So I know that you are wondering where I have been. See there is this thing called the end of the school year that has taken all of my time as of late. ("But you haven't had any problems like this the previous six years," you say? Well, when I had been teaching in the Elementary Schools I would be done teaching with about two weeks left in the school year, so I had time to clean everything and get grades done and stuff. This year it was chaos right up to the end, with kids desperately trying to undue the 17 weeks of screwing off that they had done in a last ditch effort to pass my class, and with me trying to grade finals and make up work.) In addition to the end of the year at school, there is also a musical "thing" that I am involved in at church (that I will bitch about later) that is taking up my Thursdays and most of my Saturdays as well.
But let's get to the important things - pictures of the boy!! (By the way, if you want to listen to an eclectic mix of music from all over the world, push play on the playlist on the right.)
T-Ball (is over!!!!!)
We really have no idea if the boy actually liked T-Ball or not. He would whine that he didn't want to go, but then he would have lots of fun. I think it has to do with the fact that when you are 4 years old and playing T-Ball, most of the time is spent standing around not getting the ball. (This is one of the reason why I have gone to the volunteer training so I can be a coach next year - instead of insisting that children play the traditional baseball positions, you need to modify the positions so that more kids can get the ball, because that would be fun for kids.)
We never did figure out how to get the boy to run instead of shuffle, but we had a lot of fun watching his silly antics on the base path and in the field.
He was just rocking out on 3rd Base...
POWER STANCE!!!!!
*Facepalm* (This is pretty much how he spends most of his time in the field...
It isn't very exciting.
But hitting is where the action is at, even if you have to wait your turn.
Hawks on 3!!!!
What makes every game better? Why Watermelon afterwards of course!!!
After the last game everyone got a little award from the coaches.
Owen's award was for "Most improved runner!"
So the end result for the first season of organized sports I think would be classified as a success. While his footspeed and attitude in the field were sometimes suspect, he was very good at listening to instructions from coach, and got along great with his teammates.
A Fancy Night Out
Beki's Lab had a couple of people who were moving on to bigger and better things in life, and so Beki's boss Norma had a fancy dinner for them at a nice downtown hotel/restaurant. Normally this would be the kind of thing that parents would find a babysitter for and leave the children at home, but it just so happens that Owen is everyone in the lab's favorite person in our family (They tolerate Beki and me, but Owen is awesome) and so he came along as well. Because it was downtown we got to add to the evening by taking the metro - and riding the train is always an awesome experience in the boy's book.
We talked to Owen about going to a fancy restaurant and how you are supposed to act, and he was soooooo good. We brought along a PBJ for him and some Doritoes, which he scarfed down and he also munched on some ridiculously awesome filet minion. (While I am on the topic of food. As good as the steak was, the life changing food that this restaurant served us was Horseradish Mashed Potatoes. Now, as you will recall, I am from Idaho, and I know a thing or two about potatoes, and I thought that I had experienced all there was to experience in the world of potatoes. Adding horseradish to the potatoes BLEW MY TASTE BUDS!!! It was life-changing. I went to the store and bought some horseradish - all of my mashed potatoes are now made with horseradish. I cannot stress the awesomeness of this enough!!!)
Before dinner Owen was taking some pictures. (There are no pictures during dinner - I was too overcome with the rapture of the horseradish mashed potatoes to think to take a picture.)
After dinner there was some music, and if there is music, then there must be dancing!!!
As you can see, he was dancing pretty hard and so the dress shirt came off!
Well, I'm looking a bit fat, but that bird on my arm is one fine looking babe!!
Dress Story!!! Beki knew that this evening was coming, and she really didn't have anything fancy to wear, so we took a Saturday (Seriously, this took us most of the day) and tried on every dress at the Dress Barn. (Yes, every dress in her size, the size lower, and the size higher.) She would try them on, and while she was changing, the boy and I would go out and hunt down more dresses. By the end of the session she was frustrated that nothing seemed to be cut right, and she seemed to think that she didn't look good in anything, so she went and sat in the car while I picked out which dress we were going home with. In the end she looked amazing, except that at some point in the evening the lining of the dress ripped. So she took the dress back, which means that we need to go shopping again!!!)
Great parents! That is our son running through the streets of D.C. by himself at night. And that is me taking a picture of my son running through the streets of D.C. at night.
Memorial Day
About a week before Memorial Day, and completely out of the blue, the Boy asked, "Can we go see Maddy's Daddy play and watch the fireworks?" Beki and I looked at each other like "What in the hell is he talking about?" If you recall (and if you don't you can click here http://therenbergband.blogspot.com/2010/06/way-overdue.html for a refresher) last year we went to see the US Marine Band play a free concert at Wolf Trap. It was hot and we were stuck waiting in a long line in the sun, but in the end we got to hear the band play and watch fireworks afterwards. Beki and I had forgotten about this, but apparently the boy has a very developed internal calender because he remembered. Now when your 4 year old wants to go listen to the Marine Band (his friend Maddy's Dad is a Tuba Player in the Band) you damn well go listen to the band! So, learning from our experience last year we left even earlier so hopefully we could get a better seat!
Of course we didn't leave until we had packed ourselves lots of food! (Notice the strange face the boy is making...that is because he is eating Watermelon as fast as he possibly can!)
Our efforts to get there early paid off...as you can see we were first in line!!
Owen was so excited to be able to move around and have space again!!
Being the first people in gave us first choice of where to sit, but in this situation being down front is not the best seat. First off, if you want to eat your food you have to stay on the grass. But you also have to factor in the firework factor. If you get too close down then you have to move to see the firework display. So the ideal position is about halfway up the hill to the right of center. (The right of center is so that you can see the Tuba section of course!)
We still have a pretty good view of the band. (Our friend Frank is the Tuba player on the end)
And Owen had a great view of the watermelon...
Have I mentioned that he likes Watermelon? Seriously, he is nuts for the stuff.
About halfway through the concert they did a jazz number with a lady singing...Owen thought this would be a perfect time to headbutt Papa!!
Then he decided that Papa made a comfy couch...so Papa decided to control his arms
Traffic was pretty crazy getting out of the park, but this was the boy within 10 minutes of getting in the car. Another successful family outing!!!
Yard Work (Also known as cleaning up the trees that fall in my yard)
Sometimes I think that Home-ownership isn't worth the hassle, especially when you look out the window and you see trees in your backyard. (I'm not talking about the kind of trees that are perpendicular, I mean the ones that are now lying horizontal across the yard.) Our neighbor Nan had arranged for someone to come and take care of the problem, but it had been a month and the trees were still there, so I started to cut up the bits of tree that I could get to, and that my chainsaw could handle. (I own a chainsaw...wait, owning a chainsaw is a good thing, this should be in green.... Like I was saying, I do own a chainsaw, but it is only 16" and it is electric - the kind of thing that you use to take care of limbs - like the ones that fall through yours son's swingset - not that you use to saw up the entire tree.
There was one limb on the downed tree that I was particularly worried about. It was lodged against another tree, and was still overhead, meaning that it would break off and fall at anytime, and on anyone. As I began to work on the limb I realized that because of the way it was lodged against the other tree, when I cut it free, the end that I had just cut was most likely going to spring back at me and knock me into the next county. To solve the problem I channeled my inner redneck and devised a brilliant strategy involving the use of cargo tie downs.
With the tie downs in place there was only one direction that the limb could fall.
This picture shows my great triumph, but it was no easy victory. I got my chainsaw blade stuck and had to finish the cut with a wedge and handsaw...good times.
At first glance this picture doesn't look like much, but if you notice just to the left of Owen, there is a new swingset in our backyard. We found another one one Craigslist, and so my project this summer is going to be getting this one sanded and stained and ready to go. I am also contemplating using pieces of the old one to make it even more awesome...details will be forth coming.
Wait...why is the front yard dead? Well, funny story:
At the start of spring I reseeded the bare spots of my yard, and they grew in pretty well. (Those places would be the green that is left in the picture above.) As I was inspecting what was growing in my yard I noticed that there were some creeping weeds and things that needed to be taken care of, so I got one of those "kills the weeds not your lawn" sprays. Well, it turns out that 90% of my yard was weeds and crab grass...so everything except what I had planted in the spring died.
So, determined to have a green lawn, I have reseeded (Only half at a time because fundage is limited) and we will hopefully have a nice green lawn.
Owen succesfuly completed Pre-K, and of course they had a little end of the year performance. While I could have included all of the songs, in interest of your time I have included just a few:
Hooray it's time for School!
Little Bunny Foo Foo
Found a Peanut
Owen loves to ride his bike - we haven't talked about taking off the training wheels yet - but he wanted a horn. When we got our dividend from REI we bought a few things, but still had $4 left over, and it so happened that these little horns were $4.
I think you know what kind of sound this is going to make.
Owen is highly motivated by stickers - we have been using behavior charts for almost a year now, and he is very good about behaving properly so he can earn his stickers. At first we had it set up so that when he would fill up a sticker chart we would get him a toy, but we found another way to make the sticker chart even more motivational for him. When he fills an entire column with stickers he gets a certain number of quarters depending on the task that he has been doing. This allows us to not only teach the boy about paying tithing, but to talk to him about saving your money and buying things. He had saved up a good $10-$12 so we took him to the store to buy some new toys. He carefully weighed his options and came home with a pretty good haul.
In the end he got two cars and a giant red bouncy ball!!
The bouncy ball is definitely a neighborhood favorite!!
For Family Home Evening one night Owen wanted to play Monopoly. I am not sure how he even knows about Monopoly, but he wanted to play it, so we got it out and explained to him how to play. He got pretty good at counting money, and was very good at watching to see if you landed on his properties.
And in the end he kicked our butts!
Father's Day is one of my favorite days, because along with my birthday it is one of the two days that I know that I am getting Cinnamon Pinwheels!! (If you don't know what a Cinnamon Pinwheel is, think a Cinnamon Roll made from a Baking Powder Biscuit.) Church gave all the dads a chocolate bar, which I just remembered is sitting in my church basket. (Two things - 1. Yes, I have a basket, I am the ward choir director - seriously, is there ever any other calling that I ever have? - and so I have all of the music and stuff in an old milk crate. 2. When you have Cinnamon Pinwheels at home, and you have lived for 2 years in Europe, a little Hershey Bar really doesn't do anything.) For dinner we had corned beef - AWESOME!!!!
Check out the loot!!! (The two books I picked out at Costco, one is about ESPN, the other about World War II. (My tastes are varied)
Owen always likes to get in on the opening of presents, especially if they are cookies or M&M's.
So my beautiful wife turned 30 this year. (I made a little post about it earlier) It is always tough to get Beki presents because she doesn't like money being spent on her, and so I have to be careful what I get her for fear of facing her wrath. Well this year she was already upset with me over something totally unrelated to her birthday, so I said to myself, "I can get her whatever I want, because if she is already mad at me, what is she going to do, get more mad?" She has wanted a sewing machine for pretty much as long as I have known her, so I got her one.
The boy and I wrapped it all up pretty, and we also got some really pretty flowers as well.
This was a fun card from Beki's mom. It said that they weren't going to make a big deal out of her birthday...
But then it opens up to a huge poster.
By the time Beki got around to opening the big present, Owen had already spilled the beans "Mommy we got you a sewer!!" Beki was quite pleased.
