Challenger Carnival

We just got back from the annual Challenger Elementary Carnival. It was quite a bit bigger than the ones we had at St. Hilaire. Howard Thorson was there with his wife Julie and I bumped into Shirley and Kristi Grochow and the Jorgensons. They had a silent auction with over 100 items to bid on including an Arctic Cat four-wheeler ($1,500) and a hockey stick donated by Mary Fran Twistol that had been autographed by Team USA when they were in town last winter. I had the winning bid for the hockey stick, so Aaron has that along with a State Hockey Tournament T-shirt and official program from the tournament. I bid on an Arctic Cat T-shirt with Arctic Cat sunglasses for Daniel so they both came away with something. The boys enjoyed all the games there and Daniel really shocked me with his golf prowess... He did a mini-golf putt from at least 8 feet away from the cup and he got two out of three putts in the cup! One of them bounced off an obstacle and I just turned away thinking he didn't get it, but the crowd standing around made a lot of unexpected noise and I turned back to see he had actually made it. A little Tiger Woods he was... Mr. Thorson told me the old carnivals in St. Hilaire were quite the money maker for the school, allowing them to buy some nice playground equipment and he said they wished they had done them earlier as a fundraiser.

Last night the three of us went out and shot some baskets against the garage hoop and both boys were amazing in their ability to make baskets. Daniel must have made a good 4 shots in a row and Aaron did the same. Very impressive indeed. The boys have invented a number of games recently to play on the trampoline including "snake" and "popcorn." Now that the sun is back out, they're on the tramp daily with the neighbor kids. It's getting harder to get them off it these days, which isn't a bad thing.

The boys had their Spring music "informance" program this past Tuesday, Daniel in Mr. Wigg's class and Aaron in Ms. Knuttila's. They both obviously enjoy music and Daniel is learning keyboarding in Mr. Wigg's class. It's a pretty neat classroom with these electronic keyboards that are each split in half with half devoted to each student. They're designed for just the fundamentals of finger numbering and where the different notes are. In Ms. Knuttila's class, they learn such concepts as dominant 7th chords, minor and major chords, etc. I think they're both learning stuff I was never taught at such an early level. It was quite impressive to see how well all the kids do together as a group considering how little time the teachers get to spend with them. I managed to tape record it, so if anyone wants a DVD, let me know and I'll send you one.

This weekend is combined choir time for Zion, Redeemer, and Trinity. We start tonight at the 5:00 service of Redeemer and continue with tomorrow morning at Zion (8:00) and Trinity at (10:00). We'll be singing "Rain Down" again and two other pieces under the direction of Ruth Stenson and Diane Johnson. I've been suffering from a case of bronchitis and throat stuff this past week, but thankfully it's quieted down enough to sing tonight, I think. I think I picked up the bug from Daniel this week as he wasn't feeling well at all on Wednesday night and spent Thursday at home with me.

I managed to break in the lawnmower for the 2006 lawnmowing season yesterday. I now have a very good map of Duchess' favorite haunts in the back yard. I'll do the front probably next week as the grass doesn't grow as fast out front. I was thinking the trampoline would save me from mowing a 12-foot swath of lawn this summer, but grass appears to grow under it just fine... :o( I think next year I'll start a vegetable garden out back. I found you can rent a gas tiller for a couple hours for $20, so I'll probably do that earlier in the year next time around in time for planting. I could probably get a fair amount of veggies out of the available patch back there, at least a dozen head of lettuce or spinach and quite a few carrots or peas. I think that would make a nice learning project for the boys too. Speaking of growing stuff, only one week ago, there were itty bitty sprouts of rhubarb coming up and this week, they are at least 8 to 10 inches long with full green leaves, so I think the soil back there must be pretty good for growing.

Daniel made another funny remark this week. I had given the boys "lunchbox" notes in their backpacks to read once they got to school. They're whimsical note papers you write on to let kids know how special they are and to encourage them to do their best in school. When I told Daniel, "Don't read it until you get to school," he says, "But I can't read!" As I know he hasn't reached the level of a fluent reader yet, but still holds his own rather well, I just told him, "Do the best you can," and his response was, "Is it in cursive???" It just sounded so grown up when he used the word "cursive."

It's about time to start getting ready for choir, so I better sign off for now. Hopefully all of you are having a fun time this weekend and the weather is as nice for you as it is here right now.