Valentine's Day

I know! I know! Valentine's Day was weeks ago--before St. Patrick's Day, before Easter. I have no excuse for such a late arriving post.

Viva is our crafter. She looks for opportunities to do craft activities.  Lincoln and Evan are always eager to try out a new activity. Sometimes Bentley and Jake join in and sometimes they don't!

 

Cookies Viva made at Grandma Vicki's!

Fun at Home

When Bentley and Jake were in Vegas with their dad for six days, their mom joined them four days. While she was gone, I was in charge of Viva, Lincoln, and Evan. We kept busy and had a good time together.

L&E snuck into B&J's bedroom and played foosball.

Lincoln kept Viva busy building Legos for him.

Viva also built Lincoln and Evan forts (see scarves draped over the back of the couch).

I did not let them have unlimited iPad time, but they did get a little.

Lincoln and Evan like to get up early. Viva does not.

We took a trip to the Dimond Mall.

Great-grandma played games with the boys. 

Viva played games with the boys.

I played games with the boys.

Evan really, really likes to play games.

Pinewood Derby Fun

The Boy Scout Pinewood Derby overlapped with the karate tournament in Vegas.  I was thinking that meant we were going to take a pass this year like we did last year, but then the Activity Day Girls decided to do their own pinewood derby and Viva wasn't going to Vegas, so we were back in. 

Even though Jake couldn't be there to compete he wanted to make a car with Viva and Opa. (Lincoln took Jake's car to the Cub Scout Pinewood Derby and raced it for him.) 

There are many steps to making a pinewood derby car. Some the children can do, but many of the steps are not kid friendly--using power tools or melting lead over a hot flame. Opa worked with Jake and Viva on Saturday, fitting in time with them between the Easter egg hunt and Easter egg dying.

Opa's cars from his youth!

Viva & Jake's cars!

At Viva's pinewood derby, the track wasn't working quite right and there were inconsistent race results in repeated heats. This is annoying for any family who takes the derby seriously (we take it half seriously), but the kids don't care, if you don't care. Our trio didn't care.

The races went a little better at the Cub Scout pinewood derby. Neither Viva or Jake placed high in their derbies. This surprised me because Bentley had the same design and his car was fastest in his derbies, but he also had a weird quirk with his wheels that was a big plus. One of them didn't touch the track.

PS Kara started this post (the first sentence and one half) and I (Grandma Julia) finished it.

Egg Dyeing 2016

Our other official Easter activity for the year was egg dyeing.  It is still enjoyed by all, so a good family activity/enjoyable experience for all kids involved!

Viva and I also made a peep cake to celebrate the bunny fun:

And, semi related to dyeing eggs - the next day Viva got to work turning them into deviled eggs for dinner!  She did a great job.

Easter Egg Hunt

With the boys off to Vegas for the karate tournament we decided to do an egg hunt early.  Last year the boys missed out on the official egg hunt and this irked them, so they informed me that this year they hoped for better.... :)

Snow: The Good & The Bad

The winter of weird weather continues to deliver.  We welcomed the first day of spring in Anchorage with lots of beautifully fluffy snow.  It was perfect for snowmen.  The kids were rolling huge balls of snow down the hill, but unfortunately it crumbled at the bottom because their balls were so big!  It was all good though - they had a great time outside playing together.  We didn't get enough snow this year for their liking.

On the definite downside, on Saturday the snow resulted in dangerous roads.  Our van ended up in the middle of a pileup on the highway when Matt and the little guys went to pick up their brothers from karate.  Thankfully on one was hurt.  My van, on the other hand.... well, it is going to be a number of weeks before we see it again.  Unless it ends up totaled in which case we won't be seeing it all.

Travel Adventures Round 2: Vegas!

The boys have been pouring hours (and hours and hours) into their karate training since December, and now they are off to Vegas to compete in the USA Open and Jr International Karate tournaments.  It has been a slightly rough couple of days for them.  Jake caught a flu bug on Thursday and recovered quickly.  I was feeling thankful it passed Bentley over when he started puking Monday evening--just hours before his scheduled flight to Las Vegas.  Thankfully Matt reports he seems good today, and I'm glad he caught it at the beginning of the week and not in the middle of the tournament.... !

They left last night with Matt and I will head out on Thursday to watch them compete.  They had a free day today since most of the dojo group gets there tomorrow, so energizer bunny Dad decided to road trip it.