Star Wars

Friends

The blogger editor ate my original text for this post about 2 weeks ago, which I have to say is a real bummer, because it was actually quite entertaining.

I'm over it now, really.

This is going to be a fairly Daniel-centric post, but I wanted to start with this picture of the kids enjoying themselves massively at a "Pirate concert" put on by a local library. Pirate Pete was the perfect match for their sense of humor.

The title of the post refers to the fact that letting Daniel watch the original, 1977 "Episode IV" of Star Wars has done nothing but pour fuel on the fire of his interest.

In this, what is thought to be the original "Star Wars"-inspired drawing from right after the artist's 5th birthday, we can see a re-enactment of the climactic battle scene from Episode IV.

Done entirely in the "Restaurant Crayon" style, we see some of the inherent limitations of the medium, in that only 4 colors are available and "Yellow" is so faint as to be useless.

The ships with a circular middle are TIE figthers, the red and green ones with oblong shapes are X-Wings. Blue clouds of debris represent exploded space ships, while the green cloud is the remnants of the recently exploded Death Star.


In this drawing, from late May, the Brown figure is Chewbacca, firing a blaster. Luke Skywalker is clearly identifiable as the guy doing battle with Darth Vader, and in the lower corner, Han Solo is assisting, using a blaster that mysteriously shoots two rays simultaneously.

On the left side, Daniel has cataloged the "valid" colors for light sabers, and on the right, one can see an X-Wing fighter shooting at a TIE-fighter, with the Death Star below.

The caption displays an increased level of confidence with his lettering, while indicating that the "R" is still challenging. Bidding for this priceless item of "Early Daniel" will begin at $100.... :)


Oh, did I mention that he's growing his hair out to "Be like Luke"? For those of you who may have forgotten, the hair styles of 1977 were - well - mullet-ish.

As I mentioned - this is "Rev 2" of what originally was a long, funny, serious update about Daniel, and I've forgotten many of the original talking points, but I do know that I highlighted that Daniel can read. Like, he really can read. We don't know exactly when this happened, but already in April, the Pastas pointed out that we might be shorting him when we said he just had awesome book memory. Since then, he's started reading signs, books-he's-read-before. Simple readers (with some encouragement), but the highlight was that he read a letter from Farmor just before going on vacation there. That he did without the assist that illustrations or context provide.

Playing preferably involves a lightsaber, or a sword. Pirates are cool, Star Wars is cooler.

And I'm stopping now before Blogger eats my post again. We're just back from 10 days in Norway, and when I get some posting energy back, I'll tell you all about it, but it was a good time.

Love,
ADRE.

Pictures from a Graduation

  

Friends

So I promised you some pictures from Daniel’s graduation, and this also gives me a chance to try out this new blog editing tool, because the stock blogger one is truly bad.

So the graduation was staged as an olympic event, with various activities such as an obstacle course, hurdles, jumps, soccer, basketball, etc. 

 

 

 

This was followed by an awards ceremony and a diploma. 

 

 

 

And finally, a little video montage from the event.  This might take a little while to download. 

 

OK, that’ll have to do for now.  Let’s upload this posting and see how it looks…

 

Love, ADRE.

Friends

Summer is definitely here. Both Daniel and Rachel have finished their swim lessons and pre-schools and what used to be fairly structured weeks and days is now replaced with random playdates and playing outside.

Rachel's personality has really evolved since we got home from that little jaunt to Texas last month.

Specifically, she's really come out of her little shell socially. She'll now interact a lot more with her playmates from school as well as kids she meets in the park - even initiating the contact/conversations. For posterity, we'll record that she went on a playdate with Tyler, who has a crush on her and refers to her as "MY Rachel"

Our weekend routine consists of making pancakes or waffles for breakfast, and the kids usually argue over whos turn it is to help. Rachel has gotten pretty good at cracking eggs and mixing ingredients.

Rachel's preschool wrapped up with a little show, and unfortunately, this is the only photo we have from it.

As we've mentioned before, Rachel loves books, and so there's at least one trip per week to the library. She has her own library card, and can check out the books herself.

Rachel's task chart has been focused on the letters of the alphabet. She's mastered most of them by now, but still goofs off and occasionally pretends that she doesn't know them. Still, she's worked her way through to several rewards, and a trip to the ice cream store was one of them.

Somehow, Rachel picked up the word "Boring", and uses it frequently when there's something she doesn't want to do. She'll say "UGH, that's so Boawing" and stomp her feet, but most of the time, she still has a sweet, accomodating personality.

Rachel has always loved painting at the easel. She goes at it with great gusto, and usually has a story associated with what she's drawing. This one started as "trees", but migrated into being a "Zeebwa".




Take note of that smile - you'll probably be seeing it again, since that's the look we get if we encourage her to look at the camera.

OK, so I'd mentioned in a previous posting that Daniel has been a biking fiend this spring, and a few weeks back, we went for a bike ride in the state park next to the house. He just wanted to go and go, and with one thing and another we ended up taking a 9.8 mile trip to the beach. He didn't stop, and he didn't complain until his back started hurting around the 9-mile mark. Not bad for a 5-year-old!

(He slept REALLY well that night)

Another birthday, and another trip to the pediatrician to get poked and measured. The official stats for Daniel on his 5th birthday are:

• 36 pounds (15th percentile)
• 41" tall (13th percentile)
• Skills are off the charts
• (In other words, perfect)
• 
  Physical games are part of being a 5-year old boy, and it seems that no matter what it is, it has to involve a sword, a lightsaber or a gun. We had a brief period where he thought he knew Karate (one of his friends showed him some moves), and more recently Tae Kwon Do has shown up for the same reason.

With the warmer weather, the water guns have come into play in the back yard activities.

Star Wars is still the unquestioned champion of entertainment.


Daniel also had a class graduation, and I'll try to do a quick posting of some pictures from that after I get this one done.


Around christmas time, Daniel got a pair of Sketchers tennis shoes that had little flashing green lights. They are actually pretty cool. He had the first pair in his class, but by the end of the school year, there were 5-6 others wearing them. At this age, physical size apparently has nothing to do with influence.

So it's summer, and we're having a good time. Whether it's dragging our sister around the deck, splashing in the water, playing in the pool at Grandma Babe's house, it's all good.

And that'll have to do for this time. I'll try to post some graduation pictures next.

Love, ADRE.

Daniel turns 5

Friends

Well, it happened - Mr. D is actually 5 years old. It's hard to believe that it's really been 5 years, but sure enough it has.

The little man was celebrated in two rounds - first at home on his actual birthday, and then today at the neighborhood park with his friends. We'd invited his preschool class and some other friends, and ended up with close to 100% acceptance rate, so with siblings and parents there were just about 50 people.

On Daniel's birthday, he went to lunch with Eric at a local Chinese restaurant, and had squid, which he then followed up with a birthday dinner wish of "Fish with their heads on". He does love his seafood.

On his birthday, he was allowed to open one package before dinner, and chose the one that arrived that day from Oregon. The monster truck was very popular, as were the books. After dinner he got to open the rest, and got a big kick out of the boat and legos from Norway. The cash he got from grandma babe is getting spent $1 at a time for matchbox cars...

And then there was the big 5-year-old party at the local park. Refusing to learn from last year when we just about gave all of the kids hypothermia, we scheduled an outdoor birthday in the spring. And it was looking pretty bleak a few days before the event, with possible snow predicted, but in the end we got lucky and it was high-50s and partially clouded.

Daniel wanted a Star Wars party, so that's what he got. Invitations went out to his classmates and a few family friends, and with better than expected response rate (and siblings), there were 29 kids who RSVP'ed and they all came.

Each kid got a jedi outfit and a lightsaber, took their picture with Yoda and then ran around the park for a bit.

Then there was pizza and "Yoda Soda" (Sprite with lime sherbert), followed by "Jedi training".

There were three events for the Jedi training. First to learn control of the lightsaber, the kids were given a balloon and asked to use the lightsaber to bounce it across a field....

In retrospect, we should have thought about the wind and the pine trees... Most of the balloons ended up blowing into a tree and popping...

Then there was teamwork training, where two and two jedis were tied together and had to do a three-legged race up the hill.

And finally, there was blaster training, where they got to shoot nerf guns at a cutout of Darth Vader.

Darth himself showed up at the end of training, did battle with the newly-trianed jedis, and lost... (though he'll go on record saying that he didn't feel he could use all of his powers against 5-year-olds).

And there was cake. And more swordfights. And a few tears, but no-one left unhappy.

And most importantly, the birthday boy himself had a great time.

All of the pictures we took at the event can be found HERE.

Happy birthday Mr. D - we love you.

Love, A(D)RE.

(This post was originally funnier and actually available on Sunday after the party, but blogger ate my text. The editor is grumpy).

Houston for a wedding and a little vacation

Friends

So the weekend before Daniel's birthday, we jumped on a plane down to Houston to celebrate Anida's sister getting married, meet up with the TX side of the family, and also take a little vacation with our friends the Pastas.

What with one thing and another, we got a late start to the trip, then got stuck in security, so we made it to the plane with about 45 seconds to spare after a mad dash through the airport.


Daniel and Rachel enjoyed hanging out with their cousins Brayden, Kayla and Chloe before and after the ceremony.












We took advantage of having the kids all dressed up to get some nice pictures.

















The next day after the wedding, we piled into our rented minivan with David, Barbara and Sean and headed on up to Bastrop, TX. There we stayed for a couple of nights at the Hyatt Lost Pines Resort thanks largely to some gift cards that Barbara generously shared.

What a nice place. In many ways it reminded us of the place we go in Thailand. The grounds were nice, the swimming pool was fantastic for the little ones and it was all-around relaxing. Thumbs up.

Daniel got to use his swimming skills in the pool and the kids area was large enough that he got some independence, while we felt like we didn't have to hover over him. Rachel also got confident that she could stand on her toes so they just had a grand time in there.

Daniel rode on the bikes they had for guests, and both evenings, we made S'mores at the outdoor firepits. The resort is right next to a state park, so we got some nice hikes in as well.





There are lots of additional pictures in David's photo Album - HERE.

On the way back from Bastrop, we stopped by the Blue Bell ice cream factor - which the adults enjoyed at least as much as the kids did.

(The airport and flight back were much less dramatic than the trip there).


In the spirit of keeping these short and hopefully not falling too far behind, that'll have to do for updates from TX.

Love, ADRE.

Activities over the last couple of months

Howdy all

So it's time for another big batch of updates, and today we'll have four separate posts. First a "things we've been up to" posting, followed by separate posts for Rachel and Daniel and a Rachel birthday post. As I'm sure you can imagine, a lot happens in three months of blog-silence, so we'll do our best to not overwhelm you.















Back in January, cousins Brayden and Kayla came up to visit from Texas, and that was good fun. They stayed over at Grandma Babe's place, and so Daniel got to go for his first sleepover.

When they weren't doing that, they played, built things and read books at our house. Older cousins are the coolest thing around.







The National western stock show came to town, and this year Anida got to take the kids. As usual, Daniel had more fun climbing on tractors and other farm equipment than actually looking at animals, but Rachel got to ride a pony and had a good time at that.


















In March, Grandpa and Farmor came to visit, as they usually do around March Madness. Daniel suited up in his Xavier gear (aka "the good guys") and took on all comers at driveway basketball. He's gotten decent at dribbling the ball.

As it tends to do in March, it alternated between sunny 70-degree days and snowstorms, so there was sledding and bulding of snowmen as well. Daniel wanted to put a beard on his snowman with red food coloring, but the end result was that it looked like someone slit the snowman's throat.








As a family, we all went up to Winter Park and spent a weekend at a Bed and Breakfast with a swimming pool, which was a nice break. One day we put both Rachel and Daniel in ski school, with the result that Anida got to strap on her skiis for the first time in 6 years. Good fun, though we made the tactical mistake of running into Daniel around lunchtime and that was the end of his willingness to stay in school. Rachel had a fun day on the bunny hill, but was most excited to tell us about the hot chocolate she'd had for snack.














We took a day trip down to Colorado Springs to go to the Zoo down there. Now, you might think that we have a perfectly good zoo in Denver, so why make the drive, but they have giraffes you can feed - which is actually a lot of fun.
Easter came and went. Rather than join the municipal easter egg hunt (which tends to last about 20 seconds while the big kids trample on the little ones), one of the preschool moms arranged a 10-family egg hunt in a local park which worked out wonderfully. All of the kids got to get something, and no-one was trampled.










We also had our own little hunt in the back yard, colored eggs and had Grandma Babe over for an easter lunch.



















Some old favorites repeat themselves, of course. Both kids like to go to the children's museum, and occasionally to the "Monkey Business" inflatable playground. There have been a number of birthday parties, and trips to the zoo as well.

With the warmer weather, and new bicycles (see later posts), we've started taking bike trips as a family. Rachel can ride her own bike as far as the local playground, but jumps in the trailer for the longer trips to the reservoir.

By the end of the summer, I suspect she'll be pedalling along with the rest of us, though it can be hard to remember that she's still just 3 years old.

The way that Daniel and Rachel play together has evolved quite a bit over the last couple of months. Daniel has gotten a little less bossy, Rachel a little more assertive, and so it's balancing out. Sometimes they can play wonderfully together for an extended period. And sometimes - well - not. Particularly if one or the other is tired.

And that'll do for general updates for now. Next, the kids.

A Springtime Daniel Update

There are a lot of things we could put in a posting about our almost-five-year-old, but it just wouldn't be right to lead off with anything except the new bike.

Daniel had pretty much outgrown his little 12" bike, although he was still having a lot of fun on it. On the larger wheels, he goes much faster and further than before.

We've taken several trips from our house through the state park, to the reservoir and back, and he just goes full speed up and down the hills with the biggest smile on his face you can imagine.












Daniel is sort-of reading books now. When he focuses, he can read simple sentences, recognizing a lot of shorter words and will sound his way through the longer ones. Some of it is memorization, some of it he guesses at, but there's no denying that he's really, really close to a reading breakthrough.

His favorite books have been the "magic treehouse" series for some time now -> he's read the first 28 adventures of Jack and Annie, and is apparently constantly talking about them at school. His teachers say there isn't a subject that he doesn't have an opinion on, and frequently starts a sentence with: "I learned that from my Jack and Annie books".

For those of you who are keeping track, Daniel did have another seizure here a couple of weeks ago. That makes 8 so far, and it'd been about 9 months since the previous one. So they're coming infrequently, and always triggered by a fever.

This was the first time we didn't go to the hospital at all, and it worked out OK, if a little nerve-wracking to do without the safety net of the nurses and doctors.

Daniel wrapped up the ski season with a third lesson, which didn't go all that great. He ends his first year of skiing knowing how to turn and stop, but not comfortable with going fast. That's OK, there's always next year.

In the last couple of months, Daniel's drawing abilities have really turned a corner, and it seemed to happen overnight. All of a sudden he's drawing recognizable people, houses, cats, dragons... He also writes his own cards and notes - you have to spell things out for him, of course, but you don't have to prod him anymore - he'll say "I want to write this.."

Daniel is now all signed up for kindergarten in the fall. It's hard to believe he's starting school already. He's ready for it, though.













Back in January, Daniel went on his first sleep-over at Grandma Babe's house when his cousins were in town, and most weeks have at least one playdate, either at our house or at a classmate's. Rarely does a play session last long before it somehow turns into a sword fight.

Speaking of sword fights, Daniel's birthday party will have a "Star Wars" theme to it, and 20+ kids will be running around the park with light sabers. We've bought up the entire local supply of blue pool noodles in order to make lightsabers for everyone.












On Tuesdays, Rachel has school, and Daniel doesn't, so it's Mama-Daniel day. On one recent tuesday they decided to go ice skating at the local rec center. Daniel was well-prepared with kneepads, elbow pads and a helmet, but quipped "Mama, I wish I had a butt-pad".

Like his sister, Daniel has a "Chart" of things we'd like him to work on, and upon completing it, he gets a reward of his choice. Past rewards have included various toys, experiences, etc. On one of his playdates at a friends house, he got to play with a nerf gun, and that's ALL he wanted.

We were pretty apprehensive, having previously laid down a "no guns, no shooting" rule. Not that that was working all that well - he would still make a gun from his index finger and thumb and run around going "piew, piew" until he got it trouble.... So he earned the nerf gun, played with it for awhile and got that out of his system, and now he doesn't rebel with the finger guns anymore, so this is all good.

Daniel has been taking Spanish lessons after school from Senora Cardoza, and that's been interesting. He knows colors, numbers and some other things. Some words he's learned are different than what is used in the Dora and Diego books, and when we asked about it, he said "Dora is just wrong".

Daniel and Papa got to go see Monster Trucks when they came to Denver, and that was a popular event. Much smaller than the Houston event from last year, but still fun. He particularly enjoyed the motorcycle tricks. Between the bike and his fascination with cars/engines, I suspect we're looking at a future gearhead.

Finally, Daniel's preschool class held a father-child ice cream social a few weeks ago. The dads got to come to the classroom, hang out for a while and eat ice cream. The highlight was that each kid had written a little essay about their father and what they liked about them, and the teachers made that into a laminated poster. I'll have to try to scan and post a picture.

And that'll have to do for the Daniel-specific updates for now.