Growing like a...um...bean

Just before Spring Break the kids had a special day at school where they could sign up to learn about different things. I mean things that aren't normally taught in school, of course. The school invites parents to come and teach the kids which is nice. I didn't sign up since I don't know anything fun to teach the kids. I could certainly bore them to death if I wanted to though.

Anyway, our daughter signed up to do some planting and came home with a little planter that had carrots and bean seeds in it. She was very excited and checked on them everyday. After a few days we started to see a spout popping up.

She made sure to show off the little sprout to anyone that would look. Now, not even two weeks later we have two of these big things. Not to mention some carrot tops popping out. No, not the comedian, thank God.

Obviously she has a much greener thumb than I do. I suck at this stuff. Now we need to find something bigger to put these in, and maybe something to support them so they don't fall over.

This must be my most exciting post ever!

Parents of the Year

I probably haven't mentioned it since I have been lax in posting lately, but our son is playing flag football this year. This is the first real organized sport he has ever done, so we hoped he wouldn't want to stop halfway through since it goes until Halloween.

Anyway, his first game was this weekend (more on that later) which we thought he might be a little nervous about. I mean we were, so why not him? So, on Thursday when I picked him up from school he mentioned he hurt his ankle during recess and he wasn't sure if he could play football on Friday. I let him know that he had no practice on Friday, just his game on Saturday. He said he wasn't sure how it would feel then either. I did take a quick peek at his ankle at home and didn't notice anything, and he seemed to limp only occasionally. Jenn and I decided to keep an eye on him, but felt that he might be exaggerating a little bit due to being nervous about his first game. We even told him that we could take him to the doctor to get a shot or something hoping this would make him realize it wasn't too bad.

On Friday all the kids in flag and tackle football got together and went to the local high school football game to cheer them on. He seemed to be doing okay as he ran and jumped around with the other kids. At this point we were pretty sure he was exaggerating his injury due to the first game jitters.

Flash forward to game day, I ran some errands before the game while Jenn got him ready. When I came home our son was getting dressed and Jenn told me to go look at his ankle. Yep, you guessed it, it was swollen and slightly black and blue. Parenting Win! We both felt terrible. The real funny part? He still wanted to play. We taped it up a little, told the coach to keep an eye on him and he played the whole game. He limped around a little bit at sometimes but he didn't want to stop playing. He even had a quarterback sneak for 30 yards. In other words, we were as wrong as we could possibly be.

So, if you want some parenting tips...go somewhere else.

Why my son doesn't want to change schools

Our kids go to a Lutheran school close to our house. We didn't send them to the public school down the block because the kindergarten schedule wasn't going to work for us. Then, once our son was set there, we decided to keep going. Why change if they like it, right?

Well, since it is the end of the school year we get to see a lot of the stuff they did in class that hasn't come home yet. One project was titled, "Why I Go to a Lutheran School." He wrote the expected stuff about teachers and God, etc. The kicker was the closing:

"I want to stay here because I don't want to go to a school that worships the devil."

So there you have it, people. If you don't go to a Lutheran school you worship the devil. Hey, I didn't say it. Don't get mad at me.

Aren't the last days of school fun?

Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #91: Ready, Set...Go!

I wasn't sure what I'd have for this week's assignment, but I managed to get something. This week Carly wanted us to post something ready, set, or go. Or, all three if we wanted. Here's what I have for this week.

For Ready (maybe, set?), we have my son getting ready for a simulated match in fencing class.

For Go, we again have my son. This time he is on attack. He didn't like this one since he is cut off, but I like it myself. It seems more like a surprise, or something.

That's all I have this week. Go to Carly's site to check out the rest.

Have a great weekend!

I should be sleeping

I have to work tonight so I should be getting some rest to prepare for it. But, of course, I'm not. After I dropped the kids off at school I had to take my mom to a doctor appointment, then we had an early lunch, I stopped to pick up some gifts for the Easter Bunny (he's lazy, you know) and by the time I got back home I had to pick the kids up in an hour. Now they are home, so rest is out of the question.

I should be much more rested than I am. I was off Sunday and Monday (I even took a nap on Monday) but I'm not. I know a lot of it is psychological. My brain knows that I have to be up all night so it goes into Tired Mode as soon as it realizes the midnight shift is coming up. It usually starts two days early. Just to get me prepared.

Speaking of the weekend, we went to our friend's house for a wine tasting party. I was fun, we had a nice big group of friends and got blasted on wine. I'm kidding of course, we are all responsible drinkers. (Stop laughing!) I will say that the guy running the wine tasting seemed to want us to get toasted. We tried about 12 wines and he went through them very quickly. Since I'm not a wine drinker, I was slow to finish each one, but he was quick to move on to the next. You know, wine hits you pretty quickly when you haven't had dinner yet. The last two wines I made sure the guy gave me just a splash for me to try. I didn't want to get all stupid(er); they kids were there, you know?

It was a good time, though. We haven't all gotten together in much too long, so this was a great idea. We all plan on getting together more frequently now. Next time we'll have a beer tasting.

So, needless to say, Sunday was a day of lounging. We got home kind of late on Saturday, the kids were tired, daddy had a headache, the dogs were tired, so we just hung around the house. Well, Jenn went to work out, but she'd more devoted to that than me. I was going to run on Sunday, but I wasn't up for it, and Monday I was too lazy. This isn't good since I have a race on Saturday. Yes, you are right, I'm on the midnight shift that day so I'll finish at 7am and the race starts at 9am. Is it possible to fall asleep while running? We'll soon find out.

After school on Monday I took the kids to a nature center near our house. I brought my camera, and had the kids take theirs, and we took some pictures. It's a pretty big place. I've been there before but not to the farm part of the center. I was expecting some old barn to be sitting out somewhere in a field that used to be a farm back in the day. Turns out, there were animals there and everything. We've only lived here 15 years and had no idea. We win Parents of the Decade.

This cow seemed to be afraid to come out of the barn. Or it was a fake head, it's hard to tell. Maybe he did like life in the suburbs.

I feel bad for the people whose houses were right in front of this farm. It stunk pretty bad.

More lovely pictures are on my Flickr page.

That's about all I've been up to. Time for a nap.

"I hate the first week of school"

The funny thing about the title is that the quote is not from the kids. Jenn said that tonight as we were watching Wipeout. Now, you may be thinking to yourself, "Self, how could the first week of school be hard for the parents?" My answer is; you don't have kids, do you?

Let me explain. The first week brings a few things to stress about, especially if your kids are little. On the first day you have to make sure they get to the right room and, once they are there, that they stay there without crying or clinging to you like a baby lemur. (Lemurs cling, right?)

Not to mention that these kids haven't been to school in over two months. Do you think they are going to get up all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at 6:30am? No. Even though you might have one child who gets up that time everyday during the summer and comes and wakes you up to feed him. That first week you will have to drag him out of bed. Literally, probably.

You know what is fun to do during that first week? Count how many times you say, "Please, put your clothes on!" Or some variation of that. Then count how many times you swear to yourself as you walk away. I swear one day I'm going to send them to school with their pajamas on when it's not pajama day. That'll show them.

The evenings are also fun. Even though they have been exhausted and laying partially comatose on the couch since they've been home from school, they are now way too awake to go to sleep. Or, better yet, they are too tired to go upstairs to sleep. Maybe they'll have enough energy after this last episode of Spongebob. And brushing teeth? Well, you may as well ask them to lift they house off the foundation. That would take about as much energy.

So, yes we are excited about this first week of school! Yay School! Woo!

I need to go lie down.

Family Vacation: Part Two

Our second day involved more walking, and a trip to Epcot. This time we went to the pool in the morning since we had dinner reservations at a restaurant in Epcot. Mexico to be specific.

We didn't do Epcot right the first day, which I'll explain later, possibly in another post. It was kind of neat to walk from country to country all in one day. First we hit England. We didn't do much there, but it looked nice. See.

I had to get a picture of the phone booth and mailbox. I don't know why.

Next we walked through France. We didn't go in many shops there either, but we got to see a man balance on some chairs. Our son was mesmerized by that.

I know the chairs are specially made to do those tricks, but sill, that was pretty cool.

Going through France we stopped in Japan.

Jenn and our daughter both wanted sushi. So us guys went over to America to eat some burgers and fries. Actually I didn't eat anything there. I wasn't feeling so well that day. I think it was from the heat.

After a food break we headed over to Germany and Italy. We had to hit some countries of our heritage.

There was no Swedish representation, but Norway was there. So I took a picture of this giant gnome. That seems like an oxymoron, doesn't it?

We got some smoothies as we walked through Africa. You know, nothing says Africa like a strawberry smoothie. This Coke machine was cool, though.

We also went to see Nemo and his friends at "The Seas with Nemo and His Friends." The little ride was okay, but the really neat part was talking with Crush. It was an interactive show with an animated Crush who would talk to the crowd. The kids liked it, even though they didn't participate all that much. The show was fun for adults and kids, just like a Pixar film.

Like I said, we had dinner in Mexico. I made sure to get the least spicy thing on the menu, luckily the waitress helped me out. I've forgotten all my years of Spanish. I think the kids favorite part of the day was the little boat ride through Mexico with Donald Duck and his friends.

The kids were pretty wiped out after all that excitement, so we headed back to the hotel.

The next day was Animal Kingdom day. I took lots of pictures here. Like the tree of life. Cool, huh?

At first when we walked in to the park we were under a huge canopy of trees. We thought we were going to be in the shade all day, unfortunately that wasn't the case.

We walked the Pagani Forest Expedition Trail first. It was like a zoo, but you could walk through it. Does that make sense? You were a lot closer to most of the animals, and the seemed to be more integrated.

We saw Gorillas, some weird animal called and okapi, lots of birds, including this giant one that reminded me of Kevin from UP.

Next we went on a safari. I liked how they did this. They pretended like you were on a real safari. They had radio where a pilot was radioing positions of animals to the driver and then warned us of poachers in the area. Luckily, we scared of the poachers, but not until after we were shot at!

I got a couple nice shots of giraffes, ostriches and the lay of the land as a whole. The place was really nicely set up.

We hung around the park for a little while longer by going to Dinoland USA. That wasn't so fun. The kids were hot, we were hot and there wasn't a whole lot to do there. But the giant dinosaur that greeted you seemed nice.

Then it was pool time and back to the Magic Kingdom for dinner. Which we followed up with another spin on the Buzz ride and a trip to the Laugh Factory featuring the cast of Monster's Inc. This was another interactive show, but this time the had cameras on the crowd and would get you more involved with the show. Our daughter got picked out as "Boo" from the movie, probably due to her age and hair. She was a little embarrassed, but it was cute.

Before we left we walked through the Swiss Family Treehouse. Can you believe Jenn has never seen that movie? We went back to the hotel were the kids passed out before the fireworks show. Again.

That's enough for now. I promise, Star Wars talk (and pictures) on the next installment.

As before, more pictures on Flickr, but I'm not done with them all yet.

Our big family vacation (part one of many)

I'm not sure how many posts this will take up, but I know that I can't post about our whole trip in one. Well, I could, but I would scare away everybody. Who wants to read a 10,000 word post?

As I hinted at in yesterday's post, we went to Walt Disney World in the great (hot) state of Florida. I'm going to get it out of the way now; it was hot, hot, hot, hot...you get the idea. It was such a change after coming from a cool Spring here in Chicago. I was wondering when it was going to get warm here, now I don't need to experience heat anymore all year. Of course it's going to be 90 degrees here tomorrow. Oh well.

Anyway, the fun started before we left. Turns out both kids got sick three days before we were set to leave. Our son would wake up nearly unable to talk, and our daughter couldn't breathe. It wasn't a good start. Jenn took them to the doctor on Monday, but we were starting to prepare for the worst. What if they couldn't fly? Would we rent a car to drive? Would we use our own? Do we have enough things to keep them entertained for about 22 hours of driving? Will I go insane before we get to Disney World?

It was a fun 36 hours around here. The doctor said they both had strep throat (again), but they could fly and were good to travel 24 hours after taking the medicine. Good thing we were leaving in 48 hours. Nothing like cutting it close!

So, we went to the airport on Wednesday, and were bombarded with questions on how long we had to wait until it was time to get on the plane. For two hours. Then, we get on the plane, get all ready to go, settle the kids down since it was their first flight, then we find out we need to change planes. Yipee! We had a broken one that couldn't be fixed in a timely manner so we had to wait an hour for another plane. And be asked another 40 times about when we are going to leave.

The flight down was fine once the kids started enjoying the flight, which wasn't too long. We got to Orlando, waited for our Magical Express to bring us to our hotel, and then ordered room service since we missed our dinner reservations due to the flight delay. We stayed at the Grand Floridian, which was really nice. We really liked the hotel, but didn't like paying $9.95 for a peanut butter and jelly uncrustable sandwich.

We had a great view from our balcony. We could see Cinderella's Castle from the Magic Kingdom and watch the fireworks from the comfort of our own room. Of course, we could also hear the fireworks even when the kids crashed out early, but that was okay, they didn't wake up. They were too wiped out everyday.

The first full day we were there we went to the Magic Kingdom. It was the closest park to our hotel, and we could hop right on the monorail to get there. The crowd was not too bad our first day. We waited about 20 minutes to drive the cars in Tomorrow Land and basically walked right on to the Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin. Our son liked that ride the best, I think.

We also hit Aladdin's Magic Carpet, The Pirates of the Caribbean, and Tom Sawyer's Island. Our son loved exploring on that island. There wasn't a whole lot to do, but when you are a little kid you can imagine a lot of things.

We walked around the park for about 5 hours, or so, then headed back to cool off at the pool. We did that pretty much everyday. It worked out well to cool off and take a break from walking. My feet were quite sore walking all day long.

That night we went to Fulton's restaurant at Downtown Disney. We found out that our daughter loves crab legs while we were there. It's always good when the kinds like expensive food. While we were there we hit the gigantic Disney store. It was so big Jenn and I got separated and had to call each other on the phone to find each other.

There was a dinosaur place in downtown Disney that we didn't go to, for some reason, but I took a picture of the snow covered mountain they had. I don't know who they are trying to kid, it is not cold enough for snow. I don't care how high the mountain is.

I'll stop here for now. More to come, including Star Wars Weekend! Don't get too excited now.

I have more pictures up on Flickr, with more to come as I get to it. Also, I'll start catching up on reading blog posts, too.

Finally watched "Marley and Me"

Since pretty much all the TV shows we watch are done for the season, Jenn and I watched a movie from the On Demand selection. Jenn picked, Marley and Me, which was fine by me, it seemed like something I would like. 

After watching the movie, actually I thought of this during the movie, I think Quincy might be the reincarnation of Marley. Actually, I should say our last dog, Cosmo, and Quincy together are the reincarnation of Marley. Sure, some things are different, but I couldn't imagine dealing with Quincy's and Cosmo's issues while taking care of babies. We have enough trouble with two kids ages five and seven. Heck, right now on the floor next to me is a little doll for my daughters dollhouse. It's feet are gone, eaten off by Quincy. It also has Phyllis Diller hair, but I think that is from my daughter giving it a shampoo. 

Let's try to compare a little. Cosmo destroyed two couches. Yes, you'd think we would have learned after the first one, but we didn't. We should have known better really, he wasn't well trained and we should have kept him in his crate while we were gone. We felt a little guilty and wanted to give him freedom. Not freedom to chew up a couch, but freedom to sleep where he wanted to. Maybe the couch was too lumpy for him and he wanted to make it fit the contours of his body better. I'll tell you what, he certainly slept on there much better after chewing it up. He also was smart enough to wait until we moved the couches around to hid the hole until he chewed up the other one. Turned out he could look out the little window next to the front door from that one spot. So he had to make the new couch comfy for him to watch too. It just makes sense when you think about it. 

We finally got a trainer for Cosmo after Jenn said she couldn't live with him anymore. She was mostly serious. He kept jumping up and grabbing her arm in his mouth, causing bruises all over her arms. I'm sure her co-workers were ready to call the police on me. So, after some training from a woman not unlike Kathleen Turner's character in the movie, and a little minor surgery, he calmed down after another year. Lucky for us, we didn't have kids for about another four years after that. We both said how we knew Quincy, or Cosmo as a puppy, would have chewed up the diapers. Now that I think of it, I think Cosmo used to take the wet ones. He would bring them downstairs and put them next to his toys. At least that was halfway to the garbage. 

Now, with Quincy, we have the chewing machine. He goes in the kids toys searching around for something to chew like it is a treat box for him. It's really annoying. Then he runs under the table to hide from me, when I go to get him, he starts running around like a mad dog. It's funny, and irritating, all at the same time. Basically our house is littered with half-chewed pieces of paper and kids toys. Anytime the doorbell rings I freeze. I'd like to ignore it, but the kids and dogs run over there and make a bunch of noise. It's hard to pretend I'm not home with all the racket. Unless I want someone to call the police. Nothing like having the neighbors think I leave the kids home by themselves. 

I will say Quincy walks pretty good. Certainly better than Marley did in the movie. Well, as long as a person doesn't walk by the other way. Trying to hold the 86 pound Quincy back when he wants to say "hi" to somebody is not easy. I have come close to dislocating my shoulder a few times. 

I think the end of the movie was the most similar to our experience. With Cosmo, it was an unexpected end. One day he just couldn't walk. His back legs were almost useless. He didn't seem to be in pain, but he could barely walk and he really couldn't go potty. When I came home from work and my wife was sitting with him in the backyard, I knew it wasn't going to turn out well. He didn't have the same problem as Marley, but the scene in the Vet's office was similar. I was there by myself and had to say good-bye. What do you say to a dog anyway? I certainly had forgotten about all the trouble he caused when he was a puppy, I just reminded him that he was a good dog and we were going to miss him. He knew what was happening. He may have been only a dog, but I think he knew it was the end. So, I said my good-bye, took his collar, and went to work. Yeah, I had to work afterwards, that was fun. 

The end also got me thinking about Quincy. He's been much more problematic than Cosmo, but he's just looking for attention. I think. I'm sure we will feel the same way we did about Cosmo at the end. It doesn't help the Quincy has the same coloring as Marley did. Not to mention the fact that the names are similar, at least to a dog they are. Quincy looked the the TV quite often when they called Marley. I think he liked the movie, too. 

I hope I didn't ruin the movie for anyone...

Family Portrait: 500th post

Hi! It's been a few days, as my sister reminded me. I've been a little busy this weekend and today Jenn left for Orlando for a conference, so I've been flying solo here at home. Hence this post being written at 11:22pm. 

Also, I've been holding off on posts since this is my 500th. I didn't want to link to some stupid article, or video, that I though was funny on this monumental occasion. But, to be honest, I really did't have anything special to post about. I mentioned all my friends in my anniversary post back in December, I can't add much more to that. 

Lucky for me, and you, my daughter helped me out by drawing a picture of our family. Let me share it with you. I'm sure she won't mind. 

Jenn is on the far left, I'm on the far right, and my daughter is next to Jenn and our son is next to me. If you look closely, you'll notice that us guys only have hair on the tops our our heads, while the girls have three-sided hair. It makes sense when you think about it. Oh, the thing that is on top of Jenn's head is a butterfly, and the other flying thing is a bird. Obviously, flowers line the bottom of the picture. 

So there you have it. That is our family. Just perfect, don't you think? 

I'll try to come up with my own material for the 1,000th post. 

 

Paybacks?

Yesterday Jenn called me around 2:45pm, while I was at work, and said school had called and she had to pick up our daughter. She didn't eat lunch and she said she wasn't feeling good. Never a good thing, right? Well, Jenn started to get suspicious after she got to school. Daughter seemed a little too happy to see mommy. She didn't want to be picked-up and carried as she normally does when she is sick. But, at this point, we were both willing to give her the benefit of the doubt.

It didn't stay that way for real long, however. Jenn was trying to get things done for work but our daughter was too busy running around and playing. She didn't mention anything about being sick again until the topic ofschool was brought up. Jenn sent me a text message at one point that asked how a less-than-five-year-old can be such a conniver. So, either something happened at school, or she just doesn't feel like being there.

This morning she was fine until I was trying to walk out of the classroom. Not a good feeling for me, but I was getting a little irritated because I know she is playing me. Hopefully this will pass in a day or two. Being the weekend, I'm sure she will be okay by tomorrow no matter what. We are confused as to what to do about this. Do we make some kind of deal with her? Do we tell her she can't go to ice skating if she doesn't cooperate. To be honest, I don't know if either will work. Heck, she was ready to go to the doctor yesterday to get a shot for some phantom illness because it would only hurt for a minute and then she'd be able to stay home. This girls is either going to be an actor or a con artist.

The funny thing about this is I remember doing something like this back in kindergarten. We had a major test on skipping. Yes, skipping, as in skipping down the street like Dorothy, or something. It was a motor skills thing, and I had been practicing in the the basement all weekend. Then, when the time came to perform with the class, I couldn't do it. I was too klutzy. I think I might have fallen down, I'm not positive. So, when my mom came by to check on me in the gym (she used to volunteer there) I started crying. She asked if I was okay, if my stomach still hurt like it did when I went to school. I lied and said yes, just so I could go home. On the ride home, as I lay on the bench seat (who needs booster seats, or seat belts?), my mom informed me that I was not going to be able to play with my friend if my stomach hurt. She knew I was faking it. I don't remember anything after that, but I do know how to skip now. I think. It's been a while.

So, yes, my daughter has picked up another skill of mine. Great. We are in so much trouble as she gets older.

Have a hop-skipping weekend.

Sleeping on the couch

No, I'm not in trouble with Jenn. I would have titled that, "In the Doghouse," or, more likely, I wouldn't talk about it at all. I've been sleeping on the couch because I have the annoying cold that is circulating around the Internet. No, I'm serious. Half the people I follow on Blogger, Word Press, Twitter, or Facebook are sick. Maybe it's some kind of new biological weapon that's being sent out by some nefarious government. No? Okay, either way, I've felt lousy for a while and now I'm at the point where, when I lay down, I start coughing. It is very irritating. This is the part of a cold that I hate the most. I'm exhausted, I go to bed early to get some rest, and then I start coughing 20 minutes later. Usually just after I fall asleep. So, I've been going downstairs to sleep on the couch where I can sleep in an upright position. It seems to help a bit. As an added bonus for Jenn, I'm not coughing in her ear. No matter what people might say, that is not romantic at all.

What I'm trying to say, is that I have a good reason why I've been slacking a little bit here. I'm planning to go back to daily blogging. I know you are all excited about that.

Anyone watch the Oscars? For those of you following me on Twitter, I'm sorry. I was bored and I couldn't stop typing stuff. I hope I didn't fill your feed up with too much garbage. Jenn said I was being a little mean at times, but it was all meant in fun. Sarcasm is hard on Twitter. I will say that it was a change of pace for the Oscars. Maybe not necessarily a nice change, but it was a little different. They could have cut out the second musical number, and maybe have only two people present awards to the actors. Since they had five people it made it seem like those awards were so much more important than the others. Don't you think?

I took this picture of my daughter's bed today. The cleaning lady was just here and made it up nice and set all her animals up.

It's a good thing she is small. Look, Clifford is even trying to get out and get some space.

Let me read you a story

Don't worry, it is really short. It was written by my seven year-old son, how long could it be?

It's called, The Good News and the Bad News. Here's a shot of the cover for you.

See how on the left side there is a happy kid with a sun over his head, while on the right the kid is getting rained on? Great, huh? Let me just tell you this; if I had to draw this it would look almost the same. I have terrible drawing skills. And painting skills. Or, anything that requires fine motor skills. Or talent.

Let's move on to the body of the story.




It says: The good news is my dad is turning 40. The bad news is I have to wait.

Yes, he can't wait to be 40. I guess he can't wait to start getting gray hair, go to work, pay bills, or any of that fun stuff.

In his defense, Jenn and I think he's talking about us going on our trip next week and he has to wait until June to go to Disney. Or, he thinks you get to go on a trip when you turn 40.

On a somewhat related note; he did tell me when he gets to be 16, and has a job, he's going to save up to by us a minivan. He really has a thing for minivans.

Ellipsis Monday Photo Shoot #21: Youngins'

This week Carly asked us to take some photos of young things: kids, animals, plants, you name it. This week I have to go to the archives to complete the assignment. Since it is the middle of winter here in Chicago I couldn't go out and find any good examples. Or, I should say, new examples. I did find some older pictures.

Here is a picture of a polar bear cub with his mother. Let's hear it -- awww.



Here is a picture of the kids watching some dolphins swim a while ago.



And, for the last picture, here's one of Quincy that I didn't put in his birthday post.

It's still hard to remember him that small.

Now that you've checked out mine, go check out the rest of the photos. You know you want to.

Random Wednesday (it's back)

I thought today was the perfect day to do a Random Wednesday. It's been awhile.

I watched some of Knight Rider today. I had no choice! I read the short synopsis in the newspaper and it said the doctor guy (that's his name, really) was fixing a sick robot. How do you pass up something like that? I haven't watched the show since I wrote about the mini-series last February but, not surprisingly, it hasn't gotten any better.

There were a few parts I had problems with, or should I say the most problems with. Anyway, the Bad Guy was in this warehouse that was surrounded by an EMP field so the Knight Rider guys couldn't see inside with any of their special toys. Or detect any kind of radio signal out of, for that matter. I can see that, I guess, but my question was; how is the Bad Guy able to remotely control an aircraft drone and get radio signals to all his fancy computer equipment?

Also, the sick robot was lonely and jealous of KITT and all the attention it was getting. Yes, I am serious. So the Good Doctor is able to build a robot with such great AI that it can be jealous but can't speak except in blips and beeps? He must have designed R2-D2 as well.

I have created a monster in my house. My daughter has begun reciting commercials. I really didn't have anything to do this. But, when she talks about Miracle Hangers and getting Jenn the ultimate purse that can hold anything, I know I am in trouble. Next she's going to be asking for ShamWows.

Okay, I need to go to bed.

Halloween Wrap-up

Did everyone have a nice Halloween? Wait, is Halloween supposed to be nice? How about; did everyone have a fun Halloween? Yeah, that sounds better.

For us here in the Chicago area, you couldn't ask for better weather. Well, sure you could, but you wouldn't get it. It was near 70 degrees, mostly sunny, and best of all, it was still light out until about 6:20pm or so. Thanks Congress!

The kids had been excited about it all week. Talking about all the candy they are going to get, and our son was just happy he was going to get to wear his Batman costume. (Hee, I just typed 'Batmoan'. That's kind of funny!) Our son was sick over the previous weekend and missed school on Monday and Tuesday with strep throat so he was still a little on the tired and worn-out side for most of the week. He was doing pretty good by Friday, but I could tell he wasn't 100%. Mostly due to the fact that he wasn't running from house to house. Last year we couldn't keep up with him, this year he did pretty well staying close to us. After the first block both kids were already showing signs of fatigue. Our daughter was getting pouty and wanted us to carry her bag. Son was doing okay for a while, but his bag started getting too heavy not that much later. I tried to explain to them that they need to enjoy this Halloween. They are never going to see weather like this again, probably. All I remember is getting rained on, being cold, but getting lots of candy.

Want to see our awesome decorations we did this year?

This was one of our first 'big' Halloween decoration purchases ever. You can't tell here, but the zombie is coming out of a mound where an old tree used to be. So it kind of looks like a burial place. Do you notice any thing wrong with is arm? Let me know if you do.

Here is a creepy skull:

So scary, I know. It was just off to the left of the zombie. Since it is dark you can't see the giant spider and web that is just to the left of the skull. There are also some paper ghosts hanging from a tree. We are out of control, I know.

Here is a pumpkin that a neighbor had. I thought it looked nice for a non-carved pumpkin:

If it isn't obvious already, we got a new camera. I took a lot of pictures that I normally wouldn't take. I like new toys.

Here is my favorite picture I've ever taken. No offense family members. I just think it turned out really good. For me that is.

I just wish the fence wasn't in the picture. Though, I think it adds something to it. I don't know what that would be exactly.

So, yes, we have lots of candy. Actually, I brought a big bag to work on Saturday in order to reduce the potential of a serious candy coma. By me that is. The kids don't really eat it. Thanks kids!

How was your weekend?

Another cooking tip for kids

Yesterday I asked the kids if they wanted pasta for dinner. I knew it would be easy and I was tired from working the midnight shift. Both kids agreed, but my daughter added that she wanted butter and cheese on it. Sure, it's not all that healthy, but she sounded like she might actually eat if I made it that way. That's huge!

So, as I started to cook the pasta, something very bad happened. I noticed we were out of parmesan cheese. This was a potential dinner disaster. At least for my daughter. She wouldn't cry or anything; she would just not eat it, then complain about being hungry.

I searched all the cabinets and the refrigerator twice. I wanted to be sure that I didn't miss the cheese hiding somewhere. On the second pass through the cabinets I got the idea that saved dinner. I found something that has a very similar look and texture of Parmesan cheese. And, since she is only four, I was sure she wouldn't notice a difference a difference in taste. Did you figure out what it is? Bread crumbs. Yep, I put a dash of bread crumbs on her pasta and she didn't know the difference. She even asked for more. As my daughter likes to say, I'm the best cooker ever!

Maybe we sent her to the wrong school...

Both of our kids go to a Lutheran school, which I wouldn't bring up normally, but it goes with the story. My daughter just started preschool there last week and she is doing much better than we expected.

One of the things that all preschoolers do is art projects. The other day the made door hangers. I think that is what they are called. They remind me of 'Do Not Disturb, signs from hotels, except they don't say that. They will probably make 'Keep Out' signs soon enough.

This particular hanger has a bunch of religious symbols on it. You can tell she spent a lot of time, diligently working out where the different symbols should go. There is just one problem:

Do you see the giant upside-down cross? I've been trying to imagine the teacher's expression when she saw it. There isn't much she could say since it wasn't on purpose, but it is kind of funny.

On a related note; I think I should be a hand model. What do you think?

On another related note; when I was walking our dog the other day, I swear one of the neighbors was playing the music from The Omen. It was a little creepy, and dark.

Foul-mouthed kids

The other day I was here in the office, doing bills or something like that, and the kids were running around behind me. They kept running from there rooms, out to the hallway and back. And yelling. Loudly. My daughter was mostly just screaming, she likes to do that, while my son was yelling, "DAMN!" He kept yelling it as the ran around. At first I was ignoring it, you know, don't let them know it is a bad word and maybe they will drop it. Well, after about 25 times I had to do something. What if the neighbors could hear him?

Finally I called out, "What are you guys doing out there?"

My son stopped by the door, "We're pretending we are beavers building a dam."

"Oh, okay. Can you be a little more quiet?" At least they weren't swearing, and they made a pretty good dam. See:

The only problem? That is the only way to get to my bedroom. They were nice beavers and took it down for me later so I could go to sleep.

Bye! Have Fun! Vroooooom! Screeeeeech!

I dropped my son off at one of his first birthday parties where the parents don't stay. I say one of the first because Jenn dropped him off at one few months ago. It was the first for me though! Anyway I noticed something kid of funny.

Let's say you are having a party for adults. You invite friends, or family, and you tell them to come at 6:30pm. Does everyone show up at 6:30? No. The first people show up around 6:40pm, or so, with people strolling in at least until 7:15pm. That's what you do. Nobody wants to be the first to show up, and some people just like to make an entrance. It's fine, though. Everyone is getting together to have fun.

Now, let's compare this to a kids party. The party started at 11:30am; we got there at about 11:32am and the house was packed. Everyone was there within minutes of the starting time! Why, because they were dropping their kids off and going out to do whatever they can in those 2 hours that they have to themselves. Is it wrong? No, the kids are going to have fun, right? And some things are easier to get done on your own. Actually pretty much everything is easier to get done on your own. Besides, does your son or daughter want to go grocery shopping, clothes shopping, or to the local bar? (What? No, I went to work!)

I know I'm not the first person to notice this, but I find it funny. We'll see what happens when we have our next birthday party.