Spring Break in Lynnwood

After coming home from White Pass, the wife and kid came and stayed with me at my hotel in Lynnwood. I took half days off for a couple of days so we could do stuff together. On the first day the family met me at the Boeing office, where my current project is located, and we went to lunch at Z's the best burger place in the Pacific Northwest. Most of my co-workers from the office were there and had the privilege of seeing my children that I talk about all the time. After that we went to the headquarters of Nintendo USA, where we traded Daniel's beloved, but broken DS, for a refurbished DS. This was an early Birthday present for him. There was a display at the visitor center that had all the different game consoles Nintendo has come out with. Daniel was elated to get his new DS. Instead of a plane white body, this one has a black bottom, and a dark blue lid. He played it all afternoon and evening. When it was time to go to bed he tucked his new beloved toy into bed next to him. There are few things more fun than watching a three year old with a beloved toy. On Wednesday we went to the museum of flight. They had an SR71 Blackbird, an incredible WWII and WWI display, a concord, and one of the old Air Force One planes. I was able to stand where Nixon once stood, and repeated those immortal words, "I'm not a crook". The SR71 that was there was an experimental version they built to play around with the idea of launching a super sonic drone from a blackbird. The experiment did work, to they moth balled the plane. That particular SR71 only has 200 hours on it. The kids had a great time playing around the hotel. Every morning they went to the pool while I was at work, and every evening they were down at the pool. Lil Dave also dragged me down to the gym. Daniel's favorite part was the elevators. The hotel is a huge atrium surrounded by rooms. The elevators have a glass back so you can look over the atrium while you go up and down. Daniel loved watching out the elevator and pushing the buttons.

Sprinter Break Trip to White Pass

We went on a trip this weekend up to White Pass. I don't have time to write all the details just yet, but here are some pictures.

The scenic view by our cabin at Camp Zarahemla

Guys from the X-Games jumping snowmobiles

Zach on skis

Sabrina on Skis

Sorry no pictures of Lil Dave on the snowboard from this trip.

Daniel playing in the snow at camp.
David sledding at camp
Zach sledding at camp
Sabrina sledding at camp
Zach by our cabin at Camp Zarahemla
Fixing breakfast

April Fools Day 2008

When I arrived home on April fools day, my children kept on trying to play April fools jokes on me. David started by telling me that he was sent home with a “white ticket” (disciplinary notice). This being his first ever, I gathered it was a joke, but I thought I’d play along. I told Dave that he was grounded from his beloved Xbox, TV and the home computer for a month, and I wanted him to got to his room for the rest of the night. Figuring out that this joke on Dad wasn’t going the direction that he wanted it to go, he went into the April fools, it’s just a joke routine. But having way to much fun with this, I told Dave that I didn’t believe it was a joke, and wanted him to go to his room.

Later Sabrina came home, and already worked up about having to go back to the church to retrieve her forgotten backpack. Dave, always willing to poor gas on the flame that is Sabrina, told her that her beloved guinea pig, Ruby, had gotten out of her cage, and we couldn’t find her. After Sabrina ran up stairs to find Ruby, Dave nudged me, and with a sly look on his face said “Don’t worry Dad, I put her someplace safe.” I asked where he stuck the poor rodent. He replied, with a look on his face like he knew what he was doing, and had everything under control, “I put her in the top drawer of my desk.” Yes that’s right, he put this poor guinea pig in his top desk drawer. And of course the funny part is that he thought it was a great, clever idea. I smacked him upside the back of the head, and ordered him to get the poor thing out there before if suffocated.

Sabrina, already livid that something happened to her beloved rodent, went ballistic when she saw Dave pull the thing out of his desk drawer. It took several slices of pizza to calm her down.

Sabrina Celebrates Tenth Birthday

Sabrina turned ten yesterday. Always the one to entertain she decided to have a luau for her birthday. Now before I describe our "tropical" experience, let me give some background. Jen and Sabrina settled on twelve girls to invite. A healthy sized guest list for any birthday party. Well Jen wasn't sure if some of the girls got their invitations, so Jen made out six invitations and gave them to Sabrina with instructions to deliver them at school. Apparently there was a misunderstanding on who to give the invitations to, because Sabrina handed them out to six more girls. So now we have 18 girls on the guest list. But wait, it gets better. It turns out that this whole global warming thing hasn't reached us up here in the Pacific Northwest, because it snowed the day before her birthday, and the day of, was pretty dang cold!





The morning of the party Dave had a baseball game. I froze to death watching the game, and Dave really froze to death playing. We got home, all cold to find the house all decorated as if it was in Hawaii. Our bar in the family room was transformed into a tiki bar complete with ice cream smoothies. Sabrina and her friends were in their swim suits (yes swim suits). Sabrina had flowers in her hair, and a lei. I of course was wearing a turtle-neck and a fleece pull over. All but two kids showed up for the gal la event (that's sixteen girls for those of you keeping track).





The girls spent most of their time in the hot tub. If anybody is wondering how many 9-10 year old girls can fit into a six person hot tub, the answer is 17. Jen taught them a couple of hula dances. Jen actually does a pretty good hula. It also gave me the chance to download some Don Ho music.





For the birthday cake, Jen made a volcano cake which, with the help of some dry ice, actually erupted. That was one of the highlights of the party. I also presented Sabrina with a new custom home for her guinea pig that I had been building for the past couple of weekends. Her little rodent, Ruby, is enjoying her "piggy condo" and Jen is enjoying having a place to put all the rodent paraphernalia.

Busy Saturday

We just survived the busiest Saturday yet. It started at six a.m. with a youth temple trip up by Seattle. This was Lil Dave's first temple trip. I was glad to see that he took reverence in the temple very seriously. It was a good experience for both of us. While watching David do baptisms for the dead, I was very much impressed that I needed to do the temple work for an old friend of mine that I taught on my mission. More on that as I figure out what needs to be done.


Dave and I had to leave the temple early so we could make it to Zach's 7th birthday party at Chucky Cheese. Jen had to pick up four kids, several others were meeting us there. They had fun playing the games, and Chucky came out and did a song and dance. Zach and his friends had fun, but I really hate that place.

Before Zach's party was over I had to zip Dave across town for his baseball team pictures. We were late and missed them though. Then we had to rush home and get ready for Dave’s class project that Jen somehow was put in charge of. Months ago, at the annual PTA auction, Dave’s class put up the class coming over to some poor souls house, and do yard work. So some kind hearted soul bid $450 for this “yard work”. Jen rushed as fast as she could be with dropping off kids from the party arrived late, and without David. I got Dave there a half your later. Then David had to leave an hour early for baseball practice.

To finish off the evening Jen and I filmed the junior high school play which was an original script written by a friend of ours from church.

Last Snow Board Lesson

We had a busy, busy weekend. It started on Friday taking David and his buddies up for their last snow board lesson. This was their first time up to the top of the hill. David had some problems on the first run down. I tried to convince him that he had the wrong foot forward. He thought he was goofyfoot, right foot forward, and I thought he wasn't. By the time Dave got to the bottom of the hill he said he would try a board set up for left foot forward. We took the board into the rental space, and the guy told us the board was already setup for left foot forward. So I was right, he had the wrong foot forward, and David was right, he is goofyfoot. We had a fun time, the boys even risked a black diamond, albeit a short one. During their lesson I got to go a few trips down alone. It's been a long time since I've been able to listen to music and ski by myself. I feel cheeted that I didn't have an MP3 player growing up. Having several hundred of your favorite songs in a ultra small package while skiing is so much better than a bug bulky walkman with ten songs.

We get to go Skiing

The other week we enrolled David and couple of his buddies in a snowboard class up at Whitepass ski resort. It's been over four years since Jen and I have been skiing so it was a great opportunity for us to get some skiing in as well. I'm happy to report that I can still ski fairly well. David and his friends are picking up snowboarding fairly well. You won't see them on a Warren Miller film anytime soon, but they are getting the hang of it.

Zach also went up with us. We didn't plan to, but he gave us the puppy dog eyes that we can't resist the night before. We enrolled him in a day long play care that took him on the bunny slope and gave him a bit of a snowboard lesson. Next time I think we'll try him on skis.


The only person to really injure themselves was me. We could have gone down a medium run called "Paradise", but instead opted for a black diamond called "Holiday Cliffs". It turned out to be one of those runs where the slope is steep enough that it's not visible from the top. On my first turn I hit a block of ice which flipped me over on my back. I then proceeded to bounce down the moguls on my back. Jen called from the top "You aren't filling me with confidence!" I ended up wrenching my arm bad enough that it's still pretty sore ten days later. The boys have one more lesson left, which means I get to go skiing again!!

Aristocats

Sabrina participated in our schools production of Aristocats. She and her buddy, Ashlyn, played ally cats. Dave's buddy Dallin got to play one of the Aristocat kittins, and his other buddy Tanner played the head dog. Jen, as always got roped into helping make some of the costumes, and the both of us filmed the thing, and Lil Dave snagged my camera and took a lot of pictures. Happy to say that the play was a good success and the DVD came out great also.