The Odyssey

Pete asked Dad if he would like to go to his FUTURA classroom to watch his group performance of "The Odyssey". Or, to put it another way, if he would like to get to work at 12:30.

Dad enjoyed watching three plays presented by Pete and his classmates. This was at the school in Sterling where Pete goes on Mondays for the gifted program.

Pete played Odysseus, who apparently has a prominent role in the production. Dad recorded the entire 18 minute affair, which is available upon request.

After the play, Dad took a picture of (l-r) Pete and his friends Albert, and Alonzo.

If you look carefully, Albert can also be seen in the background of the photo below of Sam (taken yesterday) shooting at the Dominion Trail playground:

Albert was practicing by himself, preparing for his playoff game the next evening. He is on Pete's team, the Trailblazers. They won the game, and advanced to the semi-final game on Friday night against the Heat.

Chat Madness

If you ever happen to chat with Pete on Instant Messenger, with Mom mixed in once or twice, it might go something like this:

Snowboarding

Dad and Pete went to Whitetail on Sunday for some snowboarding. This is the same place the family had been tubing a few weeks earlier. Pete and Dad were supposed to go on Saturday, but there was a 50 MPH wind advisory, so they decided that Sunday would be better. Sam was supposed to come too, but he came down with the flu so he stayed home with Mom.

Once they made it through the utter misery of the rental shack, they hit the slopes. Dad was on skis, and Pete was snowboarding for the first time. It turned out to be a bit more challenging than Pete was expecting, but by the end of the day they had been on 4 different lifts and were starting to do some of the steeper runs. It turns out that the most dangerous slope is the beginner run with the conveyor belt - this is where Pete and Dad witnesses several unfortunate injuries over the course of the day.

Pete's strengths were going fast and turning to the left. His weaknesses were turning to the right and stopping. Dad would follow Pete down the runs. He couldn't keep up with Pete, but eventually he would come upon a poor soul with body contorted in all directions.

This person would be Pete. Dad would help Pete to his feet, and they would continue down the mountain.

IHOP Argument

Sam argues about everything. About half the time he is wrong. The other half of the time the whole discussion is some sort of obscure technicality. There are myriad examples.

Dad and Sam went to IHOP Wednesday night, since Pete was home sick. Sam had also been to IHOP with Mom on Sunday morning, since he had wanted pancakes and Pete was still at Alonzo's house from the past-midnight Laser Tag sleepover fiasco. Anyhow, Dad told Sam that it was pretty cool that he got to go to IHOP twice in the same week, Sunday and Wednesday.

Sam quickly pointed out his pointed out his opinion that (a) the first time was Saturday and (b) it's not twice in the same week, since a new week starts on Monday.

Misplaced Credit

Dad returned to the car after running in to Bloom for some lemonade. Sam had been thinking pensively.

Sam: "There's a song in our patriotic show that isn't right. It gives credit to Martin Luther King Jr.'s Dad for all the things that he did. They always leave out the "Jr." part. The song says that Martin Luther King gave the speech 'I Have a Dream'. He was probably dead years before that speech took place."

Bagg Balm

Bag Balm is Pete's mortal enemy. It is supposed to be some kind of soothing ointment, but whenever it touches Pete's face it burns like acid on plastic. Now reading the product description for the first time, it does seem curious that it says "Treat your pet's chapped or brush-burned area with Bag Balm for soothing, moisturizing relief."

Anyhow, whenever Dad wanted to scare Pete in the bathroom he would whip out the container of Bag Balm and sing "B-A-G-G B-A-L-M Bagg Balm". After all these years, tonight Dad revealed to Pete where this reference comes from. See if you can figure it out before clicking on this link to reveal the answer.

Organ Donation

After dinner one evening, Dad and Pete were discussing organ donations.

Dad: If you meet an untimely death, would you like us to donate your organs to a boy or girl who can use them?

Pete: Yes, but make sure it's for someone who really needs them. I don't want someone getting my organs and then walking around with 6 kidneys.

5 Second Rule

Above is Pete's new shirt that he got for Christmas. It is called "5 Second Rule". The green guys counting in the back are germs. This is a good gift for Pete, since his shirt with the bloody donuts is starting to get small on him.

Also pictured in the lower left is Sam's new indoor/outdoor basketball from Target.

Slinkies

The boys took a special trip to Target, since they were selling the little mini-Slinkies 4 for $1. They each bought 4. Pete and Dad had the following brief conversation just before bed that night.

Pete: Is it safe to sleep with a slinky?

Dad: No, I don't think so. Someone could break into the house and shoot you. Good night.

Steelers

Sam is a Steelers fan. This happened some time in the last year. It appears that he was upset about the Eagles trading Donovan McNabb to the Redskins. So everyone is hoping that the Steelers play the Eagles in the playoffs - which of course would have to be in the Super Bowl.

Above, Sam is wearing his new Steelers shirt that he got for Christmas.

By the way, if the playroom looks clean, it is because Sam actually decided to clean it up by himself. This gets 2011 off to a good start, since the playroom was probably not cleaned a single time in 2010 without someone getting yelled at about it.

State Capitals

Pete let us borrow his camera to get a Hi-Def recording of Sam reciting the capitals of the 50 states (see video above). Dad e-mailed the video link to his teacher, Mrs. Rather. Sam also decided one day to write all of the states and capitals in his homework journal, which is pretty good since usually the nightly homework journal assignments are something like "write three words that start with the letter T".

Speaking of the homework journal, a fun assignment Sam had about 2 weeks ago was when he had to find 5 words words using the letters in "WINTER HOLIDAYS". He started with some simple words like "win" and "net", but then Dad, Mom, and Pete helped him find some longer words like "destroy". Sam also found the word "death", which Dad thought his teacher might not be too happy about. Sam continued and found several Christmas words in there. As a side question, Dad asked what other word could be made from the letters in "tinsel", and Pete and Sam came up with not only "silent" but also "listen".

Christmas Presents

The tree at Nana and Poppy's house was overflowing with packages, even before any appearance from Santa.

Pete and Sam were up early and hit their stockings aggressively. There was no need to wait for anyone else to wake up.

Pete was happy with his new FlipVideo cam:

He has already started using it to record lots of cool stuff like this and this.

Sam also got a Vivitar video camera, as well as a Smart Globe:

Due to space limitations, a number of gifts had to be (temporarily) left behind.

Hanging Out with Sarah

Pete and Sam got to hang out with cousin Sarah for several days over Christmas break. The musical instruments included a cello, recorder, guitar, keyboard, and Sam's new bongo drums.

Then it was time for gingerbread houses. Something didn't seem right about Sam's house. He later explained that there was a "lady portal" on the side of the house. Unfortunately the details of this are not appropriate for a family blog, so you will have to ask Sam about it after he turns 18.

White Christmas at the Beach

When Pete and Sam left Ashburn for a holiday trip to Virginia Beach, they had no idea what the weather had in store for them.

The day after Christmas saw about 14 inches of snow in Virginia Beach. Total accumulation back in Ashburn? None.

Despite not having any snow clothes, Pete decided that it was time to take desperate action. So he taped up some bags on his shoes and headed out into the elements.

Of course, Sam and Sarah were not far behind. Sam did not bother with all of the formalities - he went out for about an hour in his sneakers, sweatpants, and a thin pair of gloves.

The kids built a nice little snowman.

Uncle Steve went out later to show everyone how to build a proper snowman. The kids were a bit merciless - denouncing Uncle Steve's snowman and then Ashleigh unceremoniously destroying it.

Everyone took an extra day on Monday to dig out, and then headed back home on Tuesday. The fish (spot and shine, that Pete got a few months earlier at Village Fest) survived the extended time with limited food in 60 degree temperatures.

New Year's Eve

New Year's Eve 2011 was a fun occasion for Pete and Sam. Mom and Dad were going to a party on the street, so they left Pete and Sam to enjoy the evening's festivities among themselves. They picked up 3 movies from Redbox, pulled out the bed in the family room, and left the following instructions:

There were only 2 emergencies that required calling Dad. The first was when they could not locate the remote control for the TV. The second was when Sam said he was tired of working on the confetti and announced that he was going to use Pete's confetti - which Pete did not think was such a good idea. A detente was worked out over the phone whereby they would each prepare their own separate bowl of confetti.

When Mom and Dad arrived home around 1:00am, there were two people who were tired and ready for bed, and two people who decided to stay up and watch the Tom & Jerry movie.

They woke Dad up around 3:30 when they were ready to go upstairs for bed.

By the way, in case you read the list above and were wondering, Sam ate his donut before 10:30 (with permission).

Accident Waiting To Happen

I think the title speaks for itself.

Angry Chorus Concert

Mom and Sam went to Pete's chorus concert during school hours, so Dad got to see it at night. He grabbed his camera and Pete's iTouch and they headed off to school. Based on a recent incident at basketball practice, where Dad was playing with Pete's iTouch and not giving his full attention to Pete's exciting practice, Pete told Dad that there was no iTouch playing permitted at the concert until Pete gave the "concert over" signal to Dad.

The kids walked onto the stage. Just as the concert was about to start, they were introducing the first song. All of a sudden, some loud music from Angry Birds, Dad's favorite iTouch app, was heard blasting from the bleachers. Pete gave an angry stare toward Dad, and Dad mouthed the words "it wasn't me". Pete couldn't tell that the music was coming from the bleachers. Dad proved to Pete that it couldn't have been him, based on a series of tests that they conducted after the concert. To this day, Pete's still not 100% convinced that it wasn't Dad.

Old Friends

Pete and Robbie are old friends. They lived in South Riding together, and of course attended Sunny Patch pre-school about 6 years ago when their moms were co-founders and teachers there.

So when Robbie's family moved to nearby Brambleton, it was time for a reunion in the form of an ice cream social. Pete and Sam are pictured above playing Guitar Hero in the basement with Robbie, Michael, and Katie.

Wish Bone

Sam and Pete had an indecisive result with a leftover wishbone from Thanksgiving (see picture above). They appealed to Dad, and he made the executive decision that in this situation they each qualify for a wish.

Shreya's Party

Sam had a fun time last weekend at Shreya's party. There was a magician there, and apparently a demented face painter. Sam came home with a bit of a Snidely Whiplash look:

Sam wanted to leave the unibrow for a few days, but we convinced him to wash it off in the bath. It mostly came off, anyhow.

Fred and Ted

Sam has a homework calendar this year, with an assignment to complete each night. On Thursday night, he had to draw a representative picture from a story. He drew the following picture from "Fred and Ted Like To Fly"

Family Bowling Night

Pete, Sam, Mom, and Dad went to Dominion Trail at 7pm last Tuesday for the first annual "Family Bowling Night". They were on lane #3. Everyone took turns. The 4 jobs were bowler, watcher, pin setter/pin gatherer, and ball retriever. Dad also had an additional role of juggler. It was a fun time, although after about 15 minutes of bowling, their time had expired and it was time to head over to Steuart Weller for Pete's basketball practice and then Cedar Lane for Sam's basketball practice.

No Jacket Required

One thing Sam seems to have in common with Dad is that he rarely feels the need to wear a jacket. He claims that he is not cold, in any weather.

Ironically, he has recently been seen on several occasions wearing Dad's jacket - inside the house.

Dilemma

Dad was putting Pete to bed. Pete shared an unfortunate story from the night before:

"There were a lot of problems. I needed my expander, which was downstairs. Mom said she would go down with me to get it, but then she wasn't going to come back up to read my devotional. If I wanted to do the devotional, I had to go down by myself to get the expander. And if I went to sleep without the expander, I would be grounded. It was like the Prisoner's Dilemma."

Pete's New Blog

Last weekend, Pete decided that he wanted to start a new blog. So he created "The Interesting and Random Thoughts of Pete". Click here to check out Pete's new blog.

Probably Shouldn't Have Said That

Pete: Dad, I need to go to the bathroom.

Dad: Ok, go. I'll wait here for you.

Pete: You need to come with me.

Dad: I'm not going in there. It's not safe.

Pete: Very funny. Now you really need to come.

Tough question

Sam has been asking a lot of questions lately to which no one knows the answer. Yesterday it was:

"Is PETSMART a combination of Pet Smart or Pets Mart?"

Fortunately this one was easy enough to resolve with a Google search. Usually we are not so lucky.

Another one today was "Why does the computer browser always say about:blank"?

Sam's 7th "Video Game" Birthday Party - Presents

After completing all of the other activities in 85 minutes, it was time to crack open the presents. We started bringing them in to Sam as everyone was eating cake, since the parents would be arriving at any moment.

One of the good things about having 12 guests at your party is you get lots of presents. Sam was pleased to get a cool sweatshirt, more Tech Deck stuff, a fingerbike, some Beyblades, and lots of other stuff.

Like the rest of the party, opening the presents was pretty much a mass of humanity at times:

Slowly the chaos lightened as parents arrived one by one. And then at 3:00, when everyone had left, it was off to Pete's basketball game.

Sam's 7th "Video Game" Birthday Party - Video Games

Finally, it was time to get to the essence of the party - playing some video games. The group divided into 4 sub-groups of 4 and took turns simultaneously playing Super Smash Bros. upstairs and Crash Bash downstairs. These games were selected since they each support 4-player simultaneous action.

As expected, this was the most chaotic part of the party. But it went about as well as could be expected. After about 20 minutes of video games, there were still 10 minutes left for cake and presents.

Upstairs:

Downstairs:

Sam's 7th "Video Game" Birthday Party - Obstacle Course

The Obstacle Course is a staple of parties at Sam's house. At Sam's video game party, it consisted of performing the following:

1. Run to the dart shooting arena

2. Shoot a dart, knocking over 2 wooden blocks

3. Make a basket in the basketball hoop

4. Put one pool ball into each pocket

5. Grab the key on the treadmill

6. Jump up and grab a "power-up"

7. Jump over the couch

8. Unlock the treasure chest and take a prize (10 seconds max)

The Obstacle Course was rather chaotic, but everyone finished it successfully with no injuries. The hardest part was re-setting the course before the next participant. With help from Pete, Mason, Mom, and Dad, the crew was able to pull it off.

After the last participant had completed the Obstacle Course, Mom whispered to Dad that he should lock up the treasure chest and hide the key. To which he replied "already done".

Sam's 7th "Video Game" Birthday Party - Name The Game

After pizza, it was time to head down to the basement for "Name That Game" and then the Obstacle Course. "Name That Game" was a lot of fun. Sam went first. He drew a game card (screen shot) from the bucket and then taped the game up next to it's name on the poster. Then he picked the name of the person who would go next. If someone could not identify their game, they could ask the others for help. Everyone correctly taped all of the games to the poster:

Sam's 7th "Video Game" Birthday Party - Treats

The treats at Sam's video game party were pizza, cake, ice cream, and lollipops (to take home). Apparently Sam determined this year that "it's not a birthday party without pizza".

Above is Sam's awesome cake, prepared by Mom. Sam originally said he wanted all chocolate frosting. Then he decided on Saturday that he wanted vanilla frosting on top and chocolate on the sides. However, Pete later convinced him to go back to chocolate on top, since that would provide a more realistic interpretation of the arcade game and also give better visibility to the white dots (M&Ms). Sam placed the white dots shown on the cake.

Sam also informed us about a few things too late during the party, including that he wanted pepperoni pizza and that he wanted the piece of cake with PacMan on it.

Above, the boys enjoy their pizza. Note the painters tape in each seat with the name of who sits there. With the 15-2 child adult ratio at this party, nothing could be left to chance.

Above, Sam, Jackson, and Dylan are seen later in the party eating a combination of cake, ice cream, and pizza. Sam ended up a bit isolated during the eating portions of the party. This is partly because he insisted on sitting next to Jaylan, but Jaylan never showed up. Sam even bought a birthday present for Jaylan, when he learned that Jaylan was coming to his party and was not going to have a party of his own.