's a teenager.

Here is the finished bridge, all painted and ready to take to school.

R proudly shows off his bridge. (Note: Bad idea to take a picture of a boy in a red chair wearing a red shirt holding a red bridge.)

R stands on the actual bridge at the park. I have no idea why his hands are in the air -- did I accidentally say "stick em up" instead of "say cheese?"

Working Hard For the Money

2009-05-03T19:56:00.004-05:00

You may remember the policy we have in the house regarding the purchase of large ticket items by the boys. First of all, mom and dad must approve of the item to be purchased. Secondly, the boy must pay for half of it out of his piggy bank, and earn the other half from chores assigned by mom and dad. R is the only one who has used this policy -- he bought a much desired Pokemon game for his DS (which he and his brother have played for over 100 hours in the year or so that he has owned it.)

T has always been a saver -- I think he had over a hundred bucks in his piggy bank AFTER we went to Disney world. Anyway, the object of his desire was a Nerf gun that shot out sponge bullets machine-gun style. He saw it while buying a birthday present for a friend and decided right then that he really, really wanted it. It was forty two dollars! An extremely high price for a Nerf gun, but this one was an automatic Nerf gun. I told him I'd talk to dad about it.

The next morning he nicely asked me if I spoke to M about it yet. "Oh no, I forgot!" I told him." He responded sweetly, "That's okay, mom, no problem. Maybe you'll remember tonight." That conversation happened three nights in a row. Finally, I remembered to mention it to M. Of course, M saw no problem with a machine gun style Nerf gun.

So, I let T know. He lit up like a Christmas tree and said, Great, what chores can I do? Do you have any worth ten dollars? (No fool, that boy, we usually assigned fifty cent to one dollar price tags on jobs.) We did find a five dollar job -- clean up all the dog poop in the back yard that accumulated over the winter when it was hidden in the snow. What a job! I told him on Friday night that he could get five bucks for that. Wouldn't you know it, but on Saturday morning, he was out there at the crack of dawn (7:30) while M and I were still sleeping, and he was shoveling poop. He sure gave his walking cast a work out making trips back to the woods to dump the poop and back to the lawn to collect it. When I woke up, I saw what he was doing and gave him a plastic bag to collect the poop in so he didn't have to make so many trips to the woods.

When he came in after that job was done, he marched over to the counter and grabbed a piece of paper. He wrote $5 in the middle of the page and drew a thermometer on it and filled in about a fourth of it. "What else can I do?" he asked. Here is what he did over the course of the weekend to earn his half of the gun:

* Poop duty for five months of poop (yowzers!)
* Pick up the sticks in the back yard so the lawn mower won't break when it's christened for the
season
* Sweep and mop the kitchen floor
* Vacuum the water in the basement with the wet/dry vac -- three times over the two days
* Clean the downstairs bathroom
* Clean the upstairs bathroom

He proudly told me on Sunday at about 2:00 pm that he had earned his half. So, we took off for the store. I had told him that dad and I would pay the tax on it and buy the batteries. (That's before I realized that it took six D batteries -- those things are expensive!) Anyway, he is one happy boy. I asked him if he was proud of himself for having a goal and working hard to get it accomplished. He said, "Proud? No, I don't think I'm proud. But I'm really very impressed that I did it so fast." Well, there you go.

He loads up his gun with all 25 "bullets" that it came with. He's sitting on the landing at the top of the stairs so that he can ambush his brother.

Rambo's got nothing on this guy!

Boston Tea Party

2009-04-20T20:13:00.005-05:00

You may have heard about tea parties happening all over the country, especially around tax day. There was one in our home town, so M and R joined in the protest. M talks to our boys about these type of things and R wanted to go and use his constitutional right to protest high taxes. M took an American Flag to hold and R wanted a protest sign. He asked M to make him a "Don't Tread on Me" sign (he has recently studied early US history and knows about the origin of the saying .)

R shows me how he's going to hold the sign at the protest.

They were there for a couple of hours, listening to the mayor, a congressman, and a state senator speak. M had a roll of patriotic stickers that R passed out to 200 people there. He's so outgoing, that boy

It got a bit windy and the U.S. Flag that was at the podium blew over. R ran over to it (looking back at M to make sure that it was okay) and held the flag for the first hour of the speeches. I was so proud to here that patriotic instincts took over and he knew that the flag needed to be off the ground (his Cub Scout training helps.)

R held the flag during an hour of speeches at the rally. He told me that the bottom of the flag stand was empty and should have had sand in it.

This is just a general shot of the scene. Very calm -- a peaceful protest about high taxes.

Winners, Winners, Chicken Dinners

2009-04-19T16:28:00.014-05:00

Friday night was our fourth Pinewood Derby for cub scouts. M and the boys have been working on their cars for a few weeks now. T wanted a really cool car and R wanted a really fast car. I'd say that they both accomplished their goals since R got first place in the Pack and T was voted "Best in Show" by the rest of the Pack.

Let's step back a couple of weeks...

The pinewood derby kits were handed out at the cake bake. T, R, and M discussed what kind of cars they'd build this year. There was always a pad of graph paper available in the kitchen for those ideas that needed to be sketched out. T and R had different ideas that they would sketch and M would give them advice on whether or not the car would have any speed. T landed on his IPod design early on. He thought that it would be really cool to have a car that looked like an Ipod. R was thinking of doing a streamlined design, but he couldn't decide what it should be. Somehow he was inspired to make his a bumblebee -- the Killer Bee, he called it. Both boys did tons of work on their cars. R even helped shape the bee with the bench belt sander. He also sanded his wheels, polished the axles, and painted his car. T drilled the axle holes, and drilled the places for the weights, sanded the whole thing, sanded the wheels and axles, and painted the car. They did more this year than ever before.

Because we have lots of new boys in the Pack this year, M took his tools to school and assisted any boy that needed help -- about 10 kids took up his offer. We also had 3 or 4 kids over at the house working on their cars. I love how M helps all the other kids even though it's a competition. There are lots of "secrets" to making a fast pinewood derby car; M will share a secret if asked about it, but won't just volunteer them. After all, it is a competition. M also had a bit of competitive spirit with another cub leader -- they had a lot of fun teasing each other about who's kid's car would be faster. (I think that next year there should be a dad's race.)

They raced by dens this year, first the Tigers (first graders), then the Wolves (second graders, including T), then the Bears (third graders), and finally, the Webelos (fourth and fifth graders.) Everybody got a cool medal and the 1st-3rd places of each den got a certificate. At the end of the night the top winners from each den raced to see who was the fastest in the Pack.

T waited patiently as the judge decided whether or not his car was legal: weighing no more than five ounces, axles visible, appropriate wheels. Check. He cleared and was ready to race.

T's Ipod car is on the track waiting for the "go" to start.

He waits at the end of the track, hoping that he got first (he did 8 times, with one 3rd place.)

T shows off his winnings. Next stop, Districts to compete against all the other boys who won "Best in Show."

R loved his trophy, certificate, and medal. He's all ready to race the Killer Bee again at Districts.
(Notice the stinger on the end of the bee. Cool.)

Their First Tie

2009-04-14T19:44:00.010-05:00

T has wanted to wear a tie for a holiday for a couple of years now. I've held him off, because I'm not a fan of dressing up little boys like little adults. But I figured that he was old enough now to know what he wants and he does love to dress up. I picked him up a tie when I bought his new Easter shirt. I also picked a second tie up in case R wanted to wear one. I figured that if R didn't want to wear one, T could have two. When I asked R if he wanted to wear a tie, he nodded his head in the cool-guy way and said, "sure, that'd be okay."

M helped R put his tie on first because he was ready first. To get the right perspective, M has to stand behind the boy and then can get in the front to straighten it out.

Here is the proud boy, with his hair clean from the shower and slicked back, with his tie, of course.

T got the same treatment. He looked on as M did his tie, concentrating hard so that he could do it himself. Afterwards he told me, "I've got it, mom. I totally can do that tie by myself next time."

I was so proud of my handsome boys. They liked being dressed up...until they didn't like being dressed up. Luckily, the liking it part lasted through church and brunch.

Here are all of us posed in the lobby of the restaurant just before we got called in for brunch. What a spread it was! Eggs Benedict, prime rib, shrimp, pastries, lamb, salmon, crab pasta, chicken parmesan, and lots of desserts.

Easter Fun

2009-04-14T18:41:00.013-05:00

Our Easter tradition is that my mother-in-law, father-in-law, and brother-in-law come over for the weekend. They come for Good Friday dinner and stay through Easter Sunday brunch. Then they take off for their four hour drive back home.

Last year I served fish tacos (thanks AJ for that delicious recipe!) which was a hit. That dinner inspired me to have a Mexican feast for this Good Friday. I made cheese enchiladas, homemade frijoles (with bacon fat for creaminess and flavor), nachos, guacamole, and rice. Yummo! We all stuffed ourselves, especially Uncle D, who moaned for three hours. After the kids went to bed, we broke out the Wii and played for hours -- bowling, Mario Kart, and golf.

On Saturday, we had breakfast and then went to an Easter Egg Hunt at a local park. There were hundreds of kids there and my boys had fun. It was a bit colder than we expected (48 degrees plus it was windy) but we had a good time.

The boys waited patiently for it to start. They got more and more excited as the time got closer to start time. They started with the 0-3 year olds, then the 4-6 year olds, and finally, the 7 plus year olds.

R decided that he'd don an Easter Bonnet for the occasion.

Uncle D. provided a ride for T, since he had his walking cast on. We covered his cast with a

plastic bag since the grass was wet. Uncle D. was worried that he'd slip too much if he ran to get the eggs.

Finally the time came...let the mayhem begin! Three hundred seven-plus-year-olds ran out to get the eggs.

After we got home from the egg hunt, it was time to decorate eggs. You may not remember, but the Smith clan takes their egg decorating very seriously. When I was dating M, I participated in the egg decorating Event. It was a very detailed, time-consuming affair. People took, something like 7 or 8 minutes per egg, with multiple colors and multiple layers. I remember candles and rubberbands being involved. Well, my friends, this Easter was no different. We had three dozen eggs, two sets of colors, wax crayons, a candle, rubber bands, and even the netting from a bag of limes.

R helped get the colors on the table. He's thinking about what his egg will be like.

Here are the beautiful, shiny eggs all for the world to see.

T did some still-lifes (lives?) to show off the eggs -- and his photography skills.

We had our Easter dinner on Saturday night: ham, potatoes au gratin (not potatoes "all rotten," like T thought they were called) corn bread pudding, green bean casserole, rolls, jello with peaches, and glazed carrots. The boys and M set a beautiful table for me, using our china, crystal, and silver.

What a lovely day we had.

Outer Space Cake Bake and Auction

2009-03-29T15:23:00.025-05:00

You may remember the medieval themed Cub Scout cake auction from last year. Well, this year's theme was Outer Space. Let me tell you, this is a much easier theme for cake ideas than last year's medieval times was. Remember, everything has to be edible -- everything.

Take a minute and think of all the things you can do for an outer space cake.....

Times up. What did you come up with?

Well, we came up with the man landing on the moon (R) and Saturn with it's rings (T).

Before we go into the details, I need a minute to let you know that I know that my boys' hair is too long. They were supposed to get it cut during the week and it never happened. I was too worried that we wouldn't get the cakes done in time if we went and got hair cuts on Saturday. So, they look like ragamuffins in these pictures. You'll be happy to know that they look presentable now.

Back to the previously scheduled blog....

First, the man landing on the moon. R wanted to show outer space, the moon, Neil Armstrong, and the American flag. How to make Neil Armstrong, you ask? Easy! Fondant or gum paste. I had the mixins to make fondant like last year, but I also bought some pre-made gum paste, which I knew dried harder than fondant. We used the gum paste, but I wished that we made fondant because the gum paste was tricky to work with. It still worked though. R made the astronaut himself, with coaching from me (as in, do you think that he had one leg twice as long as the other?) We found a "how to" video on Youtube and used that as a guide. (Again, I love modern-day technology.)

R is using edible markers to paint red stripes on the space suit because "Neil's the commander of the mission."

Here's a closer look of the fine details.

I bought cake pans that were two half-spheres that could be put together for a whole sphere. R wanted a rectangle cake on the bottom to represent outer space (with black icing) and then a half-sphere on top that would be the moon. I forgot to take pictures of the moon baking, but you can see them on the counter in the next picture. R wanted to use red velvet cake for the moon. Here he is getting ready to pour the cherry chip cake mix into the pan for the outer space base.

Here's the finished product -- the first man walking on the moon -- in cake.

For T's Saturn cake, M thought that we could do something with spun sugar like he had seen on the Food Network. That seemed hard to me, but I remembered a craft that I did with the kids a few years ago where we melted hard peppermints to make a pretty wreath to hang in the window. So we bought a bunch of hard candies and gave it a try.

This is the first attempt. M bought Jolly Ranchers and it was beautiful, but waaayy too thick and heavy. There was no way that the cake would hold it without being crushed.

This is the second attempt in the oven. It was looking really good. It got to a point in which it just needed a bit more melting. Wouldn't you know it, I got distracted and it started boiling and all the colors melded together, which T thought was kind of cool, but then it got stuck in the pan and no matter what I did, I couldn't get it out. Argh!

This is the third attempt, which worked great. We used fewer candies so that it would be thinner. We also put parchment paper in the pan first so that we could get it out (so many things we learned along the way!) T did a nice design. It worked nicely, except that we mishandled it a bit and it cracked, making it unusable.

This is a case where the fourth time was a charm. Here it is before we put it in between the two spheres. Okay, now that we got the rings down, it was time to decorate the planet itself. We used Google Images to look at lots of pictures of Saturn and decided to use five different colors of icing. I used this adventure as an excuse to buy the creme-based food coloring kit that I've wanted for a couple of years, but never really had a reason to buy it. The colors are truer and it doesn't change the texture of your icing (or fondant) as much as the liquid coloring does.

T started with a base of white icing and covered the sphere, then he added in waves and swirls of the other four colors. He chose the colors based on the pictures he saw online.

Making Saturn is very serious work.
Then comes the blue.

And here is the finished planet, or the top of the planet, in all its swirling glory.

The auction was a success, raising $300 to buy the boys "class B uniforms" aka t-shirts with the pack number on it. Check out the cool cakes.

The cakes at the auction all looked really great. There were some really awesome ones -- R2D2 (made out of five cake mixes!), the solar system, with 8 different cakes, the Death Star from Star Wars. Those kids (and parents) went all out. Some of the kids favorites were the Death Star and a couple of cakes that had aliens (gummy bears) fighting -- because of all the candy.

T Turns Eight

2009-03-07T21:08:00.013-05:00

Here's a summary of T's eigth birthday party:

My dad taught me that you should have an activity for the guests to do when they arrive. I had three: 1) sign T's cast, 2) Decorate T's walker, and 3) Guess how many candies were in a jar. Here are some kids decorating T's walker.

M added his own ice breaker game -- decorate Mr. Smith, which the kids loved! As you can see, M seemed to enjoy it too.
Then the kids made their own pizzas and then ate them. They loved having the independence to choose what went on their pizzas. We played "hot potato" with it. M made sure that all of the kids got prizes by the end of the game.

T got an ice cream ball for his birthday from Grandma on the Lake -- you put in the cream, sugar, and other ingredients, then roll it around for 20 minutes to make ice cream. M ran this game with five of the kids while I helped the other five make fleece scarves.

I didn't get pictures of the scarf making in action, but here are all of the kids with their scarves. There are all a bit crazy -- see R in the back? Crazy kids.

T had help blowing out his candles from his best friend, J. The cake was a delicous ending to a fun party.

A New Cast

2009-03-07T19:56:00.011-05:00

T has had his full leg cast for a month and it's time for a new one. He needs to wear a cast below his knee for another month, then a removable (for bathing) cast for a final month.

Here he is, eager to get this big 'ol cast taken off.

The nurse used a little vibrating saw to cut through the three layers of fiberglass that made up his cast. It didn't hurt T; it only tickled when she got down to his foot.

It hurt a bit when T bent his knee for the first few times -- after all it had been frozen in the cast for a month and hadn't been used. He got some tears at this pain, but was still a trooper. Notice how his leg is so skinny and dips down a bit? That's because it atrophied while it was in the cast. The strange thing is that the last time I saw his leg, it was so swollen that it was as big as his thigh. Now it's just a skinny little thing.

M showed T the inside of his cast, which had a bunch of flaky dried skin on it and was a bit stinky. You can tell that T is thinking that it's kind of gross. You can also see his xrays on the lightbox -- can you see his fracture on the one on the right? It is a little diagonal dark line on his ankle and kind of goes around his leg.

Our awesome doctor, Dr. G., instructs his resident how to put on the cast so that it won't rub and irritate T. T chose the color maroon for his cast, but they didn't have enough of it, so they put on a first layer of white first .
The final layer of fiberglass was put on in the color of his choice. He says that he picked it because it's the color of the Griffendor house in Harry Potter.

T hobbled out of the office with his shiny new cast. It was almost 70 degrees on Friday and he loved being outside without a jacket.
He spent a couple of hours in the afternoon making a pop-up book with a kit that he got from his Grammy in California.

He concentrates carefully to ensure that the pop-up effects works properly.

Here is the first page of his book. This will be a fun project for him as he continues his recuperation.

Excuses

2009-03-03T19:17:00.003-05:00

I have so many excuses for not blogging....my computer got a virus (again!), my husband's computer won't accept my new camera's memory card, I had pneumonia for two weeks....the list goes on.

So, I have no pictures, but here's a quick update:

R was in the Quiz Bowl with four of his friends. They won three rounds and lost by only twenty points (out of 300) in the semi-final round.
T is hobbling around pretty good now. He gets a new cast on Friday. I'm taking time off of work to go with him and M 'cause it seems like a milestone in a boy's life and I want to be part of it.
T turned 8 last week and had a party on Saturday. 10 kids over -- 9 boys and one sweet, patient girl. They made their own pizzas, made fleece scarves, played games, and won lots of prizes.
R competed in Gold Rush, a Cub Scout winter outdoor competition, and had a blast demonstrating his first aid skills and such.
Both boys are excited about Pinewood Derby and are enthusiastically planning what kind of a car they are going to build with their father.
I have had bad allergies, asthma, and pneumonia. I'm almost better -- knock on wood.
Hockey is almost over -- bittersweet. I hate the early morning practices on weekends, but love to watch R progress -- and I love to cheer at his games. They are so darn exciting!
We finished reading the 5th Harry Potter book. I read it to the whole family -- all 870 pages of it. We then watched the movie. This is the first book that M has "read" and then seen the movie. I'm afraid that he now knows what the rest of us know -- the movie is NEVER as good as the book.

That's it for now.

I got "The Call"

2009-02-09T17:51:00.008-05:00

You know how when you're a mom, you dread "the call." It's the kind of call that might come in the middle of the night, telling you that something is wrong. It's the kind of call that makes your heart drop for a second. You know the kind of phone call that I'm talking about.

So there I was, merely getting my eyes dilated at my eye doctor my cell phone rang. It was M. "I need you grab some clothes for me and R and meet me at the hospital. If I were a betting man, I'd say his leg is broken." The call. Now, picture me, dilated eyes, driving on a bright, sunny 19 degree day, praying the whole time that I wouldn't hit anybody when I turned into the sun. Yeah, I had those flimsy plastic dark glasses on behind my regular transition glasses, but there were times when everything was a shadow.

But, I digress. This isn't a story about me, it's about my poor baby boy who loves to ski and is very good at it for his young age. It's about how he took a spill and has a spinal fracture to his tibia. M handed the phone to me, telling me that T wouldn't be able to talk to me, but he wanted to hear my voice. On the phone, I heard my boy, whimpering for the most part, then crying out in pain every now and then. I reassured him that it would be okay...that we were going to the hospital and they would fix him up so that it didn't hurt so much.

I arrived at the hospital half an hour later and saw M and R sitting there in their ski clothes zipped down, with bright red faces (from the wind and heat.) T was in a wheelchair, facing away from them, holding his head and quietly whimpering to himself. He was facing away because he didn't want to look at anybody -- he was quite angry at the world while he was in all of that pain.

He was triaged before I arrived and we saw a doctor about an hour later. I was concerned that NOBODY would give him any pain reliever before a doctor saw him. Apparently, they thought that there was a chance that they might have to sedate him to set it and he couldn't have anything in him for that. He was just in tons of pain. If anybody touched his leg at all, he'd yell in pain -- a blood-curtling yell that made my bones shake. It was at this point that the doctor recommended morphine.

So, they gave him one unit of morphine. What a wonderful drug. His face immediately relaxed. He relaxed his Superman grip on my hand. He even cracked the tiniest of smiles for a brief moment. It was a pleasant environment until they wanted to give him some more morphine before they put on his cast. I was in full agreement with this idea of giving him more of the wonder drug.

Now, when they ask if your child is allergic to any meds, I always answer "I don't know." After all, how many meds has this healthy boy had in his life? Not many. Certainly not morphine.

I was looking at T's IV site as they were giving him his second dose of morphine and I could literally (I swear) see a rash creep up his arm starting from his IV and moving up his arm, over his shoulder, and then up his neck and down his chest. It looked like little fingers creeping up his veins and over his body. I think that I actually shouted, "Stop! He's allergic to it!" The nurse looked over and immediately stopped the IV. Then she ran and got some Benedryl. Luckily it didn't affect his breathing at all and the rash disappeared after the morphine was stopped. Whew! Another emergency diverted.

We proceeded with the putting on of the cast. T squeezed my fingers the whole time and I'm happy to say that they finally have feeling back in them. He was a trooper. After they put on the long sock (from top of thigh to toes) they put the fiberglass cast on. Then, after all this work for a beautiful cast, they took a saw and cut it up the inside and outside of his leg. They didn't cut through the top or bottom, so it still was tight. The doctor wanted to give his leg room to swell.

Speaking of his doctor, about five different people said to me, "you are so lucky that Dr. G is on call tonight. He's the best doctor." or "Great. You'll have Dr. G -- he's a fellow in foot and ankle issues." We saw Dr. G's two residents and they conferred with him before they put the cast on.

I've never had a broken bone. I assumed they'd get the cast on him and send us home. Nope. We spent the night. And then we spent another night. We thought we were just spending the one night. Both M and I wanted to stay with our boy, but I "won" because of two reasons. 1) I'd fit better on whatever makeshift bed they'd have for parents, and 2) we didn't have M's sleep machine. So, at 10:30 pm, R and M went home while T and I went up to the Children's Hospital unit.

T wasn't hungry until we got up to the ped unit. They offered chicken noodle soup (I think it was cup-a-soup) which T said was the best soup he'd ever had. The tricky thing was figuring out how he could eat it. T didn't want to adjust his cast at all to scoot up in the bed, so I tore a Styrofoam cup down and he drank it.

T was switched to Tylenol with Codeine (a good med, but not as wonderful as morphine for killing his pain). He could have it every 4-6 hours. The nurse and I quickly realized that every four hours would be needed. T had "breakthrough" pain at about 3 1/2 hours. That extra half an hour was quite challenging for both T and I. I had to figure out how to distract him, which wasn't easy given his painful mood, and of course, he had to deal with the pain.

We made it through the night and T was excited to "order room service." At first I laughed and told him that hospitals weren't like hotels, but I was wrong! He had a menu to choose from and he chose a cheese omelet, apple muffin, peaches, and milk.

Before his breakfast came, we were visited by our three doctors - the two residents from the night before and Dr. G himself. I nearly fell in love with Dr. G -- not in a romantic way, but in an I-can't-believe-we're-so-lucky-that-you're-our-doctor way. He was so personable, so patient, so kind to T that I felt a smile spread across my face. Here's an example of his great bedside manner.

Dr. G - So, T I hear that you're seven. But, tell me, when is your birthday?

T: Feb 26th

Dr G: So, you are seven-going-on-eight?

T: yeah, I guess so.

Dr G!: That's great! I can't believe it! Seven-going-on-eight is the BEST time for your bones to heal. When you're seven -going-on-eight, your bones just get right down to business and heal. As a matter of fact, they started their healing last night. If you were as old as your mom, those old bones would take a lot longer to heal. This is great news, isn't it.

T: with a bright smile on this face: "yeah, it is great news."

He asked T if he had any questions and T asked how the bones actually heal. Dr. G told him that his brain tells the broken parts of the bones to get a bit soft and sticky, then they stick together and get harder and harder until you can't tell there was a break at all.

Pretty cool doc, I tell ya.

When T got home after two nights in the hospital, he said "it's a miracle to be home." We came home with a lot of paraphernalia -- a wheel chair, walker, and crutches. He's good at the wheel chair, can do the walker okay if the pains not too bad, but hates the crutches. We have to get him comfortable on the crutches so that he can go to the bathroom by himself, which will mean that he can go back to school.

Well, T's been home from the hospital for a week now and is doing okay. He still is in a bit of pain and is back on the heavy drugs (the Tylenol with Codeine). But we're hoping that tomorrow, plain old Tylenol will do the trick. He's going to stay home next week too, with the exception of attending the Valentine's Day party at school on Friday. R's bringing homework for him to do, which T doesn't really like too much. He watches a lot of tv, plays video games, draws, and is reading his first chapter book. But, he can't wait to get back to school because it's "boring when you have to stay on the couch all the time."

Here is T earlier in the day, doing quite well on the skis. (I love the flaps of his furry hat flying in the wind.)

Here is is yesterday afternoon, playing video games on his throne (I mean the couch that is now his bed, desk, and dining table for the most part.)

He goes back and forth on whether or not he ever wants to go skiing again. He says that this season is over for sure, but maayybee he'll try again in a couple of years. I hope he does. He sure loved it for a few years.

The Magic Kingdom

2009-02-01T19:27:00.017-05:00

We started every morning bright and early, eating yogurt, fruit, and bagels in our hotel room. We arrived at each park at least half an hour before opening so that we could ride all of the cool rides -- we rode some even twice. At the Magic Kingdom, we raced to Tomorrowland to ride Space Mountain, which we did two times. As we were leaving the ride, we saw this awesome heavy granite ball floating on water. With only a thin coating of water, we could move the ball around and around in the water. The great thing is that my dad designed the water portion of this feature. How cool is that?

This was such a fun trip. The Disney cast members are so nice, courteous, and helpful. R was just learning the Boy Scout law -- with attributes like trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, and cheerful -- just like the cast members at Disney.

Here are the boys in a shot in front of the castle. Notice that they have matching Goofy shirts? I bought those before we went at a discount online store. I figured it would be way cheaper than buying shirts there. M has a Goofy shirt too -- he looked great!

M and I were comparing Disney rides to other theme park rides and we both noticed that Disney rides are much longer. Disney makes it worth your while to wait. Speaking of waiting, we didn't wait in line much at all. We read books on how to get around Disney and ride what you want without waiting in line. We learned to get there early and we learned how to use their Fast Pass system. Was it ever worth the reading!

Splash Mountain wasn't supposed to be open when we were there, but they opened it three days early so we got to ride. I brought along ponchos to wear for the water rides. Since it was barely sixty degrees, I knew we'd be really cold while walking around wet. R took me up on the offer, but not T nor M. So guess who this is a picture of walking away soaking wet? Yep. T and M. They both said that they weren't cold, but the both immediately put on their fleece jackets and zipped while waiting in line for Pirates of the Caribbean.

While we were waiting for a parade, cast members got a group of kids in the street to play Duck, Duck, Donald. T got picked three times -- I think because he looks little. Here he is chasing a little girl (T has the blue baseball cap.)

One time he wasn't fast enough and ended up in the mush pot.

The timing of this game to keep the kids occupied was impeccable. The parade was just seconds away before they ended the game, passed out stickers to the kids, and got all the kids back on the sidelines right when the first float went by.

I was happy to see that even my big boy, R, enjoyed the parade and even waved to Doc when he walked by.

That night, we had dinner at the Hoop De Doo dinner show. Oh my goodness, did we have fun! It was a western show with singing, dancing, and jokes. They were the dumb Hee-Haw kind of jokes -- and did R laugh his rear end off! We all enjoyed it, but he repeated those jokes for days to come. The food was tasty too -- fried chicken, bbq ribs, mashed potatoes, beans, cornbread, and strawberry shortcake. Yummo!

At one point, they told us to wave our napkins in the air to the beat of the music. M and R had fun with it.

The waiters passed out washboards so that each table to contribute to the band. What a really fun way to end a long day!

Disney Was Great - Animal Kingdom

2009-01-22T20:22:00.012-05:00

We just got back from Orlando, FL, after a nice visit to Disney World. Growing up in So. Cal., I thought that I had experienced the Disney experience often...but the Anaheim version is nothing like the Orlando version. Walt Disney bought up hundreds of square miles of Orlando do that he could create this incredible place to visit -- four huge theme parks and over 10 huge resorts. It's amazing!

We left on a day that had a high of negative five -- what a great temperature to leave! It turns out that Orlando was having some Arctic air, so the temps were in the 60's and low 70's, but if felt like Spring to us. In the mornings, the temp was in the 50's and all of the "cast members" in the theme parks had on their winter gear -- heavy coats, hats, and gloves. We wore pants and fleeces and felt so free without our snow gear. One day it hit a warm 74 degrees and we just loved it. We made it to the pool and hot tub every evening. The pool was heated to about 80 degrees. Even if it was 65 degrees outside, they swam in the warm pool and loved it (I made it in the pool once, but went in the hot tub every night.) What a nice break from all the snow, ice, and freezing temps we have been having here in the midwest.

I took 250 pictures, but will share a few ones to highlight the trip for you. We went to the parks five days in a row, often getting back to the hotel in the late afternoon for a rest, dip in the pool, and dinner. Even with those rest times, we were pooped when we got on the plane to come home!

We stayed at the beautiful Animal Kingdom lodge and went to the Animal Kingdom park the first day. Here the boys are sitting in front of the Tree of Life. A beautiful huge icon in the park that is comprised of carvings of a bunch of different kinds of animals.

Here is the back of the tree, with a better view of the animals on it.
My favorite ride of all the parks is Expedition Everest at Animal Kingdom. This was the boys' favorite too, until we went to Disney Hollywood Studios, and rode Rockin' Rollercoaster. Anyway, we rode Everest four fun-filled times. I screamed my face off and totally loved it. (I tried three times to get the picture below turned around and it never worked, so you'll have to cock your head to the side. R and T are standing in front of the Everest ride.)

We saw two amazing shows at Animal Kingdom. One was based on Finding Nemo, and it had "puppets" that were controlled by actors/singers that you could see. It was incredible. I had a smile on my face the whole time. We also saw The Lion King show, with amazing singing, dancing -- it was a huge production based on the Broadway show. Wow! Disney is incredible!

T really loves musical instruments. He had a great time playing all sorts of African drums. He bought a Kalimba, an African instrument, as a souvenir. (I had a Kalimba as a child, so it's cool that he bought one. His is beautifully painted. He also bought a maracas in Mexico in Epcot.)

Both boys played instruments with an African band in the middle of the street. At first T was shy, but the lure of the instruments finally got him involved.

One of the highlights of Animal Kingdom is the Safari Tour. You drive through open environments similar to what is in Africa and can see animals in their natural habitats, with no cages whatsoever. The animals roam as they please. This guy blocked our truck for about five minutes. We just had to wait for him to move.

Finally, when he did move, he decided to come right by the truck. Yikes!

We had a great time at Animal Kingdom. We spent two half-days there. Here are the boys after a fun filled day. (You may notice all of their pins on those lanyards -- they collected those and traded with cast members every day. They had a blast doing that.)

Whew!

2008-12-22T19:02:00.009-05:00

As AJ told me on the phone, I haven't blogged in a "coon's year." So, here I am a month or so after my latest blog. Here's my checklist from the past few weeks:

Bring boxes from the basement - check
Buy Christmas tree - check
Help with craft at Cub Scout pack meeting - check

Decorate Christmas tree - check
Fix angel for top of tree - check
Take down regular decorations - check
Put up Christmas decorations - check
Buy presents - check
Send box to California - check
Send out box for Colorado family - check
Make sure M and I have something to wear to fancy holiday party for work - check
Go to Holiday party - check
Make cookies for cookie exchange at work - check
Make Christmas cards - check
Address Christmas cards - check
Make little gifts for staff at work - check
Take Christmas photo of boys - check
Print out Christmas photo of boys - check
Put photo in cards and seal cards - check (did that tonight)
Make dessert for dessert potluck at work - check
Wrap presents -- not done yet!

In between all of the Christmas preparations, the whole family has had the stomach flu and then a week later has had the cold/flu. That basically means that we were all sick for two weeks. The stomach flu started on Thanksgiving night at my inlaws house (what fun it was to do three loads of laundry between 11 pm and 3 am!)

Since it's been so long since I've blogged, here are some pictures to reward you for coming back to see if there is anything new here.

R went hunting with M one Sunday last month. He's too young to hunt himself (by one year) but he wanted to go and keep his dad company and see what it was like. We decided it would be okay. I talked to R about how he'd have to be bundled up since it was snowing. M had a heart to heart talk with him beforehand, letting him know the details of "field dressing" and told R that it was kind of a sad thing. R still wanted to go. After all of that, they didn't see a deer. (I swear that I fixed the red eye on this picture before I posted it. I tried it three times and gave up. Just pretend that his eyes are brown.)

Here are father and son sportin' their flame orange gear, ready for the hunt. (in the snow)

M and I had a lovely tenth anniversary weekend in October. We dropped off the kids at M's folks house (where they had a great time being spoiled rotten!) and spent two nights away with just the two of us. We went out for some great meals, including fondue, brunch, and tasty steak. At the steak house, we got the royal treatment because their house wine is one of the wineries that AJ and UR sell to -- we got a tour of the restaurant, including where they dry age the beef. It was pretty cool to see, no pun intended! Here we are in the restaurant. It's nice to see how handsome M looks with hair! (His is growing back gradually.)

Here's one that M took of us while we were waiting for the boys to take the train ride at the Zoo Boo in town.

Here's a picture of the boys that didn't make the cut for Christmas pictures, but it's a cute one!

Merry Christmas everybody!

Spelling 101

2008-11-20T19:13:00.003-05:00

The boys have spelling words every week. T has ten words and R has 20 words. So, we practice them every night and really work on them on Thursday nights since they both have spelling tests on Fridays. I thought you'd like to know what kinds of words they're working on.

T's words (Second Grade):

mud

rust

luck

rug

duck

must

hug

much

shut

He should do okay tomorrow. The word that he trips up on is "much" because he tries to put a "k" after the "c" (muck). Hopefully he'll remember that "ch" makes the "ch" sound.

10 of R's Words (4th grade):

beware

comparison

despair

library

nightmare

repair

prepare

scholarship

narrate

clarify

Both of them have challenge words -- words that give them extra credit if they get them right. R's (4th grade) are all around economics: economics, harvest, scarcity, community....

T(2nd grade), on the other hand, has the hardest challenge words ever: succeed, guard, customer, pugnacious, luscious, luggage. Where did they get those words?? Who even uses the word "pugnacious" these days? Anyway, I had him focus on his regular words, and we chose two challenge words to tackle (customer, luggage.) No reason to stress the boy out trying to spell "luscious". Anyway, how can they go from "us" to "luscious" or "pugnacious." Someone punched the wrong button and clicked 9th grade instead of 2nd grade when they got these challenge words...or something!

Test yourself today to see if you can spell as well as a second and fourth grader.

Singing With A Friend

2008-11-12T19:23:00.003-05:00

T had a friend over for a playdate and they broke out singing a "rap" that they have been singing at recess time. He says that they take "typical songs that we all know and turn it into classic rock." (I'm not so sure about that." T told me that he does some dance moves too. (I call it swaying.) Check it out, it's cute:

Hair Today Gone Tomorrow

2008-11-03T20:40:00.009-05:00

As you know, M is the Cubmaster of the boys' Cub Scout pack. He puts his heart into it and is doing a great job. He has grown the Pack from 8 boys when we first joined three years ago to 27 boys last year and 48 boys this year. Word on the street is that we are a really fun Pack and lots of boys want to be a part of it. He's learned a lot along the way, including how to recruit other volunteer parents; how to delegate; and how to get up in front of the kids and make a fool of himself so that the kids laugh.

The biggest fundraiser of Cub Scouts is popcorn sales. The Pack gets 28% of the sales, which is pretty impressive. Last year our Pack raised $11,000, which was the most ever raised by this Pack. So, M set a goal of $15,000 for this year and said that if that goal was met, the Cub Scouts could shave his head. Well, you do the calculations. With 27 boys we raised $11K, so what should we have raised this year with 48 boys. If you said about double, you were right --we raised just over $20,000. So, M let the boys shave his head.

Here is the before picture:

Here are the action shots:

You can see the excitement from the boys. Who will take the first swipe at M's hair?

They all crowd around to see the action.

Here is T getting ready for his turn. You can see that M is still smiling -- what a trooper!

R was pleased as punch to help cut his dad's hair off.

And now, the "after" shot. As I said before, what a trooper!

"Fall Is" by R

2008-11-03T20:31:00.003-05:00

Here is a poem that R brought home from school. It was displayed on the wall in his classroom during October:

Fall is what you see when you see the color of distinct leaves.

Fall is what you feel when you feel the endless piles of leaves and the hay on a hay ride.

Fall is what you hear when you hear kids playing in leaves and the ring of a bow in deer season.

Fall is what you taste when you taste warm apple cider with pumpkin pie.

Fall is what you smell when you smell a turkey feast on Thanksgiving and candy corn on Halloween.

It is quite poetic...and quite mid western with the deer hunting (LOL). By the way, R made the honor roll at school with over a 3.5 GPA (he's getting one B and the rest A's). M and I went to the school rally this morning to see him get his Honor Roll ribbon -- we're so proud, man.

The second grade doesn't have an honor roll, but if they did, T would have a ribbon too. He's getting one 3 and the rest 4's (just like one B and the rest A's.) We feel that we made a good choice when we switched them to this charter school.

Halloween

2008-11-02T13:06:00.003-05:00

Our friend, A, as Lord somebody from Peter Pan, R as Frankenstein and Squire Thomas. They were allowed to trick or treat on their own down the culdesac by our house before M and A's dad took them down the rest of the street. Meanwhile, A's mom and I sat on the front porch with a bottle of wine and gave out candy to the kids. (I know, I know, we got the good deal for the night, but you may not remember that last year the men stayed at gave out candy while we moms took the kids out in the freezing drizzle. So, we thought it was only fair. After all, it was a balmy 54 degrees this year. As a matter of fact, I think that we deserve to stay back at the house for two years after what we went through last year!)

M and I were invited to a Halloween party last night. We have never been to one together and had a hard time thinking of costumes. All of a sudden, I had a brainstorm and we were....

Dog the Bounty Hunter and his wife, Beth....

Whaddaya think?

Free Military Channel for a Weekend

2008-10-20T18:30:00.004-05:00

This is what R just told me as he was jumping up and down in the way that only he can:
"Yes! I was afraid they were going to say the Phantom was #1, but they didn't! After all, it doesn't have a gun.

I knew it! It's the P51 Mustang -- the best military aircraft in history. I knew it; it's an American classic. I feel (and I'm sure dad does too) that this is the best military plane of all time. Oh yeah!"

This has been my weekend -- a weekend of free Military channel. With TIVO, that weekend will last all week.

A Fun and Busy Weekend

2008-10-13T20:28:00.007-05:00

M and I had this ethical dilemma last week. We were invited to a fancy 40th anniversary party at the Chicago Yacht club that was to start at 6pm on Friday night. The dilemma was when to leave for the windy city. It would take us 3-4 hours to get there, depending on traffic. I had a half day (only a couple more of those for the year) but the kids were in school. The dilemma was when to take them out of school. Since we had to take them out early anyway, we decided to just have them skip school and head to the museum of Science and Industry. This is a museum that we have wanted to take them to for many years. We were waiting for the right time and when they were the right age. Boy, are they the right age now.

R wanted to start in the exhibit called Toys 3000. It taught kids how toys are made and tracked the business of a ball company. The boys had fun climbing a way that tracked the timeline of the business.

They got to watch robots make a toy, a gyroscope, for themselves. They got to pick out the color of the toy and the robots put their names on their toys. Here, T watches, fascinated as the two parts of the gyroscope are put together by the robot.

T loves his gyroscope and says it's cute. He played with it for the entire ride home on Saturday. Here he is, making his "he's so cute face."

One of the robots in the exhibit took a picture of our family and "danced" with it. It was pretty cool.

The coolest exhibit of all for us was the submarine tour and exhibit. When M and I were at the museum a decade ago, the sub was outside and there was no tour and no exhibits around it. That's what we expected and we were excited about that. However, now there is a great exhibit -- lots of hands on activities and a great tour with an engaging story. They don't allow pictures in the sub itself, but here are the boys driving the sub in the simulator. The boys were very proud of themselves because they had a successful mission, after they just watched a pair of adults fail their mission. That's my boys!

That's it for now, I'll write more about the weekend soon.

Apples are the Tofu of Fruit

2008-10-06T19:19:00.002-05:00

We went apple picking when uncle D and Aunt J were here last weekend, so I've been making apple things lately. I started with apple sauce in the crock pot and an apple crumble pie. As the boys were eating the pie, T asked me what was in the recipe.

Me: There are apples, cinnamon, sugar, and a bit of flour
T: There seems like more to it. It's so delicious.
R: The apples taste all cinnoman-y.
Me: That's because they soaked up the cinnamon and now they taste like cinnamon too.
R: Oh, I get it. Apples are like the tofu of fruit!

R was remembering a conversation a few months ago when I told the boys that tofu doesn't really have much flavor of its own, but takes on the flavor of whatever it's cooked with. You gotta love when those synapses start connecting in those brains.

Look at You, Blogging from your Laptop, in the Kitchen

2008-09-24T18:13:00.004-05:00

"Look at you, blogging from your laptop, in the kitchen..." That's what R said to me a few minutes ago. M bought me this awesome laptop a couple of months ago, which is so great for me. But, I haven't been able to blog from it because we couldn't get the wifi to work -- something about loading on the security software first, which prevented us from loading on the wifi software. Thanks to hours of patience by my father on his visit and some more help from M, I'm bogging wireless now! Yippee!! I feel so liberated.

We had a great visit with my folks. It's always so good to see them. I'll write more about their visit later, but here are some pictures that I took.

First, the four of them looking nice...

And here is one of them making goofy faces...

10.5" of Rain

2008-09-16T19:20:00.005-05:00

We had a doozy of a rain storm over the weekend. We got more than 10 inches of rain in three days. Our backyard didn't get the memo about it because it happens about every ten years and the house is only nine years old.

The boys thought it was great fun..."swimming in the backyard!" Or, rather, "turning the backyard into a water park."

I let them play out there for almost two hours. It was about 70 degrees. It was raining the whole time. Hard. At one point, the rain was just pounding down and I thought to myself, I better get them out of there. So, I went to the door and watched them playing in the pounding rain. And I thought to myself, What's the big deal? So they'll get even wetter! So I quietly went back in. A bit later, I made some tea for them to warm up with and called them in. I figured that I should get the cool mom award, but they were bummed because "the water is getting really high now and we can really swim!" Oh well!

On a bummer note...our basement flooded. Everywhere. Hundreds of gallons of water. About an inch or so. Everywhere. It started as a trickle in a known-to-be-affected area, which we thought was under control. Then, it started coming in the other known-to-be-affected area, which took awhile, but became under control.

Then it started coming up from the ground. That's right, the water came up through the floor of the basement. Perhaps it's because there were "water puddles" under the grass outside. They raised up, ever so gracefully, like a mound of grass. When you stepped on them, you squished down about 6 inches of water underneath.

And all of that water came into our basement.

We started with the carpet cleaner, sucking up the bits of water here and there. Then we got the wet/dry vac. We both worked down there for hours upon hours. My asthma acted up big time with all that humidity and I was panting and panting, trying to catch my breath. M would tell me to go up, but I would shake my head, No, I'm staying to help. Finally, he'd help me see that I couldn't BREATHE and breathing is rather important to living. So, he stayed and I collapsed upstairs, finally catching my breath an hour or so later.

We went to bed at midnight with most of the water cleaned up. We woke up to a basement full of water...even in places where it hadn't been before. Ugh! It kept coming up until about noon on Monday. Now we have a commercial dehumidifier going (along with our regular dehumidifier) and a commercial fan (along with our box fan). Yesterday, we kept the AC on at 65 cold degrees to help dry everything out. It's finally dry.

The irony is that the boys and I had just spent three hours cleaning up the basement on Saturday morning so that they could show their grandparents their Nintendo Wii games next weekend. I organized all of the Cub Scout stuff and consolidated it from 5 boxes to three. Lots of work. The boys picked up their toys and rearranged some things. At first I thought that all of that hard work was for naught, but then I realized that it was a blessing because we were able to quickly move things to higher ground since it was all organized. I'm definitely looking at the bright side -- like, good thing our basement isn't finished with carpeting -- it would all be ruined.

Now, the basement is water-free, but has mountains of things piled up upon couches and tables. So much for the Nintendo Wii demonstration -- as R says, at least I saved the electronic equipment from the flood. That's a nice optimistic view for sure.

T Can Ride a Bike

2008-09-14T19:16:00.005-05:00

Last Sunday, M was out with T and he called me on the phone. M said, "are you ready to go for a ride, T wants to show you something." So, I grabbed my camera and this is what I saw! (Okay, I know, it's not a surprise since you already read the title of this blog, but you can pretend to be surprised when you look at the picture.) Isn't his proud smile just precious?!

I like this shot of him putting on his helmet. Such effort is involved

And one more of the big boy in motion. I sure love him...

First Day of School

2008-09-06T17:48:00.003-05:00

T and R started their new school year on Tuesday. They're going to a new school this year -- a charter school that emphasises the three R's. They weren't too sure about going to a new school, but they like it okay now. There is a pretty strict dress code - plain pants (black, navy, brown, gray, tan) and plain shirts with collars (no stripes or prints) and belts. Here they are getting ready for their first day.

They both chose to wear blue shirts on the first day, but they could have picked any color. Can you tell that they are a bit apprehensive? Anyway, they had a really good first day, they both have made friends and they're going to do great.

I got a pretty good smile out of T. See how he buckles that chest strap on his backpack? He's always done that.

Summer Ends At Shady Shores

2008-09-06T17:21:00.003-05:00

I've blogged about the great time that we have at Shady Shores in years past. http://keepingupwiththesmiths.blogspot.com/2007/09/shady-shores-2007.html This year was no exception. We all had such a great time. We get together with our friend, Kevin, who used to work for me in San Fran. He has a bunch of family (cousins, sister, aunt, uncle) and friends who we join at this adorable little complex of cottages on Lake Huron. This isn't the best picture because it's taken from the street, but it gives you an idea of how the cottages face each other and are perpendicular to the lake. It's so quaint.

Each little cottage is about 500 square feet or so and have two bedrooms, a tiny kitchen/living room, a bathroom, and a sun porch. Ours is #7 (we've had the same one for all three years that we've been there.)

We played on the beach, swam in the lake, canoed and kayaked on a nearby river, and kayaked in the lake, played tether ball, shuffle board, and board games (including pegs and jokers) for four great days. It was so relaxing.
Everybody is so welcoming that we feel like part of the family -- hugs all around when we arrive and when we leave. The kids run around with all the other kids and have a great time. I think that they really like their Independence there.

T had lots of fun too. When he wanted some quiet time, he got out his journal of hand-made paper and his colored pencils and drew. He went out to the beach to be inspired by the scene that was out there.
I took a close up picture over his shoulder so you can see what he was drawing. He was focusing on getting the seagull just right.
We also went to a Paul Bunyan festival for a day and had a good time watching the chainsaw wood carvers and listening to tall tales. The boys even used am old-fashioned two-man saw to slice a "wooden nickle" (it was about 8 inches in diameter) and watched a boy scout brand it for them. I forgot my camera that day, so I don't have any pictures -- darn.

Here are the boys standing in front of the Shady Shores sign, like I have them do every year. What a great way to end the summer!

A New Smile

2008-08-27T22:35:00.005-05:00

While we were in Isle Royal, T lost his third tooth. It had been loose for awhile, but not loose enough to pull out. We were at the Lodge and it had been raining, so we waited it out playing our new favorite card game, Kings in the Corner. After the rain stopped, the boys and I headed out to hear a park ranger talk about fishing on the island in the 1800's. We didn't all even make it out of the door, when I saw (in slow motion, of course) T slip on the wet floor outside and slam his mouth into the edge of the screen door. Blood was dripping out of his mouth and he was screaming bloody murder with big tears coming down his face. He had his hands over his mouth and we saw that his tooth was out. M and I tried to make it a happy occasion - Yay, that tooth finally fell out! But, T wouldn't have it. He was crying into the sink, saying "this is not good" and "I am not happy about this" and "it hurts too bad! It will never be the same." We got him to stop crying and got the blood stopped, when it happened...he saw himself in the mirror.

Oh. My. Goodness.

Did the crying and wailing start again! "I look ridiculous!" " I can't believe this happened!"

Needless to say, we were late for the Ranger talk, but we did make it.

He's okay now. Thank goodness.

I'm sure you're wondering.... The tooth fairy did come, but came to our house and gave him double pay (two bucks) for the "pain and suffering." When T got up to bed after we came home, he found the money and was totally stoked.

Here he is in his glory the day after the incident:

A Visit to Gladstone

2008-08-17T21:38:00.003-05:00

My gramma was born in Gladstone, MI, so we took a bit of a detour on our way home to make sure that we visited her birthplace. Although she moved to California when she was three years old, you'd think that she lived in Michigan all her life. Whenever the University of Michigan was in the Rose Bowl (which has been a lot during my lifetime), my Grandmas would put Michigan colors and pennants up and sing the fight song. She has always been so proud of her homestate!

The town is just a little one in the "UP" (the upper peninsela of Michigan.) There's not really much going on in town. It looks like it used to be a big iron mining and railroad town back in the day. I'm very glad that I got to look it up, though.

Ever since I've lived in the midwest, she always asks me if I've been to Gladstone, MI. Well, now I can proudly tell her that...yes, I have!

Thank You for Playing!

2008-08-17T16:55:00.002-05:00

Believe it or not, your stories make more sense that our actual conversation. Here it goes.

The boys were getting ready to go to Cub Scout camp (they left today) so I was telling them Girl Scout camp stories. I went about 7 years in a row, so I had a lot of stories and had 'em laughing and laughing. I got to my CIT year (Counselor in Training) and the boys were a bit giddy. I explained how I had pool duty for most of the camp, including "polar bear swimming" (7 am swimming in a COLD pool) and "water ballet." This is where the crazy story starts....

Me: So my friend Julie and I were in charge of teaching the girls a water ballet. We had never done it before, but we figured we could do it. We picked a song that was popular at the time, "Copa Cabana."

R: You said that you got sunburned, you should have picked "Rock Lobster" (he says with his head banging in that rock-n-roll way.)

T: "R, it's Red Lobster, not Rock Lobster!"

T: Mom, I don't know that song, will you sing it?

Me: Sure, it goes something like, "Her name was Lola, she was a show girl, with diamonds in her hair and a dress cut down to there. His name was Rico, he wore a diamond..." Oh, I don't know all the words, but it was a good song. I finished the story, explaining all the moves that we did. Later on, as R was rinsing the dishes, I heard him singing.

R: "His name was Rico, he was a beaver..."

Me: Rico's not a beaver, honey. (Both boys cracked up.)

R: I'll just sing the song I made up earlier today: "I'm taking a ride on a camel's back."

Crazy conversation, huh? Anyway, I was smiling and loving every minute of it the whole time.

You Guess the Conversation

2008-08-15T19:46:00.001-05:00

The boys and I were eating dinner, laughing and telling stories. Here are three quotes from one conversation. These quotes didn't happen all in a row, but over the course of a five-minute conversation about a story that I was telling about Girl Scout camp. Your job is to try to guess what we were talking about (good luck!) or create a story that incorporates all three quotes. So, I'm looking for interactive blogging and commenting here.... Here it goes:

T: "R, it's Red Lobster, not Rock Lobster!"

Me: "Rico's not a beaver, honey."

R: " I'm taking a ride on a camel's back."

The Many Bandana Looks of T

2008-08-14T19:23:00.003-05:00

T loved wearing his bandana. He wore it a few different ways to get different looks and different levels of comfy-ness. The one above is when he took off the bandana without untying it, and moved the knot to the front. It has sort of an Aunt Jemima quality to it, doesn't it?

Here he is with a similar look, but a bit more open. He didn't care that his brother and parents told him it looked a bit strange, he still liked it.

Then, of course, there's this look, which is really quite normal.

Back from the Wilderness

2008-08-10T14:56:00.024-05:00

We're back! It was a beautiful place to visit -- and the only way to see it is to either kayak or backpack. We were in the "backcountry" for four days, hiking or backpacking on three of them. As you know, I had never backpacked before so it was quite an experience. The good news: I was able to use pit toilets and spare myself the whole pooping-in-the-woods thing. (There, I got that out of the way. I know you were all wondering.)

After a 10 1/2 hour drive, we spent the night in Copper Harbor -- the northenmost part of Michigan. Then we took the 3 hour ferry to Isle Royale. M was excited that it looked just like it used to look when he was a teenager, only smaller (as most things do as we grow up!) We got our packs on and headed over to the water taxi, which took us to Daisy Farm. Daisy Farm would be our home for two nights. The water taxi dropped us off at the dock and the boys and M checked out the map to see where we'd sleep for the night.

We basically had to walk around the campsite to find an open site. If no one was there, we could have it. We were lucky to not only find a site, but to find a shelter! I was so excited -- in addition, it was just a stone's throw from the lake (Lake Superior, that is.) We set up our two 2-man tents in the shelter just in case it rained (you can see the tent through the screen of the shelter in the picture.)

This is taken from the picnic table in our site looking towards the lake. M and R were filtering water when I took this picture. We filtered water twice a day so that we would each have 2-3 liters of water a day to drink, plus enough to cook and wash dishes with.

Now, about our backpacks. T carried about 14 pounds when we added his water for the day. We each carried our own sleeping bag, clothes, extra pair of shoes, and our own water -- plus food. (M and I carried the tents and cooking gear. The picture below shows what T carried: two ziplock bags with his clothes (one for shirts, undies, socks, and one for pants/shorts.) He also carried two dinners (dehydrated minestrone soup and beef strongenoff) and the hot drink bag (instant coffee, tea bags, cocoa bags, creamers, and splenda) and his fishing pole and reel.

R carried similar things to T, but a bit more. His food included some heavier things -- granola bars and oatmeal for each day. He also carried my air mattress, which I'm forever grateful.

After we got our camp squared away, we hit the lake. Both boys went swimming in their skivvies as did all of the other backpackers out on the dock. R stayed in the water for almost an hour and loved running and jumping off the pier. T was in the water too, but got out often to warm up on the dock.

After dinner ("Daisy Farm Tuna Mac" named by M) the boys and I played a mean game of Crazy Eights.

M and the boys tried their hand at fishing a few times, but with no luck. Later in the trip, we heard that it was a really bad year for trout.

The next day was our day hike up to Mount Ojibiway. It was a little more than six miles round trip. With the incline to get to the top, we were glad that we didn't have our packs with us. M carried T's pack as a daypack for our lunch (PB&J on tortillas) and water. R carried a hip pack with our first aid kit in it.

Some times we hiked through swamps, so the forest rangers built these boardwalks, which I loved.

The view from the top was stunning. We could see Canada, which was what the boys were hoping would be the case.

The next day we headed out for our second camp, Three Mile. It was a four mile hike with full packs. The last mile was a BEAR, and the first three miles weren't that easy either. The trail was clearly marked, but there were tons of tree roots and rocks just waiting to twist an ankle. The last mile was up and down over boulders. We were thrilled to arrive at the campsite and even more thrilled to get a shelter right on the water again.

Setting out on the trip at 9 AM, we were all in good spirits. R and T stop for a water break using our hydration bladders in our packs.
A few hours later they weren't so happy and fresh. They hung in there, but were glad to have a break. T rarely got tired, he was always raring to go. R got pretty tired and not so happy at times. Funny how that turned out...
With a little more hiking to do, we made it to our great camping spot for the night.

We woke up to see the sunrise and get an early start the next day. We had showers and comfy beds on our minds, and wanted to get to them as soon as we could. T took this picture of the sunrise at our campsite. Beautiful.

It's amazing how a swim, good dinner, and good night sleep can be so refreshing. The boys donned their bandannas and we took off for the Lodge -- 4 miles away.

Here's a view of the Lodge from the water - it's very quaint. It looks nicer than it is -- the rooms are like a Motel 6 room. It didn't have a TV, but it had a bath and a shower and two comfy beds. That's all we needed!

Here we are all cleaned up and ready say good bye to the island and take the ferry back to the mainland.

Renassaince Faire and Trip Prep

2008-08-01T16:38:00.013-05:00

Last year we went to the Renaissance Faire for the first time and the boys loved it. R had a blast fencing with the "champs" of the faire. This year he convinced his brother to have a dual with him. Both boys donned fencing gear and had two balloons taped to their masks. The person who popped both balloons of his opponent first won.

R was very excited about this opportunity to "fight" his brother -- usually he's told not to fight with his brother. On this day, we encourage him, even paid for him to fight with his brother. You can almost see his big smile through his mask.

On the other hand, I don't think T was too excited for the match. Maybe he knew that he didn't have a chance since his brother is taller, has longer arms, and won last year two times...

Nevertheless, they went at it....and R won after a good match.
M challenged me to a duo and I crazily accepted. Talk about a height/arm length advantage! He beat me mercilessly -- even when I did take a slice at his balloons, those darn things wouldn't pop!

The boys also participated in a Peter Pan sword fighting class (never mind that Peter Pan used a bow and arrow....he taught sword fighting that day.)

Both boys really enjoyed the class and really got into it. (T had a bit more fun doing this than fencing with his brother.) The man who was Peter Pan did a really good job at engaging the kids in the class.

After they completed their training, the boys fought the bad guy, Sheriff John. It was a good show/class.

During a magician show, R volunteered and was up on stage for about 15 minutes. He even cracked a joke or too -- what a shy boy! NOT!

Isle Royale Trip
For the next week, starting tomorrow, we will be heading to Isle Royale National Park for a backpacking trip. Yep, you read that correctly, I am going backpacking. I don't really see the need for carrying everything that you need on your back, but M does and I love him, so we're doing it. Isle Royale is a place that he talked about on our first date. He went there for a few years in a row with his youth group and he loved it. He used to always talk about how he wanted to go back and take is kids there when he had kids.

Originally, he was just going to go with the boys because I had no interest in going. After all, we're talking about backpacking here. Carry all you need on your back; sleep in a tent; poop in the woods. That's not for me. I'm not a priss by any means, but come on...poop in the woods! But, as they talked about it and I looked at pictures of the beautiful place, I began to get jealous. So, I'm going. We're not really hiking far at all -- only about 4 miles a day (with loaded packs). Now, I'm really excited about it. (By the way, I think that two of the camp grounds we're going to have pit toilets. I never knew I'd be so excited about outhouses in my life!)

I'm looking forward simply to making family memories..oh, and seeing moose.
T's looking forward to eating gorp and seeing the cool wild flowers and picking thimble berries and fishing.
R's looking forward to doing the day hike to Mt Ojibiwa because we'll be able to see Canada, and picking thimble berries.
M's looking forward to sharing his fond memories with his family.

By the way, R's birthday is tomorrow and he'll be 9. How many 9 year olds have been backpacking? Probably not too many...and even fewer have been to Isle Royale.

And They're Off!

2008-07-19T20:22:00.004-05:00

(Note: I posted two blogs today. Don't miss the one below this one.)

Yes, it's that time of year again. Time for the Chicago to Mackinac Island race. I heard on the radio that it's the most prestigious fresh water sailing race in the world. Wow!

For the first time, the boys and I saw M off in Chicago. Usually we drive up to "the island" as folks around the race call Mackinac Island and driving to Chicago too makes for a lot of driving.

We had a great time. We dropped M off at the harbor at 10:00 this morning for his 10:30 boat call (he wanted to do some adjustments on the boat before everybody got there.) It was pouring rain when we dropped him off. Not a good sign for a comfy race. He said that it was going to be a wet three days.

Then we went to Navy Pier in Chicago. The boys and I played around at the Children's Museum there for a couple of hours and then headed to the end of the pier to see M's boat parade by. We met M's folks, brother and sister-in-law at the end of the pier. It was fun because there were hundreds of boats out there already racing. M's fleet is the biggest and starts last (since they're so fast.) He told me that they'd be by at about 12:30 or so. At ten to one there they were! I yelled to him and he heard me and waved! What fun! We saw his uncle and cousin on the boat too.

I took this picture of them going by the Chicago Light House. He's gonna love the photo 'cause he sure loves the Chicago Light House.

Here's a closer up one of the crew as they sailed by. M's waving to us.

May the winds be swift. Good luck sailors!

Best In Show

2008-07-19T19:36:00.011-05:00

I'm officially the coolest mom ever. It's true. If you don't believe me, just ask R.

You see, a couple of weeks ago I read that there was going to be a Guitar Hero competition for kids going into 3rd through 6th grades and I signed him up. You should have seen his almost-nine-year-old version of his happy dance! What he also loved is that instead of his usual 30-minute maximum of video games per day, I told him that since he was "in training" for the competition, he should practice an hour twice a day for the week before the competition.

And did he practice! His dad was kind enough to practice with him often. Notice the faces concentrating so hard during this riff.

After a week of intense training, the day came. I fed him a good lunch with protein and carbs to keep him going, then we were off.

As excited for R that I was, I didn't realize that I'd have to watch (and listen!) to FIVE HOURS of rock and roll! OHMYGoodness, did I ever have a headache when it was over. (I know, I'm old.)

Anyway, this is what we watched for five hours. We saw the backs of two boys for five minutes, then we saw the backs of two different boys for five more minutes. And so on and so on and so on and so on.... for FIVE HOURS.

Each pair of boys played two songs -- each boy got to pick one song that they challenged the other boy to play. You get points for the number of notes you get correct. Some kids were hitting about 70% of the notes correctly, then there were some in the 90%. R is better at some songs than others. He gets from 84%-97% right at home. I crossed my fingers.

When it was R's turn, R picked "The Metal" to play and he hit 96% of the notes correctly (rock on!) His competitor hit about 75% correct.

Then, it was his competitor's turn to pick a song. I held my breath, praying "oh, please be a song that R knows and is good at." The boy picked "Helicopter." I had never heard of it before. I quickly looked at M and he had a big smile on his face. "R rocks this song out!", he said to me. I breathed a sigh of relief. R got 98% of the notes right on that one!! I was a proud mama bear. (R told me afterwards that when he saw that the boy was going to pick "Helicopter," he thought to himself, "Okaa-aayyy, if you really want me to play this song, I'll be glaaad to play it since I LOVE it!")

As they began the competition, they announced that there would be a Best in Show award given to the kid who "rocked out" and had good showmanship during their performance. About an hour into it, we realized that no one was rocking out, so M and I encouraged R to have a blast and do his thing while he performed.

R did some awesome rock-and-roll-kicks when he hit the key chords when transitioning to the bridge of the song (don't I sound oh-so-rock-and-roll-ish with my jargon?)

You can tell by his stance that he was groovin' and rockin' with the rhythm. I was so proud, man! I was cracking up and crying with pride the whole time!

After the first song, I put my camera away so I could watch. That means that you won't be able to see his turning-around-backwards-and playing-without-looking at the screen stunt. It also means that you won't be able to see his "atomic knee drop" that he ended the show with. Let me tell you, I almost peed my pants! It was awesome.

And he was awarded for his awesomeness. He was given the award for Best in Show! Too cool, huh!

Only two boys from each level (Easy, Medium, Hard, Expert) made it to the finals. Believe it or not, but there were two boys who got 100% on one of their songs and they moved on. (I think that they were ringers and should have been competing on Hard, but R's cool with the results.)

T was there the whole time too, playing his Nintendo DS. Once during the competition, they had a competitor who was going to play Easy (R plays Medium) and they needed someone to play him, so T volunteered. He had a great time too and played better than he's ever played at home.

As a matter of fact, his competitor picked a song, Welcome to the Jungle, that he's never played before and he did pretty well on it.

Cub Scout Overnight

2008-07-08T18:58:00.011-05:00

M was in charge of a wonderful Cub Scout overnight. It was all day on Saturday and then they spent the night. He did a good job of delegating (tough for him to do) so that he had four sets of parents in charge of four different one-hour activities during the day. The theme was native Americans and each boy was assigned to one of three tribes. When they arrived, they were given a blank neckerchief and told to think of their Indian name and decorate their neckerchief with that name. They also decorated slides to hold their neckerchief on -- and they got beads throughout the day to add to their slide.

As with all Cub Scout meetings, the flag ceremony is a very important part. There were 19 kids in all during the day. Not a bad turn out in the summer for a pack that has 25 kids in total.

R poses with a group of Cub Scouts who are excited to start their day of fun (R is in grey with a green neckerchief.) Each tribe has a different color neckerchief -- two tribes' colors are represented here.

I did a lot of the research for M for this outing. Here is T (with yellow neckerchief) playing one of the games I discovered. The kids would throw a feather, run, pick it up and throw it again until they made it to the finish line. You can see T's yellow feather in the air in front of him.

One of the activities was to make a fishing pole out of sticks. M cut down all of the branches for the project and another dad led the activity during the day. R is picking out his lucky fishing pole. It was so lucky that he caught a fish without any bait!

Nothing like a group of boys praying before dinner to warm your heart. (R is in the back in grey and T is in the back center in yellow.)

The kids made "candy apples" in the fire by coring an apple and shoving brown sugar and raisins in it and wrapping in foil. Cook for 15 minutes and voila! Tasty goodness!

Not the best picture, but I wanted you to see the beads that they were able to get throughout the day. T is putting his last bead for the day (given to him for performing in a skit).

After the campfire, there was a quick thunderstorm and then a beautiful rainbow to end the day. I went home to the luxury of my comfy bed (and allergy-free house) while the boys stayed in the tent. A good ending to a great day.

Week at the Club on the Lake

2008-07-01T18:25:00.016-05:00

Two weeks ago we had our second annual week at the cottage. Just like last year, we stayed with another family. Just like last year we had a really nice time. Oh, there were lots of reasons not to have a good time: four days of 60-degree weather and thunderstorms; I was sick for three of the days with severe allergies. (Long story on the allergy front, but I had an ear infection, sinus infection, and a throat infection from allergies. AND I "grew into" allergy-induced-athsma! Total bummer! But, we won't focus on that.)

As my friend says, any day on the lake is a good day.

Since our weather in June is unpredictable, I packed lots of indoor activities to play. The boys and I also loaded up on library books before leaving. I also got little toys to hide in the sand so that even if it was too cold to go in the water, they'd have fun in the sand. Of course, any weather (except thunderstorms) is good sailing weather. And, almost any weather is good fishing weather. So, all in all, it was a good vacation. Here it is in pictures.

T had a blast using his new snorkel and goggles. I threw three dollars worth of coins into the shallow part of the lake and he spent HOURS looking for the coins. I think that he collected about $1.60 worth. Not bad for hours of fun.

M had a blast with the newest addition to our fleet -- a little Sunfish. While he was zipping around the lake with high winds, I could hear him yell "yahooo" from across the lake.

The boys are trying to get the baby dinosaur out of the "dinosaur eggs." This kept them busy for awhile and then they made houses in the sand for their dinosaurs.

M took T for a ride on the Sunfish. This is a sailboat that T actually likes to go on. He likes to capsize on purpose and then right it (with his dad's help.)

T also loved taking the kayak out for a spin. He said it was lonely sometimes when nobody went with him, but he'd go anyway if he couldn't talk someone else into going also.

The whole family fits on "Sabotage," the boat that M and R race on Sundays. Can you tell that I'm driving? (But, I'm obviously not paying too much attention to driving since I'm waving to someone!)

Fishing was an everyday activity on this vacation. We got a lot of pan fish that we caught and released. One keeper, a huge Rock Bass, was one that we ate because T loves to eat fish and couldn't believe that we weren't eating all of the 24 fish that he caught. He was quite pleased with the Bass nuggets that I prepared as a shore lunch one day. Here is R fishing off the stern of our friends speed boat (anchored for this occasion.)

I love this one of T checking his hook. I don't know if you can tell, but he has his life vest under his sweatshirt -- he looked like the Incredible Hulk.

The boys really wanted to catch Walleye - a tasty fish in this region -- but they only bite at night. They woke up really early(5 am) and went out to give it a try. They even used live minnows as bait. They didn't catch any walleye, but this was the trip that they got the keeper bass that we ate. They used our fishing canoe to get to the deep hole (50 feet deep) in the lake.

Here's the keeper in the live well. Hard to see it, I know.

The proud fishermen, facing the sun with closed eyes. But, very proud of their early morning outing.

I tried to go back to sleep after I saw the boys off, but I couldn't. So I crept back downstairs in my pjs and took these lovely sunrise pictures. Then I made a cup of tea and sat outside watching the sunrise, waiting for my men to bring home breakfast.

At the end of the week, we packed up and went home. It was a fun week at the lake....and it was nice to return home.

Specs

2008-06-12T19:47:00.007-05:00

In October, we got both boys' eyes checked. R needed a new prescription for his glasses and T's eyes checked out okay. It was T's first appointment ever and we wanted to make sure that he didn't have the same problem that R did. T has a slight astigmatism, but nothing to worry about. Fast forward to April....within two weeks, T complained about a headache twice, and then finally said that things were blurry when he reads.

Three days later, we had him back at the eye doctor and it turns out that he also needs glasses for "up close work." It's not his astigmatism that's the problem, it's that his eyes have grown and changed and now needs glasses. So, he and M picked up some very snazzy glasses. M came home and told me that they were "trendy." Not sure what trendy means for kids glasses, but they are a cool shape and very blue. The pictures don't really show the color well (I'll have to take another picture in daylight.) Here they are as he was reading "If you give a Moose A Muffin" to me:

I asked R to put on his glasses so you can see both of them in their glasses glory. (I really do need to take a picture in the daylight; that flash isn't good. But you get the idea, right?)

After dinner, R asked if he could go outside and read. A bit later, T joined him with his box of pastels and pastel paper. What a great sight for a mom to peak out at! It's not too often that these boys are both quiet at the same time :>

Haiku revisited

2008-06-03T19:13:00.002-05:00

The boys are bringing home a lot of things from school since it's the last week before summer vacation. R brought home something that he "published" (it was a poem he wrote that his teacher selected for R to type up on the computer. She put the finished poem on the wall at school.) Here it goes:

Forest

by R. Smith

Shady, oh so nice

Soft moss is under my feet

I feel a fresh breeze.

Nice, huh?!

One-Man Band

2008-05-12T19:26:00.003-05:00

At dinner tonight, T said to me: "Mom, I made a one-man band today with two instruments."
Me: Cool. What instruments did you play?
T: The bongo drums and accordion.
Me(trying to picture this): Wow! How did you do that? Did you play the bongos with your feet?
T: No, I had my arms around the bongo drums, with my hands holding the accordion.
Me (still trying to picture how this works): So, did you play the bongos with your head?
T: No, I played the bongo drum with the accordion! It worked great!

Ahhh, I should have thought of that.

Note on a completely different subject: Thin plastic cutting boards don't work as a baking sheet protector in the oven, even if it looks just like the baking sheet protector you own. It just melts in the oven and stinks up to high heaven.

Midieval Cake Auction

2008-04-21T19:08:00.013-05:00

We spent the weekend working on some projects with the boys. One was the Cake Auction for Cub Scouts. The theme that the whole pack voted on was "Midieval." My boys were thrilled with his theme. They love knights, swords, dragons, and such.

M and I looked up different cake designs online (what did we used to do without the internet?) We found an awesome idea for a dragon using home-made Rice Krispies Treats to mold into a dragon. We ran the ideas by both boys and were able to convince R that he would love that for his cake (he's easier to persuade than his younger brother.) T wouldn't go for the dragon cake because he had his heart set on a catapult. Yes, that's right, a cake with a catapult on it. Of course, I let M engineer that one.

First, I helped each boy make a cake. T made a chocolate one and R made a yellow butter cake. We decided that both cakes should be "castle grey." I remembered seeing black food coloring in the store at Halloween time, so we got some of that and put a few drops in the frosting.

T carefully frosted his cake, which was going to be a fort with a catapult in it.

M and R made the Rice Krispies Treat mixture and we added lots of green food coloring to it. After spraying his hand with Pam, R molded the dragon onto the parchment paper with the sketched out dragon on it. This process worked really well. (I don't think that he liked the texture at first, but he got used to it.)

He got the hang of it. It was tricky timing. You had to work with the mixure after it had cooled off a bit so it would hold together, but before it got too cool and wouldn't be maleable anymore.

The end result was a pretty good looking dragon. It's sitting here waiting to cool and harden before being decorated with fondit scales, eyes, teeth, tongue, and claws. (I was scared to make and work with fondit, but M found a recipe that seemed easy enough, so I did it and it worked pretty well.)

Then it was T's turn to make his Rice Krispies Treat mixure (and dye it brown) for the base of the catapult (or "cannonpult" as T insists upon saying despite repeated pronunciation lessons from his well-meaning mother.)

The best part about working with Rice Krispies Treats is tasting the mixture. T and M made the entire catapult out of Rice Krispies Treats on Saturday, only to have Mackinaw eat the whole thing while we were taking a nap. So, M rebuild it (with modifications using Kelloggs Cereal Straws) on Sunday. Somehow I don't have pictures of the work in progress (perhaps due to the stress of the untimely demise of the first catapult or perhaps due to the stress of wondering if the dog was going to live another day...) But, see below for the best catapult cake (throwing fire balls) that you've ever seen in your life.
Sunday evening was the actual cake auction. Each boy stood up and explained what his cake was and how he made it. Then the bidding began. The deal was that bids could only go up to $15 and if the boy (and his family) wanted to buy the cake back, they could for $1 more than the highest bid. I had fun running the bid up on cakes that I knew that families were going to buy back. You should have seen R and T's faces when they saw me bidding for cake after cake -- Mom, are we going to take ALL those cakes home? or you should have seen my face when R tried to outbid me on a cake that we did cake home. I had to explain to him, "when Mommy bids $10, you don't bid $11, okay?" It was a lot of fun! We bought back T's cake and also a little boy's cake that nobody else was bidding on -- I felt sorry for him and bought it for ten bucks.

Here's T standing proudly with his catapult cake. You'll see there are brownie pieces decorating the outside of the cake -- T loved this real castle look. (Also notice the really long cake behind T. That's an excalibur sword cake -- pretty cool.)

R is posing like a dragon near his dragon cake. He described it as "a fire breathing dragon on a rocky surface using Rice Krispies Treats and fondut for the dragon."

The Cub Scouts had a goal of raising $160 for the night and they surpasssed it, raising $240. As a reward, each Scout was given one water balloon and at the count of three, they each threw their balloon at their den leader. What a blast! M brought a change of clothes just in case, but he didn't get wet. Three balloons hit him, bounced off, and broke on the grass (much to the disappointment of his little Tiger Cubs.) All in all, it was a fun activity :>

M passed out the water balloons to the excited boys, thrilled at the chance to get their den leaders wet.

Cherry Blossoms in DC

2008-04-13T15:29:00.018-05:00

Whew! What a trip we just had! It was spring break week and we took the bull by the horns for our first big-time road trip. We did lots of planning for the trip and knew that there was more to see than the time we had, so we prioritized our list of must-sees, saving the rest for "next time." In the car on the drive home, R said that I should put a warning at the beginning of this blog, saying that it would be a long one, because we did so much. Consider yourself warned.

Here's we go:

Saturday

Drove ten hours to Baltimore. The boys watched DVDs (Transformers and School House Rock) and played Nintendo DS (Pokemon and Zelda) in the car on the way. We arrived at the hotel at bedtime.

Sunday

Baltimore aquarium, B&O Railroad, and Fort Mc Henry.

Weather: Cloudy and about 50 degrees

The Baltimore aquarium was really nice. It was set up so that you meandered your way up and up, seeing different parts of the sea on each level. They also had a dolphin show and IMAX theater. R bought a bookmark and T bought a thimble as souvineers. (They both had twenty bucks to spend for the whole trip. They managed their cash very carefully.)

Baltimore is home to the first railroad in the country (the B&O of Monopoly fame). The museaum had some amazing old locomotives -- it was one of the best collectections we've seen (and you know we've seen a lot!)

We only planned on doing two things today, but M and I really wanted to see Fort McHenry also. It was here in 1814 that Francis Scott Key saw "the bombs bursting in air" and inspired him to write the Star Spangled Banner. We got there with 45 minutes to run around the fort and check it out -- we're very glad that we did.

Dinner at a cute little spot just off the Inner Harbor -- We had appetizers of veggies and three dips -- hummus, red peppe puree, and yogurt and cucumber dip. We were off to a good start! For dinner, I had crab cakes (when in Rome!) and the boys had cream of crab soup (again, when in Rome!), M had some kind of fish too. Yummo!

This is a cute picture of T (with his two missing bottom front teeth) showing the pear that he chose for his snack that day. He wanted me to blog it so that AJ would see it because "she really likes pears."

Monday

Washington DC - trolley tour, Jefferson Memorial, FDR Memorial, Lincoln Memorial, Arlington Cemetary, Korean War Memorial, Vietnam War Memorial, WWII Memorial.

Weather: 44 degrees and drizzly, or as I like to say, "slightly miserable"

We decided to take a trolley tour of the city which allows you to get on and off as you'd like. Thank goodness we did, because we did enough walking to walk our feet off, even with the trolley. We had a really nice guide, "Grumpy", who put R and T up next to him in the front. He'd ask them questions, and of course, R would answer while T would look down at the floor of the trolley. Grumpy loved R and first called him the "Jr Tour Guide," but upgraded him to the "Co-Tour Guide" by the end of the tour because R knew so much!
We got off at the Jefferson Memorial and walked to the FDR and Lincoln Memorials. I had never been to the FDR one before and it was pretty cool. The boys had a good time checking everything out.
It was Cherry Blossom time too -- and they were gorgeous.

Then we took the trolly to Arlingon Cemetary. It made me cry to see the rows upon rows of thousands upon thousands military buried there. We also saw the changing of the guards at the Tomb of the Unkowns -- something I remember doing with my grandparents when I was 12. R really appreciated it and T thought it was boring.
Back in DC, we walked from the Koren War memorial (where we thought of Uncle Harold) to the Vietnam Memorial (where we thought of Uncle Paul's daddy) to the WWII Memorial (where we thought of Great Grandpa Smith).
Finally, we walked by the Washington Monument and caught our trolley back to Union Station, where we took the return train back to Baltimore.

Note: We pushed it to far. Everything was great until the last hour, when T just broke down -- crying, tired, headache, stomach ache. Was he dehydrated? Hungry? Sick? We weren't sure. He was a miserable wreck, sobbing and sobbing -- and there was nothing we could do that would help him. I knew if we could just get him on the train and leave him alone, he'd be okay. Luckily, I was right. About twenty minutes into the 35 minute train ride, he was feeling better and back to his happy self. We learned our lesson and scaled back the days to come.
On the shuttle to the hotel, there was another family with two boys. Our boys hit it off and had a great conversation comparing DC stories.

The boys wanted to climb the trees, but was a mean mon and told them they couldn't. Here they are hanging a bit from the tree, which I didn't say they couldn't do.

T and R liked the statue of FDRs dog. You can see that it's a favorite picture among kids -- see the shiny tips of the ears and nose where people have rubbed off the patina over the years?
Eating lunch by the Korean War Memorial. We packed our lunches and snacks everyday and stayed at a hotel with free breakfast, so that we'd only have to eat dinner out. Every little bit to save money helps!

M and the boys in front of the Lincoln Memorial.

We took a bus into Arlington Cemetary in Arlington Virginia (just a few miles from DC). The boys were curious about touring a cemetary. We saw JFKs eternal flame, as well as Bobby Kennedy's simple white cross.

Watching the guard slowly march back and forth in front of the Tomb of the Unkowns (it used to be called Tomb of the Unkown Soldiers, but has been changed to the Unkowns since they might be airmen or Marines or something else.) This guard was amazing to watch; he was so precise with his walk and how he turned around in three moves, with a clack of his heal each turn.)

This is the official changing of the guards, which happens every 30 minutes. It was such a sight to see! So serious, respectful, and somber. I'm so glad that I got to see this again and to share it with M and the boys.

At the Vietnam War Memorial, we looked up Varner Party of Five's dad. I didn't find the exact name that I was looking for, but I found this name that I think is right. We all rubbed our fingers on it and thought about the grandpa that our cousins never met.

Tuesday

Swimming at the hotel, Naval Acadamy at Annapolis Maryland, more swimming at the hotel

Weather: 55 degrees, cloudy
Based upon T's breakdown, we made Tuesday our easy day -- I knew we'd need one, I just didn't know we'd need it so soon!

We slept in, ate breakfast, and went swimming at the hotel.

We left to go to Annapolis in time to get to the Naval Acadamy by noon, when all of the midshipmen would be out in formation for uniform inspection before lunch.
We made it just in time, but darn it, they didn't have the inspection outside because there was a chance of rain. They still had the formation, but it was inside where the public was not allowed to go.
We had a tour of the Acadamy and it was really neat. We got to see a typical Midshipmen's room (all the students are called Midshipmen). We saw their amazing pool and wrestling gyms. We saw the beautiful chapel and the nice houses that the naval professors live in.
We found a nice little restaurant on the harbor and had Crab Bisque for lunch with tasty bread.

Back to the hotel for more swimming.

Wednesday

The White House! Mount Vernon, and Alexandria

Weather: Sunny! and 60 degrees (now that's more like it!)

In order to get a tour of the White House, you have to write your Congressman usually 6 months in advance, then submit your social security number for a secret service security check. We did that and had a reservation for a 9:30 am tour.
We decided to drive into DC for this and then we'd head to without traffic, it would be only a forty minute drive, but we heard that it could take up to two hours. So, we left early, hoping to get there in plenty of time for breakfast, but knowing we'd have to skip breakfast if the traffic was terrible. The boys each had two NutriGrain bars on the way, so they were covered.
We arrived in DC at 7:30, with moderate traffic. We ate breakfast in a little diner and headed to the White House -- only to learn that "the President and Mrs Bush are using the White House this morning, so please come back any time between 10:30 and 12:30 for your tour. Bummer! So, we headed over to the White House Visitor's Center and did everything possible there to bide the time. At 10:00, we went back to the White House only to see a line of at least 600 people waiting to get in! There was no order to the line, so we had people with 11:00 reservations in front of us. Hmmmm..

Well, we waited and waited, and waited. The boys entertained themselves by creating an army of animals (I don't know either, but it kept them occupied for the TWO HOURS that we waited in line.)

Finally, at 12:30, we made it to the front of the line -- only to find out that we weren't on the list! A Secret Serviceman took our names and social security numbers and told us that they would confirm that we had an appointment and then run our security check. Hopefully, he'd be able to get us in within an hour.
By now, T was fading, so M ran (literally) to a little kiosk about two blocks away and came back with four Snickers bars. Both boys were smiling ear to ear when they learned that we were going to give them a whole candy bar and they could eat the whole thing before lunch!
At about 1:30, we were in the White House! It was a self-guided tour of the East end of the first floor. It is sure pretty in there with tons of antiques -- a silver urn from John Adams, a portrait of George Washington that Dolly Madison saved when the White House was burned down in the war of 1812...it just goes on and on. What a great experience.
Note, there are no cameras allowed in the White House, so you'll see no pictures here. As a matter of fact there are a lot of things you can't have, including purses, phones with cameras, remotes for cars. All that you can have is a wallet with ID, one key, and an umbrella. (Frankly, I think that the umbrella is a funny one -- seems like you can make your umbrella into something bad like a bomb or weapon or something. But, with all the Secret Service folks around, I guess they'd grab you before you did anything with your James-Bond-like umbrella!
By the way, Pres Bush took off in Marine One while we were in line -- we saw the Secret Service guys move around on the roof of the White House and then heard the helecopter take off. Cool.
After the White House, we ate our lunch and drove to Mount Vernon. It was sunny and beautiful, we spent the whole time there on the grounds. They had a great activity pack for kids, full of questions to answer. R really got into it and T had a blast holding the map out in front of him, since he dubbed himself the navigator. We walked all over the place, but didn't go in the house itself. There was a really long line to get in and the boys had just seen the White House which was enough for them. We really had a nice time.

On to Alexandria. This is a beautiful, ritzy, old town that was founded during George Washington's time. General Lee was from Alexandria. We went there not for the history, but for the Torpedo Artist Warehouse that I had read about -- it was T's #1 thing that he was looking forward to on the trip. It was an old Torpedo warehouse that is now home to hundreds of artists who use it as their studio and shops. The artist live across the street. T loves art -- he loves to make art, loves to look at art, and loves to collect art, especailly pottery.

He had twenty bucks burning a whole in his pocket and wanted to spend it. I warned him that there might not be one thing in his price range in the whole place, but he wanted to go and check it out. We went to every artist studio in the place and narrowed down his choice to three things: two mugs and one little fish with a marble eye. He got the fish. He was such a happy boy, walking as fast as he could from one studio to another, stopping to appreciate a huge painting, then moving on. He saw things for hundreds and even thousands of dollars that he wished he could have, but he was in good spirits and happy with his fish
Back to the hotel for more swimming and dinner.

This is George Washington's old tomb (he's been moved to a place on the property that won't slide into the Potomac River). This is a typical sight on our trip - R reading the blurb with the rest of us listening.

T and R posed in front of Mt Vernon -- the same place that I posed for my grandfather thirty years ago.

Thursday

Back to DC for the Air and Space Museum

Weather: Sunny and 60's (of course, when we'll be inside all day!)

Before I did research for this trip, I thought that the Smithsonian was one museaum, rather than the eight or so museaums that it really is. The one must-see museaum that everybody agreed upon was the Air and Space Museaum.

Boy, did the boys have fun! From Amelia Earhart's plane to Apollo 11's landing module, to the Spirit of St Louis -- you name a plane or space craft, and they had it there.

This is something I saw a lot of at the museum -- M pointing at something and explaining it's history or how it works to the boys. He's pretty darn knowledgeable about this stuff and the boys were pretty darn interested.

Excited to see the Spirit of St Louis, the boys patiently pose for me.

Friday and Saturday -- divided the drive home in two days, with swimming at the hotel in between.

T's favorite things that we did:

Mt Vernon
Air and Space Museum
Torpedo Art place

R's favorites:

White House
Air and Space Museum
Mt Vernon

T added: Oh, and all the monuments and stuff. Oh, and the Aquarium and the RR museum. Is that okay, that I have more than three favorites?

You bet it's okay :>

When They Grow Up

2008-04-04T18:54:00.003-05:00

The other night I asked the boys what they wanted to be when they grew up. Here's what they said:

R said:
"Remember when I was going to be a fighter pilot? Well, I don't want to do that anymore for three reasons: 1)I don't want to eat carrots for every meal (like his great grandfather did in the War), 2)I decided it would be too much of a risk for my life, and 3) I might get dizzy from all of the buttons and switches, even with the 'heads-up' display. So, now I want to be either an author because I like to write. Or I'll be a scientist and find a cure for Diabetes....or I want to be a historian to find out about history and someday teach it to kids, maybe."

T said:
"I'm gonna be a pilot, dog breeder, artist, or a scuba diver."

R joined in: "Oh yeah, I might be a scuba diver too."

There ya go.

Spring, Easter, Winter

2008-03-23T18:51:00.012-05:00

Thursday was beautiful. It was 48 degrees (downright balmy after the winter we had) and the snow had finally all melted. I mean all melted....even those stuburn piles of snow at the end of everybody's driveways (from being snow blowed higher and higher.) We could see grass (albeit brown grass) for the first time since December. After all, we got 99 inches of snow over the winter. Only four times in the past one hundred years had we gotten more than that. We are talking about a record breaking winter.

But it was over. The snow was gone. It was sunny. I was ecstatic. Then Friday came. And it brought a "winter storm." That meant 11 inches of show. No, I'm not kidding. Good Friday was a snowy day. And it was the day that the Smiths drove to have Easter with us. What was usually a four hour drive took them seven and a half hours. What a bummer!
Here is a picture that I took on Easter Sunday -- showing the snow and icicles on a bush.

The great part is that they made it and we had a nice weekend.

We had a tasty fish taco dinner on Friday night (thanks, AJ, for the great recipe!) We slept in, had a good breakfast (eggs, sausage, toast, berries, kringle) and then dyed Easter eggs on Saturday.

Saturday night was our Easter dinner -- M was in charge of grilling (on a spit) the leg of lamb, which had been marinating in olive oil, garlic, lemon juice, and rosemary for 24 hours. I made smashed potatoes, grilled asparagus, and heated up some tasty, flaky rolls. I also put out a bowl full of berries -- strawberries, blueberries, and blackberries. I think we've had this same meal for three years now and I love the simplicity and deliciousness of it. It was also a hit with the family. Of course, we used our china, crystal, and silver.

The next morning was Easter and the boys got on their Easter clothes. Both were proud of their duds. T was happy with his, but he wished that he had a tie. I told him that next year he can have a tie. (He loves getting dressed up. For the Christmas program at school, the teacher told them to wear their best clothes to the concert. T wanted to get a tuxedo because that's "the best." He was actually quite disappointed that I said 'no.' He said that we got him one for Uncle D's wedding, and this was just as fancy. Alas, he wore a Christmas sweater and slacks, much to his disappointment!) Anyway, don't they look so grown up?!

Here is T showing off his argyle socks that the Easter bunny game him. He loves a complete outfit.
After church on Easter morning, we headed off to the beautiful manor on the lake and had a wonderful Brunch. It was a great time in a lovely house. They offered us a tour of the house, but we declined since we had taken the tour on the two previous Easters. But what a lovely place! And what a lovely brunch!

Grandma and grampa were proud of their grandsons. We had a great Easter!

Pinewood Derby

2008-03-15T19:23:00.008-05:00

Last weekend was a very busy one. I'm going to take it in parts -- this episode will be about the Cub Scouts Pinewood Derby, which both boys were able to compete this year (T's first year and R's second year.) The boys (including M) have been planning their cars since January. First, they spent time drawing and redrawing their car designs on graph paper, starting over when they decided they didn't like their design or when M decided that their idea was too tricky to make.

Then, they got their kits and bought wood.

R wanted a "plain wood car that was really shiny." So he got some fancy-smanchy hard wood called "cocoballa" or something like that. (Yeah, I know it's called "pine"wood derby. I asked M about five times if it was legal to buy a different kind of wood besides pine. He reassured me over and over that it was legal and finally he printed off the rules so I could see it with my own eyes. It's all good - you don't have to use pine in a pinewood derby. Crazy!)

Here is Riley posing with his car before the race. (Notice the very lovely patriotic background that M set up for me. Actually, I took photos of all the boys -- as I did last year -- which everybody enjoyed.)
T wanted an "old fashioned racing car" and the color he wanted to paint it was "British Racing Green." Very specific, that boy is! He first designed an extremely difficult car that M really wanted to help T build, but just couldn't figure out how to build it and make it even sort of fast. T repeatedly said that he didn't care if it was fast. Finally, I asked T "T, if your car looks really cool, but it's always the last place in all of your races, would you still be proud of it because it looks cool?" He teared up a bit and said, "no, I guess I want it to be a little bit fast too." Relieved, M helped T design this really cool racing car. It's a bit hard to see, but believe me, it looked really cool with it's racing stripes and fake engine on top. (M tried to convince T to put a little Lego hat on top so it looked like there was a driver down in the car, but T wouldn't go for it. He likes his things to be authentic and cars don't have little hats on top. M even showed him pictures of race cars on the Internet and you can see the helmets and only the helmets sticking up, but T wouldn't budge.)

Here's a close up shot of it. M takes these "beauty shots" of the cars each year. It's an awfully cool car. As a matter of fact, I thought it might win the Best in Show prize. Alas, a Sponge Bob inspired car won that award that is voted on by the scouts themselves.

The race was a blast to watch. T and R raced in two different heats. Both boys did well. T got a few firsts, a few seconds and some thirds (he raced 10 races in his heat.) R did really well, getting mainly firsts and some seconds in his heat. He did so well that he qualified for the final heat...and won second place! (I had this huge fear that T would do better than R and R's been doing this for two years already. Luckily, both boys were extremely happy.

One of my favorite moments was when T leaned over and said to me, "I'm so happy for R! aren't you?!"
"Yes, I told him. I'm happy for R too. but you know what? I'm very proud of you too, T."
Yeah, me too, he replied.

The award ceremony was fun, because M was the MC since he's the Cub Master and because R got a second place medal. All of the kids got a trophy. Fun times!

Valentine's Day

2008-02-20T20:32:00.003-05:00

Finally, we have our firewall up and three spyware programs installed and I'm back online. Thank goodness! I don't have a lot of time to blog, but I want to catch you up on what's been going on around here.

Last week was Valentine's Day; M and I decided we'd keep it low key. So, he got me the new James Taylor CD (it's a live album of the concert that we saw last year -- cool.) and I gave him a big candy heart box filled with beef jerkey (I took the candy out, threw it away, and replaced it with five bags of beef jerkey. We exchanged these gifts in the morning and I figured that was it for the day. After work, I met him at T's gymnastics class and he looked terrible. He told me that he wasn't feeling good and needed to head home. So I stayed for T's class and took T home. When I walked in the door, T tore off in the house and ran upstairs, then I saw R walk into the room with a toothless grin, and said "happy Valentine's day, mom."

Then I took it all in.

I heard James Taylor singing softly in the background. R was all dressed up in khakis, a dress shirt, and a belt. M was looking nice in a dress shirt too. The dining room table was set with our china, crystal, and silver. The red cloth tablecloth was ironed and on the table with a couple of candles.

R said with pride, "I made the salad all by myself -- I even cut the vegetables. Then I placed the croutons on top of each salad so they'd look nice." How cute is that? He "placed" the croutons on!

By now, T came running down the stairs, all changed out of his gymnastics gear and all dressed up in khakis, dress shirt, vest (always a vest when he's dressing up) and a belt.

M was busy cooking in the kichen..he smiled at me and said, "see what I have here?" He had huge sea scallops. Yummm. He was also making pasta carbonara, a dish that he made "all" his girlfriends before me, but never made for me. (He used to give me some lame explanation about this, like, but honey, I didn't Marry them.)

It was such a delicious dinner. Not only was the food delicious, but just looking around the table at my handsome family brought tears to my eyes.

It's so nice to be loved so much.

Trojan Spy Returns!

2008-01-21T13:58:00.001-05:00

Remember how excited I was about five weeks ago that we got rid of that Trojan Spy that hacked into our computer? Well, I was a bit premature on that excitement. We have that darn spy out of our computer, after four weeks in repair, with a new hard drive, and new spyware and firewall that won't load on. I'm really not supposed to be online right now, because another darn hacker would be able to get into our computer because we can't load on the spyware. M has spent hours upon hours with the tech support (in India, like all the rest of them these days) and has not been able to get it done. So, I have to be fast today.

I have tons to catch up on and I won't even try now. I'l just tell you about today (sans pictures, because we're keeping our pc "clean" until we're all set up properly.) Today is a holiday for MLK, which as R describes, "was a great leader who helped civil rights. That means that all people are treated the same, no matter what.)

It will be about 10 degrees for the high today, and colder than that for the low.

R got a Star Wars cook book from his Aunt J (my sistah) for Christmas and he wanted to use it today. And used it we have! For breakfast R and I cooked Forceful Frittata and Handmaiden Hash Browns. He read the directions, got the ingredients out, mixed it up, and put it in the oven...basically, everthing except take it out of the oven. That meant peeling potatos, grating potatos, cracking eggs, measuring milk, and so on. He did a good job. I made bacon to go with it.

T was in charge of lunch. He got out his own kids cook book, looked through it, then pulled out R's Star Wars cook. He ended up making Darth Double Dogs and Sith Slush -- can you tell which book he ended up using?

As you Star Wars fans know, Darth Vader has a double light saber -- it's two sided. So, the Darth Double dogs meant that we had to take a wooden skewer, break it in half, and put a hot dog on each side of it -- double dog! Then you were supposed to take refridgerater cresent roll dough and cover the middle part to make the handle -- voila! We didn't have the cresent roll dough, but we did have refridgerator pizza dough and it worked like a charm.

THe Sith Slush ingredients included 7-Up, fruit juice, and pureed blueberries and/or blackberries. The boys loved them and said it made them feel like it was a hot day outside -- gotta love those imaginations when it was 5 degrees at the time!

That's the day so far...I'm sure Martin Luther King would be proud...we treat all Star Wars characters equally :>

Thanksgiving

2007-12-11T20:12:00.000-05:00

Forgive me, but our computer was attacked by a Trojan spy...or something like that....and I haven't had web access for a couple of weeks. We're back up now, after many, many, computer scans and upgrading of our Norton Utilities and Spy Sweeper, and two other programs that I can't think of their names.

So, Thanksgiving, remember that holiday? Now that it's the middle of December, it seems like a long time ago. We went to M's folks house and had a lovely Thanksgiving with his family. U.D.#2 was there for Thanksgiving and U.D. #1 and J came over on Friday and spent the weekend. There was lots of good food, lots of Pegs and Jokers games and lots of fun. Here's the weekend in pictures...

R was getting pretty hungry on T-Day, but he patiently waited at the table, hoping someone would take pity on him and serve him some food. (You'd think he hadn't had breakfast, lunch, and snacks during the day!) Notice the "nice shirt" that he packed for the occasion. I told the boys to go upstairs and get a "nice shirt - one with buttons and a collar." He came downstairs with two -- one that he knew I'd approve of and his Cub Scout shirt. I surprised the beegeesess out of him when I gave the Cub Scout shirt a thumbs up. (If I had that many patches on my shirt, I'd want to show it off too -- patches can be seen better in picture below.)

The boys always have fun playing with U.D#2 whenever we see him. He's a very fun uncle for two rough-housing boys. He also teaches them things about Star Wars, architecture, history, science, and the meaning of life.

We spent some time at the park on Friday with Gram. She had a lot of fun with the boys. Here, she's playing with T on the teeter-totter, trying to make T go up really high.

Just for being so patient waiting for my next blog posting, here's a little treat for you. It's a Christmas card photo that landed on the cutting room floor, but is darn cute if I must say. (I told the boys to put on a sweater, any sweater they wanted to put on. They both came down with the home-made Irish fisherman's sweater that Great Gramma Pete made for them -- the same ones they wore in last year's Christmas card picture. I figured, what the heck? They love the sweaters and the sweaters have a lot of meaning, so they're back for an encore!)

Singing in the Car

2007-11-26T20:05:00.001-05:00

On the way home from gymnastics today, T sang me the song that he learned in school. It's an old standard, but he was very proud of knowing the words (at least he thought he did.)

The song is "Silent Night." Now, before reading his lyrics, picture this beautiful boy, with beautiful eyes, a bright smile, and a beautiful, clear, almost-soprano voice:

Holy night, silent night
All is calm all is bright.
Around the vertigo, mother and child.
Holy infant so tender and wild.
Sleep in heavenly peace, sleep in heavenly peace.

Isn't that great? I think it's priceless. He asked me to sing with him and corrected the order of the first line, but held on to the "around the vertigo" and the "wild." I sure love that boy!

Fall to Winter

2007-11-20T18:44:00.000-05:00

Our weather has been getting colder these days....definitely a sign of the winter to come. According to Farmers Almanac, this will be the coldest winter here than we've had in ten years. It's been in the low 30's when I leave for work in the morning and in the mid-to-high 30's when I head home into the evenings. Hold onto your hats!

Two weeks ago, however, it was a balmy 52 degrees and the boys did some raking to get the backyard ready for winter. Pay no attention to the big shadow of myself (or that "big fuzzy thing" as T called it). I like this picture 'cause it shows how excited R is for hiding his bro in the leaves.

T had a lot of fun too, as you can see by his smile. By the way, do you see those red adirondack chairs in the background? Boy, I love those chairs!

This picture is for AJ, who always wants to see pictures of Macky. Here she is trying to dig T out of the pile.

Finally, a picture of proud R, looking oh-so-serious and tough. I guess that his rake is his weapon or something...

Dinner Conversation Tonight

2007-11-12T19:48:00.000-05:00

T said to me: Mom, Antonia has a crush on me.

Me: Oh, you think she has a crush on you?

T: I KNOW she does. She told me.

Me: What did she say to you?

T: T, I have a crush on you.

Me: I guess she does. What did you say to her?

T: I said, Okay. Just okay. That's okay, right?

Me: Yeah, that was okay to say.

R (the older, wiser brother): Yeah, you don't want her to think you have a crush on her and you don't want to hurt her feelings, so 'okay' is good. She should be fine with that.

T: Good. 'Cause she's a nice girl

Pack Meeting at the Park

2007-11-08T20:07:00.000-05:00

M is Den Master for the boys' pack, which means that he's in charge of the pack meetings. The pack consists of all of the dens from 1st through 5th grades -- about 25 boys or so. M took a lot of time in planning this meeting. Here is is with a den leader, going over the last minute details for a successful meeting.

After the flag ceremony, awards and songs (led by me), the boys were divided into two teams. Each team had to come up with a team name and make a flag. R's team was the "Multitaskers" and T's team was the "Porcipines." Here is T's team making their flag. Evidently T couldn't see, so he jumped on the table.

After the flags were designed and constructed, the teams were off to four different posts in this park. Two of the posts were over half a mile away, so they had to follow a map. (I only have pictures of the nearby tasks, I didn't hike two miles that day chasing after the kids.)

One of the posts had the tasks of finding big puzzle pieces and putting the puzzle together. As you can see, it has the boy scout motto on it, "Do your best."

Another task that they had to do was tie themselves into a "human knot" and then get out of it, all holding hands facing each other. The teams had a hard time with this and get frustrated. When this happened, M would get all of the adults there to get into a knot and lead us out of the knot. That was enough for the boys to get a second wind and figure it out.
When each task was complete, the team could get a bandana and put it on their flag. It was quite a badge of pride to see those different colored bandanas flying high. R is admiring the bandanas that represent his hard work while he takes a water break.

It was a great meeting and M got compliments from all the parents, even the been-there-done-that parent that is never happy!

This is my artsy-fartsy picture of the snack for the day, Boy Scout Trail Mix.

King Tut and Ben Kanobi

2007-10-31T19:30:00.000-05:00

We have survived another Halloween and the kids had a great time. T was King Tut and R was Ben Kanobi(the young Obi Wan Kanobi from Star Wars). M and I made their costumes last weekend and they turned out pretty good, if I do say so myself. M found a patter for R's costume online, but it was for an adult. M figured that R was about two-thirds the size of an adult, so he cut all of the measurements by one-third and used a T-square to draw it out on the brown fleece that we bought. It wasn't so hard to sew, but was just a bit tricky to gather the fleece in the back of the hood. (R doesn't have the hood up in the pictures.) I designed T's costume using a glue gun and sewing a bit for the head dress. M and I tag-teamed on T's staff. M cut down a piece of pvc pipe he had. T and I spray painted it gold; M screwed in the ornament on top; and I wrapped and glued the ribbon around it. I had fun with T as he helped with all of the decorations of his costume -- lots of gold and jewels :>

I was able to scoot out of work early to help out in T's classroom for his Halloween party. Here he is sitting with his buddy, Black Spiderman

Here is R as Ben Kanobi in his school parade. Can you tell that he feels pretty good about his costume?
For the third in a row (I'd call it a tradition) we had our friends, the H's, over for dinner and trick or treating. As you remember, they live in the country on 40 acres and don't have a neighborhood to trick or treat in. Their son dressed up as a knight. Notice the very solomn poses all the boys took in this picture. I tried to get them to smile, but they were in character, so to speak.

And here are the boys checking out R's loot at the end of a profitable trick or treating night.

Autumn has Arrived

2007-10-20T19:10:00.000-05:00

I do love the changing of the seasons. It's a nice way to mark time. We didn't really have that in southern California, where I grew up. The fall colors are beginning to show and it's just gorgeous. Here are the colors that I see every evening when I drive home on my street:

It was cool last weekend, so we had a lovely fire in the fireplace. M read to R and T (and Mackinaw) by the fire -- what a nice, warm sight to see:

My sistah gave me a nice birthday present, full of Fall baking supplies (apple cookie cutter, tiny pie cut outs of an acorn, leaf, and apple; and a leaf and apple pancake forms. This morning we tried out the pancake forms. We finally got the hang of it after a couple of tries. R was the official pancake maker. He was very serious about his job!

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