Lego Club hard at work

These were taken a couple of weeks ago. It was very nice out, and my yard was a mess, so I had the kids come outside to rake my yard.

This doesn't exactly look like raking. It actually looks moderately dangerous.



They actually did a very nice job of raking the yard. After playing in the pile for a while, they loaded the leaves into big buckets for me. They're quite helpful. Just wait until we have Lego Club after a snowstorm.

Sushi!

On Saturday we had some friends over and made sushi. You knew that it had to be an important event, since it took two years of intense planning to make this night happen.

For some reason Susan is a bit too happy about squishing rice. Matt and Michelle pretend to have an intense discussion so they don't have to get their hands dirty.



Matt gets conscripted.



Stuart and Ellie brought fish and wine, Matt and Susan brought the sushi apparati, and Michelle and I provided the huge counter (seems fair).



Look at that sushi!



I can say that the sushi was excellent. I consider myself an expert, since I personally ate about half of it.

Still at the Park

Kelson is happy.



Milena is happy.



Eli is happy.

At a Park

Michelle took Eli, Milena and Kelson to a park while I was with Koleman and the Lego team. This was almost a month ago.



I'm slow getting pictures up.



Can you see all the fishies?

A Dog's Life

It's very, very hard.

Random Pictures

Reading is fundamental.



Who wants lemonade?

Lu Has a Birhday!

Grandma Lu celebrated a milestone birthday recently (I'm not going to be so rude as to announce her age to the world - so don't ask!). We had a party in Plymouth, which was a great success. Lindy and Lu pose in front of the cake:



And, in what is becoming a bit of a tradition for us, we had a great big 90 candle fire:



A couple of cute girls wait at the kids' table.



Milena apparently has been waiting too long, but Eli is happy about something.



Thank goodness I don't need to do this anymore.

Lego Team Picture

One of the Lego Team members has personally requested the team picture to be put on my blog. Here is a candid photo of them trying to figure out how to group themselves.



And here they are, smiling and happy.



I only wish I had photographic or video evidence of one of the robots knocking people on the head. This is a dangerous sport.

Lego Club Club at Gustavus, Part 2

OK, here are some videos from the Lego Club's trip to Gustavus. Most of them involve bowling balls, which is always fun.

The bowling ball experiment explains the Conservation of Energy. Apparently, if you conserve engergy, bowling balls can't hit you in the face. That's why I'm going to start buying those fancy new light bulbs.



The goal, of course, is to not flinch as a bowling ball comes hurtling towards your nose.



Another victim.



And two final contestants.



Koleman tries to light up a room with his biking skill.



Potato in the liquid nitrogen!



Here is what happens to the potato

Lego Club at Gustavus, Part 1

(For those of you who don't know, Koleman is part of a First Lego League team. What this means, in the most general terms, is that every week he gets together with friends and builds robots out of Legos. For those of you who want more detail, you can go to the FIRST Lego League page for the 2007 Challenge.)

A couple weeks ago the team went to Gustavus to learn about energy from an "expert". Apparently college kids love make-your-own-cookie, so that's what our team had to start out doing.



They're all 9 years old, which means that they're all halfway to college. Yikes!



The expert we scrounged up is allegedly a Gustavus physics professor. The kids are paying close attention as they learn about the difference between "kinetic" and "potential" energy. (After all the sugar cookies, the kids are currently loaded with potential energy.)



Here the kids are learning something. I'm not sure what, because I was trying to figure out how you play air hockey on such a thin and twisted board.



Here they see how water flow can generate power.



And here one unruly student learns how to use physical energy to make water fly through the air towards other students.



Solar power! (kind of)



I'm sure this is going to be the wave of the future - bicycles in your living room, allowing you to light a single bulb. You and your spouse can take turns biking and reading - it's both educational and healthy!



The highlight of the day was certainly the liquid nitrogen. A balloon, racket ball, bouncy ball and potato were all sacrificed in the name of science. The kids are in a college physics lab, with resources all around, and all they really wanted to see was a potato dropped in liquid nitrogen.

Kids.



I'll have a follow-up post with some interesting videos from the visit, most of them involving a bowling ball.

I was robbed!

I went to the annual Zilge Chili Fest last night. I suppose I could blog about the fun that I had, or the people I talked to, or embarrassing stories I heard about Brad's youth, but no. All of that pales in comparison to the voting travesty which took place.

Anyway, here's TallBrad (and no, the other picture will not go on a family oriented blog like mine, you dirty, dirty man):



And here is the evil Mr. Duhzinkster, the charlatan whose chili was somehow voted (by one measly point) ahead of mine.



You can see that I am trying to take what was rightly mine - the necklace given to the maker of the winning chili. It is completely inexcusable that his chili received more points than mine, which was superior in every way. It doesn't make any sense. I would have thought that the anger would have died down, but it hasn't. I don't know if I will ever be able to set foot in West Saint Paul again.

Life has very little meaning for me right now. As a matter of fact, the picture which best describes the loneliness in my heart is this picture of Brad's fire pit, ignored and neglected.



And, since I have nothing else to add, here is a picture of some random kid trying to kill some random dad.

Kelson Teaches Grandpa a Lesson

A couple of weekends back, Grandpa Gary was taught a lesson on Wack-a-Mole.



As you can see, Kelson is pleased with the way the match is playing out.



He truly has the skills and form to make a world class Wack-a-Moler.



And here is video proof of Kelson's dominance. (Yes, it is 1 minute, 55 seconds of Wack-a-Mole - potentially the greatest video ever put on YouTube)



(I think Grandpa might not have been trying)

All Grown Up

Milena gets so cranky if she misses the Sunday funnies.

It actually happens!

I always thought that worms in apples was a myth perpetrated by the hokey and cheesy graphics lobby. Apparently not.



Once Michelle cut the apple open, the worm made a dash for freedom (or Michelle's thumb, whichever was closer).



Isn't he cute?



Hey, this is why you check out my blog, right?