The boys really look forward to our pumpkin carving nights.  We spend a good deal of time planning and picking out just the right pumpkins.  This year, we picked our pumpkins from a local Pumpkin Patch – a wheelbarrel full.  Kenny picked the biggest, a 45 lb beast of a pumpkin, while Nathan picked 3 white pumpkins.  We had one more at home – so that’s what we were carving tonight.

At the pumpkin patch, they had a lot of the fun stuff.  A corn maze, hay rides, some hay pyramids, etc.  When we were in the corn maze, I tried to convince them that we had to hurry because of the corn zombies – but I don’t think anyone believed me.  They were too cool for that.  Of course, there are some scary corn mazes around our area that I’ve taken people too while in college that reduced many a man to tears (which is funny) – but I doubt the boys are ready for that (or me ready for spending time up because of the nightmares.)

Anyway, our new pumpkins.  We carved 3 from 5 pumpkins.  One is the Jolly Rogers, one Aang, from Avatar the Last Air Bender and 3 to make up our jack-o-lantern pumpkin (this was what Nathan wanted).  So here they are:

This one is Aang, the Last Air Bender

This is the glowing Aang

–TR

and from that day forward, he’s added nothing but joy to our lives.  And from the moment I saw him, I fell in love with him. 

The funny thing about kids, especially your first child, is that they open up an entire new world to you.  We go through life at such a fast pace, living life and missing many of the little things that are going on around us.  However, with kids, that can all change.  Kenny has brought a number of things into our lives, but the thing that I am always surprised by is the excitement that comes from seeing the world through the eyes of a child.

From a first trip to the beach to play in the surf (this is one of my favorite pictures)

having his first birthday cake

or riding your first bike

the world is full of amazing things happening around us all the time – but as we get older, they lose their luster.  When people tell you that having children will make you young again, this is what they mean.  Having Kenny come into our lives brought with it a number of changes – some expected, some unexpected.  Suddenly, you go from being a young married couple with no responsibilities but to those of your spouse to having a tiny little person who depends on you for everything.  Everything changes…your marriage changes, relationships with friends change, how I drove certainly changed and if you are lucky, how you see the world changes.  It’s both an amazing and terrifying experience all at the same time.  And to those that would ask, I wouldn’t change a thing. 

 
(He still has his black kitty)

I have had the extraordinary privilege to watch my baby growing into a young boy

and have seen him become more confident, adventurous and outgoing every year.  He flourishes in school, is naturally curious and has always accepted that Nathan (his younger brother) idolizes him, and that there is a responsibility that comes with that. 

It’s been an amazing eight years…eight years that have come and gone way too quickly.  But no matter how big he gets, I’ll always be able to remember him as my little boy.

Happy birthday Kenny,

Your Daddy

Nathan decided to do the same events as Kenny, so a lot of times, they got to watch each other do their specific events, which were the 50m, the long jump and the Frisbee throw (I guess, that would be like the discus in real track).  I have to admit, I enjoy watching the boys participate in track because I remember what it was like to do many of these events myself.  When I was in high school, I would have participated in the decathlon if they would have had it – but they didn’t in our area – so I often did a wide variety of events.  But the one’s that I had the most success in were the sprints (100 and 200) and the jumps (Long Jump and Triple Jump).  The triple jump was always my favorite, but I was a fair long jumper (over 20 ft) – so I’ve been having a good time working with Kenny this year trying to teach him some simple techniques to help him move from simple stepping into the pit to actually jumping into the pit.

So how did they do?  Well, they came home with a cornucopia of ribbons.  Kenny finished first in the Frisbee throw, 3rd in the 50 m and 6th in the long jump.  However, in the long jump, Kenny really made a lot of progress.  He PR’d during the meet (7’ 8”) and seems to be getting a much better grasp of how you jump into the pit.  Over the last two meets, he’s made a lot of progress – so I’m excited to see how he does next year. 

Nathan on the other hand, finished 6th (which he as really happy about because it was a yellow ribbon) in the Frisbee throw, 2nd in the 50 m and a participants ribbon in the long jump. 

The best part was that they both had a really good time at the meet and unlike the weather predictions, the temperature stayed in the low 80’s (rather than near 100 like advertised) so we all didn’t swelter in the heat. 

The meet also gave me a chance to try out the YouTube integration on my Google Phone.  I uploaded short snippets of each of the boys doing each of their events on my phone and was able to upload them directly to YouTube.  They turned out ok…I’ve posted them below:

Kenny’s Events:

Frisbee Throw

Long Jump

50 m

Nathan’s Events:

Frisbee Throw

Long Jump

50 m

–TR

The last day of the carnival, my wife and I took our boys down to the carnival for a day of unlimited rides.  They were kiddie rides, and Kenny and Nathan loved different types of rides.  Kenny loved the long slide and Nathan loved the kids roller coaster.  Here’s a few pictures from our day.

–TR

Anyway, during the meeting, Kenny was asked to pick out a story that he’d written (a short one) and this is the one that he’d picked.

For those that might have a hard time reading phonetically (this is the first year where he’s really started worrying about spelling — but in general for stories, they are told to just write and not worry about spelling), it says [without correction]

Wen i grow up i want to be just like my dad.  I will be just like him.  Giving speches all a round the werld.  Doing stuf on the computer and do wat my dad did to the tv.

A sweet story — and one that reminds me that my two boys are always watching what I’m doing.  Oh, and the stuff that he was talking about with the TV is noted here: http://oregonstate.edu/~reeset/blog/archives/616. 

–TR

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=48932&l=8f3da&id=792728815

–TR

So, I’ve posted a couple of pictures on my facebook page for folks wanting to see what the family is up to.  So for those interested, you can find:

• A couple pictures of the family at my brother’s wedding at: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=48487&l=9b376&id=792728815
• A couple pictures of this weeks snow at: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=48490&l=604a0&id=792728815
• A couple pictures of the kids and Alyce trimming the tree at: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=48492&l=3bfac&id=792728815

Kenny’s Pumpkin

Nathan’s Pumpkin (a skull with spider webs — he picked it):

–TR

Oct. 11th

This was our first day to see the Mouse and everyone was excited, which you might be able to see from this picture.

The first thing that we did in Disneyland was head to Toon Town.  This is where Mickey “lives” and has lots of little places for the boys to play.  There we saw and did lots of fun stuff, like ride on the Gadget roller coaster, Roger Rabbits spinning cab rides and look at all the little houses.  The boys also took some time to play on the little cars.

We were actually just about ready to leave Toon Town when someone dropped by to say hi…Pluto!  When Nathan saw Pluto he decided that he wanted to give him a hug.

and then Kenny…

followed quickly by Goofy and Minny

The rest of the day was spent riding rides.  We rode lots of kids rides (the tea cups, story time, the Mad Hatter, etc), some not so kids rides (Thunder Mountain, Splash Mountain) and those in between (Star Tours).  The funny thing is that Nathan is my little dare devil.  On Thunder Mountain, he was sitting besides me yelling faster, faster while the train ran down the mountain and would have rode it again and again had the line not been so long.  Pretty funny.  And the Buzz Light Year ride, that was a favorite because you got to have ray guns and shoot at the bad guys.  We kept trying to see who could score the most points.  I like the Buzz light year ride as well, at least, up to the point where I broke my digital camera.  I’d set it down on the floor and it got pinched between between the console and shattered the led screen.  Dandy.  Fortunately, it still takes pictures — I just can’t see any of them which will mean that I’ll likely be taking lots of duplicate pictures over the next few days to make sure that some of the pictures that I’m taking are getting saved correctly.

Anyway — that’s pretty much day one.  I have a few more pictures (prior to shattering the screen), so here are a few from the rest of the day.

Oct. 12

On the second day, we thought we would try to do a few of the rides in Disneyland that we had missed and then go over to California Adventures and see what that park had to offer.  In general, we were holding off on the California theme park in part, because a number of the rides that I know that Nathan would like to ride, he’d be too small for.  And he was so proud of being a big boy, that I didn’t want to disappoint him.

So on to the day.  We went over to Disneyland and the first ride that we tried to get on was Nemo, but I swear, the lines there are just crazy — and I can’t figure out why.  Since we didn’t want to stand in line for an hour for Nemo, we went looking for other fun.  To start, we went on the Buzz Light Year ride again, followed by a ride on Star Tours.  Kenny really like Star Tours, so that one was for him.  Then, while walking over towards Splash Mountain to get a fast pass, we saw that Space Mountain was pretty much wide open.  Not surprisingly, Nathan was game for a ride on the roller coaster…Kenny was a little unsure and Alyce was ready to give it a go.  After the ride, Nathan was ready to go again, Alyce was walking around on wobbly legs and Kenny told me that he never wanted to ride on Space Mountain again.    But I was impressed that everyone was willing to ride it with me — because I’d long since given up hope that I’d get anyone to ride Space Mountain with me.  My little thrill seeker and I rode on Splash Mountain one more time, and then we grabbed some lunch before going to California Adventures. 

At California Adventures, we did a lot of rides just for Nathan — and that was partly because Nathan got jipped out of one of the rides.  They have this ride called the Grizzly Run — which pretty much is a ride where you just get wet.  Nathan really wanted to ride it, but you have to be 42 inches so he was just too short.  He was really disappointed, but was a champ about it.  And because of that, we road a lot of other kids rides and then stayed for the pixar parade.  After the parade, we went back to Disneyland to ride on Thunder Mountain one more time (I’d promised Nathan) and then we headed back to the hotel.  Overall, I think that everyone had a great time so it was definitely worth the trip.  Anyway, here are a bunch of pictures from our second day.

 
Kenny after riding the Grizzly Mountain

–TR