A gift for Dad

Back in October, the kids were home alone the day after Glenn's birthday and had the brilliant idea of creating a video for him.  I was so impressed with their results, because they had never used this software.  I'm told it only took them about 20 minutes.  Kids and technology.  Crazy. Anyway, it gives me chills every time I watch it.  The song is wonderful.  It's technically is a love song, but fits well enough for a daddy, too.

Thanks for being such a great dad to your kids, Glenn.  God bless you.

If the above video isn't working, use this link to youtube.

Spiky 'Do

The girls and I had haircuts last week, and Morgan wanted to participate too.  The poor boy usually has to put up with my second-rate hair cutting skills, so why not let a professional do it for once?!  We sat down and looked through the hair books at some boy styles he could pick from.  I'm sure you're aware, when you have short hair, your options are quite limited.  All we came up with was short on the sides and longer and spiky on the top.  He was SO excited about it!

 Can you see that big grin?  It was plastered below his nose the whole time!

I don't know what this is....  His gangsta/cool dude pose, perhaps?

I think I can safely report that his dad was a little less impressed with the 'do we came up with.  Dad's a good sport, so he's not said much, but it pretty much looks like he just rolled out of bed.  But look on the bright side: we use to fight it to lay down every morning.  Now we encourage it to stand on end.   If you can't fight 'em, join 'em!

Gingerbread Judges

No gingerbread house activity is complete without some judges recognizing the hard work.

It took the judges a surprisingly long time to decide.  All the houses were so good.

In the interest of fairness, each house was recognized in a different category.  Nicole's house got second place overall.  It was a fabulous good time.  (You can see Morgan in the back of this shot waiting anxiously for the judges to make up their minds!)

Gingerbread

We divided and conquered this year, for Thanksgiving, that is. We started at Glenn's sister Nancy's house for a couple hours and then drove to my brother's house for a yummy dinner and overnight stay. Thankfully, we didn't miss out on the exciting fun event they had planned at Nancy's.....

Gingerbread houses!!

They were busy as little bees for quite a long time.  This was serious business.  (I know you're wondering about all the wine glasses.  No, these minors were not imbibing on turkey day.  Nancy had a yummy cranberry punch and broke out the pretty stemware for all to use.  You can rest easy.)

Even our teenager wasn't too cool to make a gingerbread house.  Almost, but not quite.  Don't tell her friends, okay?

Morgan and his Godfather outdid themselves.  

Their creation had a fire ring, cows eating hay, and Phil and Morgan standing in front of the house (use your imagination).

Nicole's is on the far right, and Ellea's is in the middle.  Both fabulously loaded down with candy and frosting
and ready to give their builder one heck of a sugar high!

Guitar

Morgan has decided his newest endeavor will be learning to play the guitar.  It doesn't hurt that it's something that his Godfather does.  Not only can he try to emulate him, but he can use it as an excuse to spend time with him.

He's borrowing a guitar from his grandma, and thinks he wants one of his own for Christmas.

So far, he's learned the D chord.  He says he "wrote" a song.  Haven't heard it yet, but I'm sure it's a good one!

Puppy Chow

 My mom and darling daughter decided to make some goodies the day before Thanksgiving.  I had gone to the store and pick up ingredients for "puppy chow."  This yummy, chocolate snack is also known at "muddy buddies."  It's melted chocolate and peanut butter-coated chex cereal topped with powdered sugar.  Yum - everything's yummy with a chocolate, peanut butter, powdered sugar coat!  Maybe Morgan would eat broccoli with that stuff on it.  Okay.  Maybe not everything would be good with chocolate, peanut butter and powdered sugar.

They also made no-bake oatmeal cookies.  Everyone else enjoys these, but strangely they're not my cup of tea.  Normally I'm all about anything with some form of chocolate involved, but these - no so much.  That's okay.  It makes up for my over-indulging of everything else chocolate.

Day before Turkey

We decided to go out to dinner last night as a happy-day-before-Thanksgiving-let's-celebrate-our-family event. (It's fun stringing lots of words together with hyphens. You should try it.)

My fries were so tiny that I tried eating them with a fork.  It's hard to eat fries with a fork.  Ellea wanted to be in the picture stuffing her face, apparently...

Pretty girl.

Morgan spent most of his time in this game trying to figure out how to make the motorcycle go.  A well-spent seventy-five cents!

He decided to play this silly crane game.  I was shocked when he managed to win something.  I thought these things were rigged to be impossible!

Happy Thanksgiving to all my blog-reading friends!
May your turkey be moist and your family be thankful.  God bless!

Girl Can Jump

Glenn was telling the girls just the other day he wanted to teach them how to jump when they're playing basketball.

Then he saw my pictures and was impressed to see that Ellea can in fact jump!

It looks promising...

I wish I could tell you that it went in, but sadly it didn't!  But now we know that girl can jump!

Free Throws

Remember yesterday, when I said I didn't know much about basketball? Well, Glenn gave me a little more knowledge, and I thought I'd share.... He (gently) shared that when you have a free throw, you are not throwing the ball, you are shooting it.  Okay.  Good to know.  I think Glenn was afraid I'd take offense at his correction, but I don't claim to know anything about sports, so it's all good.

But......  if you don't throw the ball, why is it called a free throw?!!  I may start calling it a free shoot.  Just saying.  Shouldn't there be consistency?  I like consistency.

Fired Up

We're ALL about the basketball in this household, so we went to another basketball tournament in a town 2 hours away last Saturday.  Both girls' teams (6th and 8th grade) played three games each.  You'll also remember that Glenn coaches both teams.  I'm telling you, we LOVE basketball around here!  We were there about eleven hours which was a bit long, but it was a great opportunity for them to get more experience on the court.

I took my big girl camera, of course, and loved it.  I took over 150 pictures.  My favorite thing is that it has "continuous shooting."  That means that it's not like regular point-and-shoot digital cameras, where there's what seems like a 10-minute lag between shots.  That's why I took so many pictures.  Every time I pressed the shutter, I took two or three shots.  This was my favorite series of pictures....

Ellea coming in for the kill.

 Give me that ball.  I want it.

 It's mine.  You can't have it!  (Look at that face...  This is serious business.)

 Victory will be mine!

The ref finally called a "jump ball," which is what they do instead of making the players roll around the court fighting over the ball all day!  They alternate whose ball it is each time they call a jump.  (There.  I've now shared all my basketball knowledge with you.  There's a tiny bit more where that came from, but not much.)

You have no idea what a big deal this is that Ellea was being this aggressive.  Glenn's tried for two years to get her fired up to want the ball.  I don't know what got into her, but her daddy/coach sure was pleased!

I spend their childhood teaching them to be sweet and polite and share with others.  Basketball comes along and reverses all that!  So long as they keep it on the court.

Big News

It's official.  It's amazing.  It's BIG news around the Poxleitner abode........



We finally have moved on from dial-up Internet!  Woo hoo.  We have officially entered the current century.

The nice (not very talkative, little bit scary) installer guy from Hughes Net came and installed our satellite dish yesterday.  It's the newest, fastest satellite out there (and the only option for those of us who live out in the tullies.)  And, boy, is it faster than dial-up.  What have I been waiting for?!  Oh, that's right, it's $50 a month versus the $10 that was dial up.  Sometimes you just gotta bite the bullet....

The dish is installed outside Morgan's bedroom window above the roof over our back deck.  I leaned out the window this morning to take this picture.  Glenn offered to go out on the roof and take the picture, but I said it was okay.

He did it anyway.  Isn't it pretty?  Not really, but it represents a new, faster connection to the outside world. And a new fight with my kids.....  "Get off the computer/iPod already!"  They weren't allowed to use the Internet because it would tie up the phone line (and I did that enough on my own!).  Now I'm going to have to monitor their computer usage.  See, there was one benefit of dial up.

Word Cloud

I recently discovered a fabulous website called www.wordle.net that makes these cool "word clouds."  You type in the words you want it to use, cut and paste some words from another source, or enter a url from a website and it takes the most frequently used words and throws them together all random-like....

This word cloud is from my blog.  Looks like I use the word "basketball" the most.  That's not too surprising....  I had so much fun (read: wasted too much time) playing around with the layout and the colors, etc, etc.

Give it a try.  It's kinda fun.

Spencer's Own

The school had a special assembly last week with a singing group which also advocates anti-bullying.  I wasn't going to attend, because I had a hundred other things I could've been doing, but I am glad I did.  They were an excellent group.  Their name is Spencer's Own and they are five brothers originally from Twin Falls, Idaho.  They now live in Nashville Tennessee and have just released their first single, "Idaho Love."  You can find it on You Tube.  I also, love their version of "Brown-eyed girl."  (click on play button when window opens - you won't be disappointed)   No promises on these links, or on the quality of the videos.  I still have dial-up, so I can't actually watch them!  Soon I will enter the 21st century.....  (Update:  I checked the links at school and they weren't so great.....  I've changed them.  Enjoy.)

The kids really enjoyed the music too.  We bought their CD's and had all five of the band members sign them, and Nicole got her picture taken with Nicholas.  This guy has taught himself how to do something called Beat Boxing.  If you've never heard someone do it, you're missing out.  He sounds just like a drum set keeping the beat in the background--only better than a drum set.  It's very cool, and harder to do than you would imagine.  Well, anyone can do it, I suppose, but doing it well is the tricky part.  The girls and I gave it a try the other day and had a good laugh over our inability.   Check out this you tube video of him.

Veteran's Day 2012

All our students got together, kindergarten through seniors, to have an assembly honoring all our local Veterans yesterday. Morgan recently joined Boy Scouts, so got to participate in bringing in the flag.

During the Star-Spangled Banner.  What a cute little patriot.

Singing his little heart out.


God Bless our Veterans.  Thank you for what you've done to secure and maintain our freedoms.

Calling

 This man has found his calling.....

He loves basketball, he loves kids, and how he loves teaching kids basketball!  He's a good coach, too, in my slightly-biased opinion.

Basketball Tourny

We're in the midst of a big basketball tournament in Grangeville this week. Glenn, being a glutton for punishment, and a basketball nut, is coaching both a 6th grade team and an 8th grade team for this tournament.

Ellea is number 33.  Her team won 26 to 16, yippee!!!

And Nicole, who hasn't played basektball since 6th grade, agreed to play, and did very well.  She got to throw freethrows once and this one was nothin' but net!!  Woot!  Her team won also, 19 to 15!

Five more games today.  Bring it on.

Seattle Pictures

The motel I stayed in at Seattle was just a few blocks from Pike's Market, so I spent a lot of time just wandering around.  I didn't buy a whole lot because I didn't have room in my luggage.  It made me so sad that I couldn't figure out how to bring along my big-girl-camera.  It was about a year ago that we were in Seattle and my true lust for a real camera began.  Our hosts had a camera just like the one I now have, and I loved (was jealous) of the pictures he took with it.

So, due to space constraints in my luggage, and refusing to pay $25 to check a bag, I had to settle for Ellea's little camera.

Not bad, but not my Canon.

Seattle Music

As I wandered around Seattle for my conference a couple weeks ago, I was struck by how many people sit on the sidewalk and play music hoping people will appreciate their display and throw some money in their bucket.

I wish I had taken more pictures.  There was a bag pipe player.  I saw a violinist.  There was an older guy playing an unusual stringed-instrument that was very mournful sounding.  It was fascinating.

I was especially taken with this pair--although not enough to dig out my purse and pay them for their talents.  They had a whole drum set going with overturned buckets.  They even had cymbals and a cow bell.

Then there was the mini-piano.  I was dying to know how this guy got is piano here right at pike's market.  There is a very steep hill to go down unless someone dropped him off right on the corner.  Those look like pretty sturdy wheels.  Does he just push his little piano all over town??  Enquiring minds want to know!

And they will!

With the miracle that is known as the Internet, I googled it.  You can go watch you tube videos if you're dying to see this guy in action!  And, according to this article, he does push it a few blocks from some "secret" hiding place and has been doing so at least FIVE days a week for 26 years!!  This is his fifth piano since 1986! 

So there you have it.  Now you know "the rest of the story!"

Seattle Food

I traveled to Seattle recently for a work-related conference.  My favorite part of the whole trip was the food.  Imagine.

 

The first night I found a P.F. Chang's and enjoyed some take out.  Pad Thai--something I had never had before.  Very yummy.

One day for lunch I wandered into a deli at Pike Place Market and ordered this yummy Grinder sandwich which they warmed on the Panini press.  I was going to take it back to my motel and eat, but I found a little table by a waterfall and sat in the sunshine and people watched.

I went to Pike's place with a couple friends one evening and ate fish and chips over the waterfront.  My dinner mates thought it was odd when I pulled out my camera to take a picture of my food.  Apparently, most people don't document their meals in this way.  Go figure.

Lashes

Nicole found these great fake lashes for her devil costume this year.  They were vicious.  If you stood too close, she could poke your eye out!

Mama Cows

You haven't lived until you've tried to sleep through mama cows and baby calves who have been separated against their will. 

 Yup, it's weaning time.

That beautiful time of year when you rip the babies from their mamas and tell them to deal with it.

Now, granted, the babies weigh approximately 800 pounds by now, so one would the think the moms would say, “good riddance.” But they don’t.

I think they might say, “my udder hurts.” I can’t be sure.

But it’s been three days now and still they’re getting out of their pen to get closer to their calves.  And they're still bawling day and night, although it's slowed down a little (thank goodnes). 

Their udders cannot still hurt three days later.

They’re just good mamas, I guess.

Up a Tree

 

Before we could hit the trail on Halloween night, we had to rescue Ellea’s cat, Vandal. He managed to climb over 30 feet up a tree and couldn’t figure out how to get back down. By the time we rescued him, we think he’d been up there for about 24 hours. Mom tells me that when I was a kid, my cat got stuck in a tree (I don’t remember this).  My dad said he’d come down eventually, and he did. Ellea didn’t care for that story. She was pretty distraught by the whole scene because her cat was loud and clear about his desire to be saved.

And then she got even more upset because her daddy was clearly doing something dangerous to retrieve her cat.  He put this ladder in the bucket of his tractor and I lifted the bucket up. 

Do not try this at home.  We are what you call experts.  Or dummies.

He had to rip the cat off the branch, but surprisingly, Vandal didn't get scared and scratch anyone.

Ellea sure was relieved.  I'm sure the cat was grateful too.  He's been much more affectionate ever since.  He never really knew how good he had it until he got stuck in a tree!