Offspring had a good day yesterday, pt. 2

The Princess (who can feel free to skip this post) was supposed to go to Church Camp yesterday. But her mom and I decided this weekend that she and her brother wouldn't be attending for reasons that I don't want to get into here, essentially it boils down to some differences between American Evangelicals and Reformed Christians (iow, we can be uptight about worship and sacramentology).

It would've been her first time going away for something like this, and she was really looking forward to it. But it was the right call -- even though it carried the special kind of difficulty only known to Dads of daughters with fully-functional nasolacrimal ducts. But the three of us talked about it, and she understood our thinking.

A couple days later, for fun I read the Offspring questions 107-110 of the Larger Catechism -- not really to teach them anything, but to make them appreciate that they're memorizing the Shorter Catechism 49-52 instead. Still, something must've clicked as I rushed though that.

Yesterday, when her friends were posting statuses and pics to Facebook about getting ready to leave, etc., what's my little girl do? She posts:

Q. 108. What are the duties required in the second commandment?
A. The duties required in the second commandment are, the receiving, observing, and keeping pure and entire, all such religious worship and ordinances as God hath instituted in his Word; particularly prayer and thanksgiving in the name of Christ; the reading, preaching, and hearing of the Word; the administration and receiving of the sacraments; church government and discipline; the ministry and maintenance thereof; religious fasting; swearing by the name of God, and vowing unto him: as also the disapproving, detesting, opposing, all false worship; and, according to each one’s place and calling, removing it, and all monuments of idolatry.

We didn't prompt it, didn't push it -- didn't even see it 'til a couple hours later, actually. Honestly, I didn't even try to convince her we were right in our thinking -- we just explained our position and that we thought it was important -- the Spirit did the rest to her conscience.

I'm not posting this to brag on her, really. But when I read that post, I choked up a little. She's such a precious gift, and seeing the Spirit work in her as He is doing is such a privilege. More than a miserable sinner like me deserves, that's for sure. And I'm glad for the opportunity to express my gratitude for that display of grace.

Soli Deo Gloria.

Offspring had a good day yesterday, pt. 1

Frodo's been helping out with an elementary school robotics camp that Arnold's attending. That's really all I can say because I haven't witnessed any of it, and what they've talked about has been beyond my ken. Sorry, guys, just nothing for me to talk about.

Samwise, on the other hand, has been really pushing himself with his guitar lately, learning gobs and gobs of songs. He seemed pretty stoked yesterday for me to hear what he'd worked on -- Precious Death's "You Can't Break Me." He's not done with this by any means, but was still excited to show it to me. I was excited because I've been trying to get him to pay attention to Precious Death for at least 5 years. Give it a listen (sorry for camera work, was really just going for audio, but it was okay enough to go with this format, I thought)
(if you want to hear the original -- and see the lyrics -- click here)

Now we just need someone to provide the vocals. Maybe Frodo can do his Christian Bale Batman for the verses.

A Day in Selfies

So, yesterday, we hung out at ye olde Family Fun Center, Wahooz. Couldn't get any good action shots, so went with a collection of selfies to commemorate the day.

this one is sort of a meta-selfie. I should try to post the one that Samwise took here.

A Decade of Mercy

I'm about to head to bed and by the time I wake up, this little dude's odometer will have turned, and he'll be in double digits.

Sure, my youngest hitting the decade mark makes me feel older than any of my own birthdays could. But the important -- and mind-blowing -- thing is that this one has made it this far in pretty good health and spirits. Sure, there've been more hospitalizations for him than the rest of my little family combined (more than double, actually) -- but none have been truly worrisome, really they've mostly been expensive annoyances. (for the skinny on this, if you're new to the saga, click here)

We don't owe this to his own strength and perseverance (which he has in spades), to the care of his wonderful mother, his passable father, his supportive siblings (who are really his most devoted caretakers when it counts), the grandparents and extended family who are always ready to drop everything and help, his two excellent doctors, or anything else merely human.

It's the mercy and care of Our Lord, who by His providence has given him better health, greater strength, and better kidney function than anyone could've expected. But this covenant child, recipient of the promise of God is seeing His God's hand at work in his life. He, more than many his age, can see that (in the words of Thomas Watson) "We are kept alive by a wonderful-working Providence. Providence makes our clothes to warm us, and our food to nourish us. We are fed every day out of the alms-basket of God's providence. That we are in health, that we have an estate, is not by our diligence—but God's providence."

So tonight we celebrated the anniversary of his birth. We celebrated the time we've had with him, and the time we look forward to. But most of all, consciously or not, we celebrated the Triune God's care for him.

Gracious Lord, I thank you for our little Arnold, and beg Your continued care for his health as I plead for You to draw him to a saving knowledge of You.

And son? Happy birthday, and Lord willing, many happy returns.

A Beauty of a Bot

So, this last weekend, we took our oldest up to Moscow to participate in the Idaho FIRST Tech Challenge Championships with the team from his school. Mostly, this involved TLoML and I wandering around our old stomping grounds engaging in excessive acts of nostalgia, while he worked on the robot with his team making sure everything was ready for the competition.

The team participated in 6 matches -- 1 didn't count on their overall score. I got somewhat iffy video of four of the five that did count. Like with many things, I don't think the youtube video captures the excitement of it all, but it might come close.

Beauty Bot starts on the far right of the screen here


Beauty Bot starts on the far left of the screen


Beauty Bot begins this match directly in front of (and blocked from view) by the umpire on the bottom of the screen. Best angle I could get -- sorry.


Beauty Bot starts on the far right of the screen here

If one of us has time in the next few days, I might add some more information about the videos.

Anyway, the team and the robot performed a lot better than they did last year, and it was a blast to see them at work. In addition to just doing better, they won an award -- the Think Award, which is described as

Given to the team that best reflects the "journey" the team took as they experienced the engineering design process during the build season. The engineering section of the notebook is the key reference for judges to help identify the most deserving team. Journal entries of interest to judges for this award will include those describing the underlying science and mathematics of the robot design and game strategies, the designs, re-designs, successes, and those 'interesting moments' when things weren't going as planned.

They also came in second for the Inspire Award

Given to the team that truly embodied the 'challenge' of the FTC program. The team that receives this award is chosen by the judges as having best represented a 'role-model' FTC Team. This team is a top contender for all other judging categories and is a strong competitor on the field.

Better than just the nice words, coming in 2nd to that, got the team a spot in the FTC West Super-Regional Championship next month. So that's a month of scrambling to make some improvements to the robot and fundraising to get the team to California. Good thing they've got nothing like studying to distract them.

Here's a shot of our boy holding the Think Award and smiling -- something I have a hard time capturing on filman image, but he couldn't help himself when I shot it.

XMas Programs/Recitals/Etc.

(I apologize in advance for the spacing on this post, depending what your screen resolution, and window size, this could look pretty ugly)

I find myself at the end of a busy week of children's Christmas programs, wherein parents, grandparents and resentful siblings were able to see the culmination of hours, days, and weeks (and sometimes entire minutes) of preparation on the parts of many, only to watch those who we get to see and hear too much of at home.

We started the week with Samwise and a group of guitar classmates performing during a veritable (and interminable) cavalcade of acoustic performances from the secondary students at his school. Samwise was, for reasons beyond my ken, enrolled in the beginning guitar class and so was playing with people who've been playing for 3 months. They had a lot of fun doing a "funny" little song they wrote. Results varied beyond them. 14 hours after that, the audience members that hadn't fled were released, relatively unharmed.

The next night, Arnold and the Princess got to strut their stuff in the elementary classes program. As you can see from this picture of the Princess I took right before showtime, we had seats in the a good distance away from the stage, and more clearly, I need a better camera. It was a very ambitious program of singing, dancing and recorder playing. I won't say that very few of the kids had talents commensurate with the ambition of the music teacher, but, um... it was cute.






And hey, did I mention, there were recorders? Yup, 90 4^th and 5^th graders played "Frosty the Snowman" on recorders. Several of which had the same key. (if you use your imagination, you can see a pink recorder in her hands there...see above paragraph).






I thought they did a really good job integrating all the grades into the program, and shuffled it up enough that even the shortest of attention spans weren't pushed too far past the breaking point. Someday, I would like someone to explain exactly how this position
represents a partridge in a pear tree, though.






Today, Arnold's music academy put on a recital--we had a flautist, a guitar player, a clarinet wrangler and several pianists perform a song each for us. I was quite impressed with the range of ages and abilities shown, and despite the nerves, they all did a great job. I was, naturally, very impressed with Arnold's playing, this was better than any time I've heard him practice. Thankfully, it was a small crowd, so I was able to shoot a video.

Happy Birthday, Samwise! (or...Man, I Need to Tweak my Camera Settings)

In Commemoration of Samwise's 12th Birthday, I took a stab at a Popcorn Cake.

I think he liked the looks of it:

TLoML described the cake as a popcorn ball mixed with trail mix. Frodo said it was like a movie theater's concession's stand after an earthquake. Both I think were compliments. :) Pretty tasty, actually, and fairly easy. "Sticky", "gooey" and "a giant mess" begin to describe the process of making it.

After that, we gave him his new Nook (yes, my boys are e-book readers now...*sigh*). This is mostly him being excited, and a little bit of him being a giant ham.

yeah, yeah, yeah, the pictures are lousy. I know, I know.

Nothin's More Excitin' Than

New Glasses Day!

(especially if it gives Dad a chance to try to get better with his new camera)

First Weekend of April

Not as eventful as last weekend, but I liked doing it, and hey...it's not a book review, right?

So, this weekend, I

enjoyed this old friend who has sadly, decided to go away again (not my pic, btw)

over-indulged here

toured the Old Idaho Penitentiary with the family enough implied gore for the eldest two Offspring, different enough for the others

didn'tover-indulge here (for a change)

watched this again, was afraid it wouldn't be as funny the 2nd time around, but it was

introduced my children to this classic glad to report, they reacted as they should--laughing hysterically, quoting and requoting ad infinitum

finished was better than it was my sophomore year in high school, don't know why it took me so long to reread it (won't make that mistake again)

read such a fun read

started not bad, not bad at all

was blown away by the premier of mystery fans, quality TV fans...watch this

This Past Weekend

So, this weekend I:

laughed a lot, but not as much as I hoped I would at

laughed more than I expected to and totally DID NOT cry at but there was a lot of pollen and dust in the room while I watched

celebrated her 9th birthday

got this for TLoML

tried this yummy yummy beer (Kona & Maui Brewing Companies make the best argument for relocating to the Aloha State)

spent far too much time with this guy (have just started the 5th week of P90X Doubles)

finished this good stuff

started this remember this being good in 10th Grade

watched the latest episodes of and NPH got it done on all fronts this week (tho' Segal absolutely killed, as per usual)

tried out this very, very tasty cake recipe mine didn't look quite that good. BTW, if you make it, double the KoolAid like I did (accidentally yesterday, on purpose from now on)

all in all, a good weekend. How was yours?

So Much for that Father of the Year Nomination

I just got an email from Samwise's school administrator, letting me know that he'll be meeting with her tomorrow, thanks to an email I sent his teacher.

It's not that he's in trouble or anything, don't get me wrong (me, either...at least not with the school). No, he's going to be asked some questions, which will lead him to "snitch" on some classmates (I'm using some vernacular here that I understand is used by "skels" on "the street").

What guy doesn't want to do that? What guy isn't filled with gratitude toward the person that put him there?

sigh

NaNo Post Mortem

All righty, I'm now 3 for 4 on NaNoWriMo (not even sure you can count 2007's pathetic showing as a try). As much as I loved the 2008 story, I think this year's is better. Now, how I got from a Science Fiction comedy in the vein of Hitchhiker's or Red Dwarf that I couldn't see past chapter 3 of to a mystery that I couldn't see past Chapter 1 of to a Hornby/Tropper-esque coming of age tale to an Urban Fantasy that morphed mere hours before I started into a straight-up Fantasy, I have no clue. But I really, really like what resulted.

The way the plot developed sorta surprised me, I'd envisioned three parts. Part I took place in 1985, would go on for maybe three or four chapters. Then Part 2 would be a chapter -- a little longer, maybe. And then Part 3 would make up the majority of the novel. Yeah, well, best laid plans and all that, right? I never got to part 2 (I wrote a bit of it tonight at work, after the month was over), part 1 just was too interesting. I'm still trying to decide if I make Part 2 an epilogue, and then pick up part 3 next November, or if I keep plowing away. You can see a short bit about it here.

So anyway, what about Frodo? Well, he didn't win this year, he had a hard time shuffling priorities around and it bit him (tho' he did put up a valiant effort the last night in two hours, writing about twice what he spent all day Saturday composing). So he's 2 for 3. BUT, I will say this about what he wrote, it's a whole different kind of writing than he's done before. His first two NaNo's were pretty cartoonish, with flat characters, and rather slapdash and out of control--the second was a great improvement over the first. But it wasn't until I read this year's work, that I realized how far he hadn't come then. His protagonist this year -- and a couple of the secondary characters -- were people, who acted like people. They thought, they spoke like someone you'd actually meet. Not a family of 4 who'd eat 500 pizzas a day for dinner or something. Does he have a long way to go? Yes. Is he a better writer than his old man was at that age? Probably. Anyway, not technically a win as far as the rules go, so chalk this one up as a moral victory.

I got a good deal of help along the way--back in August I threw up a post that got some interesting suggestions here and in other places. My old high school pal, Brent, saw something I said on Facebook and hooked me up with a great book about writing about fighting (I'll talk more about that some other time). A friend from college, Erika, who also also does this 30 day mad-dash, was a great source of encouragement -- not only in what she said, but also by leading me in the word count for most of the month, giving me something to shoot for. My kids were always supportive, even when (especially when?) they were distracting me from the work. And, of course, TLoML who listened to me moan about how impossible it was this year, pretended to give a crap when I babbled in the vaguest manner possible about minor victories I'd made, and generally indulged me in this for the month. Thank you all of you.

Enough about this for now...on to other things, there'll be something different tomorrow, like something about Neti Pots or...I dunno. We'll see.

NaNo-ing

As you've no doubt noticed, I'm doing National Novel Writing Month yet again. I just threw up the code for our stats/word counts over there to your right. Not the most impressive of numbers, but give us time.

I'm more than a little surprised at the direction my novel's going. FOr most of the year, I'd been playing around with a Comedic Science Fiction idea, and despite some great help from readers a few months ago, I decided I just couldn't pull it off. Then I veered into a Nick Hornby/Jonathan Tropper direction, but that one again, fell apart in the planning. Somehow, I started something that touched on urban fantasy, and then became just good ol' fantasy. Surprised the heck out of me. I'm really not sure where I'm going with it, honestly, but I'm having a blast finding out.

I wrote a fight scene tonight--first one since college. This one was far superior to those, but, ugh. I've got a long ways to go there. It was pretty fun tho. I kept fighting the temptation to mime out certain moves to make sure I could describe them correctly, but was pretty sure my co-worker would've labeled me insane (or more insane), so I kept it to the brain. Also tonight, two characters I've been working on for a week were finally introduced, which was a relief. Sadly, when I got to their grand entrance, I'd forgotten their names. So that derailed me for 5-10 minutes. Their new names are pretty cool, and at least one of them is easier to pronounce, but man, I'm gonna be trying to remember their old ones for quite some time. Note to self/other writers: jot stuff like that down. Duhhhhhh.

Frodo's the only one of The Offspring that's taking the plunge this year. The others are plenty busy, and probably a bit demoralized by not being able to finish in year's past. I think next year, I'll give the Princess a nudge again, I think with a little effort on her part, she'll be able to produce something, she just needs more practice. Samwise is clearly not a writer--at least not in his mind, and that's fine, his creative interests are directed elsewhere, and it won't be too long before he'll be writing little ditties (and maybe some long ones, too) instead of stories. Frodo, meanwhile, is writing something very new for him--the last couple of years he's written two adventure/superhero stories in a series, and this year he's going for more of a semi-autobiographical, slice of life kind of thing. The change is doing him good, it's a lot of fun to see his skills develop. Sure his word count is low, but in a week or so I expect them to skyrocket.

For no particular reason...

A few days ago, TLomL went through the hand-me-downs in waiting to get some reinforcements for Arnold's wardrobe. One shirt found it's way to The Princess' collection instead. Now normally, I prefer (and I think she does, too) her in the girlier things, and am not that crazy about the tomboy look for her. But I can't help but think this really works for her.

Yessir, That's My Baby

Am not going to bother with a why-I'm-not-blogging post, tired of those, and frankly, I don't know. I sit and sit in front of blank screens and nothing worth posting gets generated (and it doesn't take reading much of what's posted here to see that I have very low standards in that regard).

Today, I do have something worth talking about. After years of work, and a pretty major project that saved our state a whole lotta cash (for which no "Thank You" card will be forthcoming), The Love of My Life today completed her course of study to become a Certified Public Manager.

Wanted to take a moment to extend my congratulations publicly, and to say how proud I am of all she's accomplished. Way to go, Love.

Moving Oratory

Samwise stood for election today as his 6th grade class president, along with three other candidates. We don't yet know the results, which is driving him crazy--and depending on how distracted he gets over the weekend, could end up driving us all crazy. Being new to the school, he is at a disadvantage compared to the competition (tho' it could pay off, I guess), but he had fun.

To keep the playing field level, there was no campaigning allowed (that's my assumption about the rationale at least), just name recognition and a single speech today. Here's the text:

My Campaign Speech

First of all, I'd like to thank you all for your time. I'd also like to say thanks to Mrs. ----- for putting this together.

7 score and 7 years ago, Abraham Lincoln gave a speech. A lot of other people have given speeches at many other dates and times. I will be like them today, speechwise.

Now, there have been some problems in class.

1. Talking.
   
2. Disruption of the class.
   

And I have solutions to those problems. For talking, I have 2.

1. You would get additional punishments, along with the Tigger Bucks fine. So, like, if someone was talking they'd put $20 on their desk AND lose a recess or something .
2. The people who aren't talking get rewarded.

Now, for disruption. I'd STRONGLY suggest a refocus form or something.

So, um, yeah, um,.............I'm going blank here...............OH! That's right! Adios, mis amigos!

Or “That's all folks!” or something. I don't know. Well, ok, I'm done.

He had no help composing that speech, and even did the math to figure out how many score (he even knew the date off the top of his head). Honestly, I know when I was in 6th grade, I probably couldn't have written that second paragraph, and would've killed (well, poked savagely at any rate) to be able to. Consider me proud.

Grampa went to a Wildfire and All I Got was this Lousy Tshirt?

Since before he retired, my dad's been cooking up ways to make some money in retirement (my thought...why retire?). One of the ways has been as a driver for those fighting wildfires that crop up in Idaho every summer--from various sites to other sites from the fire to the airport (and vice versa), etc. He's been called to duty twice in the last couple of years--he's had at least one down year in between those, which put us in the odd position of hoping the fires don't get too bad, but sorta hoping they do.

What I find interesting enough to focus on today is, like just about every aspect of our culture, fire fighting has been commercialized. There is apparently a decent amount of swag to be picked up at the fires. A couple years ago, my dad brought back tshirts and caps for the grandkids (and himself) with the logos of the companies (is that what you call groups of firefighters?) he was near/driving, or of a waterbomber group, etc. But this year, he brought back tshirts for that very fire. In this case, the Hurd wildfire. Yeah, it had it's own logo (as you can see on Arnold's front and the Princess' back below). My mind boggles that while people are being evacuated, people are being brought in from all corners, federal funds are being allocated (granted, that can take milliseconds), and this thing is being contained; someone has the time to design and print these suckers. The stuff he brought back a couple years ago could be generated in the off season (and, I should note, was of higher quality). But in the midst of all this to create these just strikes me as odd. Not nefarious, don't get me wrong, just odd.

First Day of School 2010-11 (part deux)

So, my first day as a "Learning Coach" for the younger Offspring at a virtual academy has come and gone. And I'm on the verge of starting the countdown to my last one. Seriously, seriously had a lousy time. I'm pretty sure tomorrow--and several more tomorrows to come--will be better (and not just because they really couldn't get worse), which helps some.

No matter how much I prepped, the day was still full of--

"I'm supposed to have you do what now?"
"I'm supposed to print X? Where is X?"
"Why did I print 2 copies of that?" (fairly certain the parent company is owned by an ink cartridge manufacturer)
"Seriously...I spent 15 minutes preparing all these things to get you going on an activity that...teaches you to do something you've been doing for 4 years???"
...and so on

Now I've gone through a lot of that when I homeschooled in the past, but then it was my fault for not preparing correctly, reading the instructions, etc. and I could either shrug it off or laugh at myself. But now...as I'm not the responsible party, it's all their fault and if those dunderheads would just get things straight, everything would be fine and dandy.

Yes, A. I realize the double standard at work here and B. Shut up.

And don't get me started on the mandatory orientation session that interrupted my day, threatened to derail everything, and went on for 2.5 hours covering things that anyone who was conscious and semi-aware during registration/recruitment would know (which didn't stop several Learning Coaches from asking and reasking questions about them, and being so, so, so grateful for the answers). If you get my Facebook feed, you heard me whine about it already. And if you don't get that feed--well, now's a time to be thankful you didn't have to put up with that.

Still, the Princess and Arnold were über-excited about starting, and most of their enthusiasm didn't diminish throughout the day. Actually, they were very positive about the whole thing and are rarin' to go tomorrow. As long as that holds up, I can fake it on my end. Probably.

Naturally, the only time Arnold wasn't smiling/happy/excited today was when I broke out the camera (odd, as he's usually the world's biggest piece of cured meat cut from the thigh of a hog). Still, holding to tradition: here's the first day of school pic:

First Day of School 2010-11 (part 1)

So less than a week before classes started, I got a call from the same Charter that Frodo'd enrolled in saying that there was an opening for Samwise--thankfully, I didn't make a fool of myself and actually got him into the school.

Today was the first day there for both of them. And no, they don't have to wear that fast food worker looking outfit every day, they just happened to both pick the same thing. (and unlike me and my sister at that age, didn't feel immediately compelled to change into something else once they saw the other). So far, we've been very impressed with the teachers and staff; and while the school's educational philosophy might not align with ours perfectly, but it's good enough for government work (and thousands a year cheaper than the only school nearby that comes closer).

Anyway, the boys had a good first day, and ran into a good number of fellow "refugees" from their old school (their word, not mine) and are looking forward to what's coming up.

Of course, not everyone was hard at work this morning: