Painting

A perfect activity for a chilly afternoon. 

Pinewood Derby round 1

This week we had the chance to experience the Pinewood Derby. I’d never been to one and didn’t know what to expect. Jess worked on Oliver’s car the night before making sure the weight was around 5 ounces. Oliver and I finished it the day of the races. To finish the car the directions read:

Apply several coats of sanding sealer; then sand entire car with a fine-grade sandpaper. Give model at least two coats of fast-drying paint in your choice of color. When paint is completely dry sand with a fine sandpaper, apply a final coat of paint and allow to dry thoroughly. TO FINISH, rub entire car with a rubbing compound. Details such as steering wheel, windshield, driver, racing numbers, etc., should be added now. For a super finish apply a coat of auto wax and run to a high gloss. 

Um, yeah. Congrats if you got through that whole thing. We spray painted the car red and Oliver put some designs on it with a white paint marker. Not bad at all. Our motto: simple succeeds. Oliver finished 9th out of 30 cars. He was happy with the result. 

It was quite the event. I think the little siblings enjoyed it almost as much, maybe a bit more, than the kids participating. 

Whirlwind

It was a whirlwind of a weekend. Jess headed off to Texas to run a Ragnar race. He had a fun time and ran fast. His team finished fourth overall (out of 100+ teams) and had the best team van out there! It was fun to get a text here and there to be updated on the latest. In the photo below, see his reflection in that van there? Look to your right. His team was the NachoAverageRunners and had a Nacho Libre theme. His brother and sister-in-law put it together and are so creative. Love it!

Back at home it got a little crazy. It culminated with discovering that Ian had spilled paint on our office carpet (while I was folding clothes and the other boys were in the room with him, albeit doing something else), rushing to make a moustache for Oliver’s Theodore Roosevelt report, restocking the school art supplies (emergency!), and handing out candy to the kids at lunch for spirit day, plus hosting a gaggle of kids on Friday (and while making them hot chocolate I couldn’t get the whipped cream to, well, whip)! Needless to say on Saturday, I was tired and mentally exhausted. I went to bed at 8:45pm. I should probably do that every night. Haha!

But it was also a weekend of good times. My favorite part was when the kids decided to do this:

That’s right. They slid down the park hill on their bellies. Believe it or not, zero grass stains on their clothes. A miracle! They also did some of this:

...with some friends one afternoon. They call this the zip line and all the kids love it. 

And then there’s Ian. He is riding the scooter with no fear.

Ollie decided to take that same scooter down the sliding hill. 

Wahoo! I guess that was a fitting way to end our whirlwind weekend on a Sunday afternoon. 

Snapshot of the latest

Do you find that the amount of pictures you take correlates directly to the temperature outside? If the temperature is higher I take more photos, which means these cold winter months don’t get as much photo recognition. With that, I give you a quick snapshot of these days with some of the few photos I’ve taken. 

This cute kid is 18 months old and as active as can be. He likes to do everything everyone else is doing. He sings and dances to music, loves basketballs, golf balls, baseballs, soccer balls. He can’t get enough time in swinging, riding his scooter, and reading. Oh yes, and he loves to eat snow. 

We went sledding on a beautiful sunny day in February. 

I took Ian down the hill and he sort of liked it. When Jess showed me this photo all I could think of was, “I totally have mom sledding form here!” The boots, the hood, the face! Ha!

Ansel and Ollie take a breather after several good runs. 

Ansel REALLY wanted to go bowling one afternoon so we made it happen. We have a family bowling tournament coming up and the kid wanted to get some practice in. 

It was league night and the older people couldn’t get enough of Ian. We had several octogenarians smile and wave to the little guy. He was eating it up. 

Jess and I visited the Tiffany Glass exhibit and LOVED it. I mean, look at this wisteria lamp!?! The cost for this lamp was around $499, that’s $10,000 in today’s dollars. These lamps now go for over a million. The workmanship. Wow!

It was fun to see the lamp below because we have a copycat version of it in our home. This outing was a rare date for Jess and I and we were like, “Gee, it sure is fun to hang out together.” Ha!

We took the kids to a basketball game and they enjoyed the first half, tolerated the second half, and could hardly stand the overtime. I remember feeling the exact same way when I was their age going to college basketball games. But it was a great game and we went home with the win!

And that’s about it. The month has turned to March and Oliver is happy to hear the birds, Ansel is eagerly watching the flowers spring up, and Ian wants to ride that scooter everywhere every day.