One Year Closer to Becoming a Lego Designer

Running a little behind...

Isaac's birthday was Wednesday.  Of course the only request he made was for Legos.  Legos.  More Legos.  In fact, he's started his Christmas list and on it are about 15 Lego sets . . . all different, of course.

We invited the Grandpas over for dinner, cake, and presents.  Dinner was corn dogs, mac and cheese, and broccoli.  Seriously, the boy asked for broccoli.  Makes my heart sing!

After dinner was cake time.  The cake this year was a Lego Star Wars Stormtrooper Minifigure.  The only part not made of cake were his "c-hands".  Two Devil's Food 13x9 cakes is all it took (with a little left over).  The kids like to watch the cakes get frosted -- and really, who doesn't? -- and when they figured out it was a Stormtrooper -- oh my!  They exploded with squeals, shrieks and quite a bit of jumping.  Especially Isaac.  And they hadn't even eaten any yet.

Pretend you can't see the crumblies from the cake in the frosting.
Or rather, just pretend he's a real Stormtrooper who was recently in battle.

Blowing out the candles . . .

Always the perfectionist, Isaac must adjust the Stormtrooper's hand . . .

With the birthday loot (I wonder what it could be) . . .

I'm not going to caption each of these photos, so you'll just have to pretend you can hear, "Oh my gosh!  My first Fold Out Racetrack!  I'm so lucky!  I love Legos!  I can build a robot!  I'll put all my books here, and the Legos here, and the robots here, and the backpacks here . . ."

This I will talk about.  For his final gift of the night, he was sent on a treasure hunt.  Clues had been made and strategically placed for him to find, the last clue, of course, leading to his gift.  It was so much fun!  Some of the clues were tough, and he breezed right through them!  So proud!

The last gift -- a Lego organization center!  This used to be Olivia's dresser (and before that it was my brother's!), but it broke.  A little glue and some paint and voila!  Now Isaac has a place to put his Legos.  Hopefully this will eleviate middle of the night foot pains from stepping on them.

Even though bedtime was looming, we let him put together one set.  He chose the 3-in-1 Lego Creator set. 

Less than a hour later . . .

I'll save pictures from the chaos of the day after for another post!

Mushrooms, Toads, and History

On Friday I decided that Ezren and I needed to get out of the house.  It was a beautiful autumn day -- partly cloudy (just the way I like it), slight breeze, bit of a chill.  I seem to be saying that a lot lately!

We decided to head out to the lake about 15 minutes from our house. 
Before we left, I thought to myself, "If I don't take the camera, I will regret it, but if I do take it, it will be a burden to have with the dog and Ez." 

So, I didn't take it. 
Fully regret that.
(All of these pics are from another walk at the lake . . . four years ago.)

The forest looked different.  Not bad different . . . just different.

Zelda was in heaven.  She loves sniffing all of the other animal smells and was going crazy.  I'm not sure how, but she seems to know that we follow the path.  She lead us along the trail and not very far in we saw our first . . .

MUSHROOM!

I have a thing for mushrooms.  Small ones, big ones, it doesn't matter.  Fungi are just so fascinating!  One day, no mushroom, then poof!  Mushrooms everywhere!

We saw mushrooms of all colors:  red, orange, yellow, green, purple, brown, black, white, pink -- though sadly, no blue.  I'm not even sure if there are blue mushrooms, but we looked.

We saw big ones (8" tall),

small ones (.25 cm),

short ones,

tall ones,

fat ones,

skinny ones,

flat ones,

round ones.

It was a fungus infestation!

The coolest mushrooms by far were found by Ezren.  He called them Rainbow.  On the side of the trail were these two mushrooms, side by side, as wide as my hand.  In the center was a bright red circle, then it spread out to orange, and lastly, the edges were lemon yellow!

Gorgeous.

He told me they should be in Mushroom Gorge (from Mario Kart).

We're very lucky to have this lake so close to the house.  Not a lot of people frequent the trails.  I think they are afraid of this:

Not us though!

No Duck and Cover here.  We embrace nuclear radiation. (HA!)

Ezren chose to continue our walk along the History Trail.  There used to be a farm and house on this land before the nuclear plant was built, and you can still see the remaining foundations.  There are cool ponds and an old dock that used to be used for fishing.  Some grapes are still growing on the arbors.

At one of the ponds, Ezren and I stopped to enjoy the algae.  Seriously, it was completely covered in the green stuff!  When we were ready to continue on, I just happened to look down before taking a step, and holy cow, a huge toad was literally one inch from my foot!  Really big.  The size of my spread out hand.  He must have come from the pond because he too was covered in algae.  I asked if Ez wanted to touch it, but he said, "No way!"  I touched his back, but he just sat there.  So, I held tight to Zelda's collar and let her get close enough to sniff.  And when she did -- BOING!  Away went the toad.  He hopped right out into the pond.  And because there was so much algae, he could actually hop twice on top before going splash into the water.

In total we were at the lake about an hour and a half.  It was wonderful to breathe the fresh air and feel the wind on our skin. 

To see nature. 

To touch the earth. 

To feel like we were completely alone.   

Imagining what life was like a hundred years ago on that farm amidst the towering trees which themselves are hundreds of years old.

And next time I'll take the camera.

Olivia and Noobie

Olivia and Noobie have a special relationship.

One cool evening in September when Olivia was just one month old, we went on a walk.  She was cozily tucked next to me in the Snuggli, happy and content.  The sun is setting, a slight breeze is blowing, a wonderful evening.  One block later, this loud, obnoxious cat comes trotting up to us (Olivia and I).  I seriously thought he was going to jump onto Olivia.  Frightened me a bit.  I had Chad grab the offender and carry him around.  I never thought a stray cat would let us pick him up, but he did.  He just laid there content and purring with Chad as we walked around.  We went to a few houses in the area and asked if anyone knew to whom he belonged.  No one did.

What could we do?  He was declawed in the front, so we didn't feel comfortable letting him just wander around.  Evil opposums might get him! (Later we found out, Noobie could hold his own if needed.)  We took him home and tucked him into our utility room where he proceeded to voice his opinions constantly. 

I was teaching at the time and let all of my students and fellow faculty members know of the cat we had found.  Surely he belonged to someone.  Surely they would be missing him and looking for him.  We called the vets.  We called the police.  We called the local pound.  We put up signs.  A month later, we decided that no one was going to come get him.  He was ours, and we named him Noobie . . .  because he was our new cat.  I know, original.

I firmly believe that Noobie wanted to be with Olivia.  That he was supposed to find us.  Corny, but those two are connected somehow.  Before Olivia outgrew her infant carseat, she used to take naps in it.  She would be laying there, covered up, asleep, and Noobie would climb up and sleep on her lap.  Amazing!  None of the other cats gave much thought to her.  When she was older, and we were living in Coffeyville, I would often find Noobie in Olivia's crib with her at naptime. 

Nowadays, Noobie sleeps with Olivia almost every night.  She has a bunkbed, and he climbs the ladder to get up to her.  Before I go to bed, I go in and take him out (she sleeps with her door shut).  He's either on her pillow or next to her chest.  And when she spends the night somewhere or if he doesn't get it before she goes to bed, he will often stand in front of her door and meow.  Very loudly.  He misses her.

 

Sunday Biking

Sunday started as a wonderfully brisk autumn morning.
Cloudy, a little breeze, bit of a chill in the air.
Perfect.
We decided to go bike riding. 

The street we live on is too hilly for the kids to ride.  They aren't big bike riders and don't yet have the skills to manage the hills, so we generally pack up the bikes and drive somewhere a little flatter to help them gain confidence.  We like the high school parking lot, but a church is now occupying it on Sundays (complete with parking attendents).  The elementary school, too, was being used.  The lake is OK, but not the best location.  So, we settled on a street that will someday have houses built on it but for now is empty, quiet, and (best of all) relatively flat.

It's not all fun and games, this bike riding stuff.  I don't even remember why she was pouting.

A few minutes later, after riding around a bit, she's a girl with few cares in the world.  She practiced on the small hills (said they were "gigantic!") thoroughly enjoying herself.

Isaac has enough skills to start riding without training wheels but refuses to take them off.

See, the kid can stand up and ride . . .  why does he still have training wheels?

At one point, he came around the corner and got a training wheel stuck on the curb.  Check out the spinning back tire!

Ezren doesn't even want to try yet.  Sigh.  One day he will, but for now, he's content to chase the others and jump around.

This doesn't happen often, but the van window was begging me to take a photo of it.  How I got in the picture, I just don't know.

Chad and Zelda racing with Olivia . . .

My attempt at art . . .

And lastly, a nice shot of Chad . . .

. . . wearing Olivia's hoodie.

House Construction

Some of you wanted to see how the house transformation was going. 
Of course, that was back in March through May when it was actually happening.
Things are still happening now -- only on the insidem, and I'm not showing them . . . yet.

So, here is a peek at what happened on the outside.

I'm in the window wondering what Chad's doing in the backyard . . . with the camera.

Super Lego Brothers

I finally caught one of Isaac's three dimensional Mario creations before he deconstructed it.

Yet another Mario . . . mostly two dimensional this time

Ezren is showing off his ship.

He wants to be just like his brother and has taken to building with Legos.

He's not as into it as Isaac.

He does, however, love getting his picture taken.

The Super Lego Brothers . . .

I love how they bond over Legos.

I love how they love each other.

Even when they fight.  And yell.  And throw things.

Legos always bring them back together.

Ez's Special Day

Last month we had Olivia's special day. 
Just Olivia for one night and one day.  Doing something special -- her choice.
Bad mom forgot to take pictures of that.

Friday was Ezren's turn.
After dropping the kids off at the Grandpa's, we came home for dinner.
Nothing special there -- leftovers.
But we did spend the evening playing Skip Bo, Uno, and the Wii.
FUN!

Saturday morning we went to some garage sales (good finds!) and then home to shower and get ready for lunch.
We have a new Chick-fil-a just up the road.  For the Grand Opening they sent us some coupons.
I love coupons!
Got a free sandwich for me and a free Kid's Meal for Ezren.  Chad had to pay for his meal. 
It was a really fun lunch. 
Ezren was very excited to have us to himself.  He talked a lot.

After lunch was the main event . . . BOWLING!
Ezren's been bowling twice before and absolutely loves it.
Bowling is so expensive these days.  I don't remember it being that expensive growing up.
Thank goodness for coupons!

Got the shoes.

Picked the ball.

We're ready!

Ezren gets a few pointers from Chad (who was in a bowling league as a child...).

The people in the lane next to us had a lot of bowling balls and Ezren liked to choose different ones each time.

Did you know that bowling alleys have these really cool ramps for little kids to use?  They're awesome!  You put the ball on top, give it a big push, and whoosh!  It goes down and (hopefully) knocks some pins.

During the game I had two strikes.

Yes, you read right. Two.

This was not one of them.  In fact, this throw ended up being a gutter ball.

But check the scores!

Ezren:66

Chad: 114

Kathrina: 85

Apparently, Wii bowling does not translate to real bowling.

The bowling alley we were at had a game room, and we decided to play.

I wanted to play air hockey (rock!), but Chad and Ezren wanted to play Mario Kart. 

Ezren couldn't reach the pedals, so Chad worked the pedals and Ez did the steering.

He was so proud they won first place!

It was such a fun day!

How did Ez feel about it, you ask?

I think he was happy . . .