Football fanatics

I'm overscheduled and crunched for time, which somehow means I'm more efficient and trying to do more.

Like staying on top of photos and posting here.

A couple quick photos from Finn's latest sport adventure: flag football. He just wrapped up soccer, and is down to one more week of football. They play two short games each Sunday, and the boy unfortunately has missed 2 1/2 weekends (sprained finger, stomach bug, and tickets to Julius Caesar).

He really loves to play this game, which makes it more fun for us. He's playing wide receiver and quarterback. Today he scored a touchdown in a 6-6 tie game, and was absolutely beaming.

I'm not sure when it happened, but he's become a huge football fan. Perhaps because football has become a nearly year-round thing here, thanks to arena football. I was skeptical, but splurging on season tickets for arena football seems to have been worth it. Finn and Calvin are hardcore fans: At the last game, Calvin caught a game ball (several players signed it, and he slept with it for a few nights) and Finn, who has become a JumboTron regular (that's what going to games is all about – getting on the big screen, right?), has a cameo in the team anthem video. I still can't quite wrap my head around arena football, but they love it.

Meanwhile, we're almost done with the school year. We're sprinting through the last 9 days, with a million things to help out with: a concert, a publishing party, baking bread in two classes, helping with two park parties ... but the highlight, certainly, is Calvin's moving on ceremony next week. He's moving on to middle school next year, whether we're ready or not. We have a little bit of camp this summer, but mostly the boys plan to ride scooters, sleep in the treehouse, and play Minecraft.

Because they can't get enough football

The boys have had so much fun at the San Jose SaberCats arena football games that we treated them to season tickets this year.

I need to point out that in the past we've often walked into the stadium FOR FREE because they're so desperate to get butts in chairs that someone is always giving away tickets outside. But with season tickets, the boys get premium seats in the end zone, so there's that. And there's an annual barbecue with the team, which was held last weekend at a new bar in San Jose that's centered on video games.

So the boys completely ignored the players around them:

Until one of the offensive linemen joined in and totally schooled them in Super Smash Bros.:

Once we coaxed them to put the controllers down, Finn and Calvin brought their football around to gather signatures, including that of Jason Stewart, who is our favorite player because his name rhymes with Mason Stewart:

First home game is next week. You might want to buy stock in green and yellow temporary hair dye.

Soccer season

eager to be in the center of the action

what form!

It's solidly spring here, and we're three weeks into soccer season. (No baseball this year!)

To Finn's delight, his teammates voted to name themselves the Seahawks — that's his favorite team. Doug is taking advantage of his lightened-up schedule these days to coach the team. He has several years of experience coaching baseball, and as he hoped that experience more than makes up for his lack of expertise in soccer.

The team is off to a great start: They have a 2-1 record, and we're especially happy to see how well they play together. They're supportive of each other and very engaged, and they look like they're having a blast on the field.

Not a bad way to spend springtime Saturdays...

making fun of coach

Book geeks

I've been so backlogged with photos, I haven't posted in ages!

The boys are off to a great start this year in school. For 5th grade, Calvin has the same great teacher he had last year and has been especially interested in the work they've been doing on maps and U.S. geography and on cells.

Finn really likes his 2nd grade teacher (I do too) and has been very focused on writing neatly and, lately, using descriptive language in his writing. He's very proud of how he's doing in reading and math; I'm just happy to see he's finally discovered books without a lot of pictures have redeeming value.

Outside of school, they're both enjoying new activities. Calvin joined a swim team and has been making great improvement with regular lessons. He still has some skills to build before he should enter a meet, but he can compete if and when he wants to — he says he wants to win a medal.

Finn is very busy with both fall baseball and soccer through this month. Baseball is especially intensive, with two long practices and a game each week, but he's holding up well.

With author/illustrator Katherine Roy

Shark cupcakes!

I'll try to get some other pictures up, but I had these quick ones from last night: Finn was jealous that Calvin got to a book signing with his teacher (Aaron Becker, who made the beautiful Quest and Journey books), so he said he wanted to go to a signing too.

So yesterday he went to his first signing, a book launch party for Neighborhood Sharks. The author grew up in the area, and wrote about the sharks who thrive just off the coast of the Bay Area.

Finn loved it: He parked himself in the front row and helped the author measure out the length of a shark, asked a great question ("Why do humans hunt sharks but sharks don't hunt humans?"), and picked up an extra book for his classroom. It was a very late night, but so worth it. (The shark fin cupcakes were a nice bonus.)

I never thought going to book signings would become a hobby, but I'm happy to encourage them.

Summer camp craftiness

It was all Camp Galileo last week, with both boys at two Galileo programs. Calvin worked on a video game and Finn went on a road trip.

Calvin got to choose: the K-5 camp that Finn went to, or the Summer Quest for grades 5-8. The older group won easily, but it was difficult choosing what to focus on. He settled on making a Minecraft mod and trying 3D printing. (If he had three weeks, he'd be making a go-kart too — deferred for next year.)

For those who don't speak Minecraft, "mods" is short for "modifications" — ways to customize the game. (For the uninitiated, it's a creative world-building game, using block shapes. That's an oversimplification, but sufficient.)

Here are some screenshots of his mod. First, here's his red "awesome armor" and "explosive sword":

What makes this sword so cool, aside from its stylin' red-and-black look? When you use it, lightning strikes your targets:

And he made these "sweet" building blocks. Here they are atop a tower he built:

Put it all together:

Meanwhile, Finn traveled along Route 66. In the art room (the "so-called" diner, he says), he whipped up this billboard he plans to use when the boys host a restaurant at home. (He's especially proud of the sequins, which sparkle in headlights and attract your attention.)

And here's his billboard along with a print of the Chicago skyline reflected in Lake Michigan ( a cool technique with oil pastels and watercolor). Behind them is his kachina doll, inspired by Native Americans in Arizona and composed of three spirit animals he chose to help him in his pursuits: a bear's head, for strength; a shark in the middle, for swimming; and a wolf's legs for stamina.

The kids collaborated on retaining walls to protect the Mother Road from rock slides:

And Finn made a working headlamp for exploring the Grand Canyon:

The grand finale: a short clip of Finn's rubber band car — he's very proud that it can go past 18 feet!

Football superfans

Doug has found a way to enjoy football all year round: By getting the kids hooked on arena football.

They've become huge fans of going to San Jose SaberCats games. The games are loud, high-scoring, loud, fun, and loud.

(I find the whole setting fantastically tacky. I haven't been exposed to so much Warrant and David Lee Roth since high school. There's talk of getting season tickets next year ... I'll likely yield my seat to their friends.)

There's not much of a crowd — we often score tickets for cheap to free — but there's fire and motorcycles and T-shirt cannons. (In between, there's some football.) The boys are inspired: Our pregame routine now includes Knox gelatine, colored hair spray, and face paint.

 Friday was the last regular-season home game, and the boys were thrilled to get their souvenirs signed:

Summer camp happiness

We just wrapped up a great week of summer camp for both boys.

Calvin is halfway through a two-week camp at the middle school, where he's taking self-defense, karate, and cooking. No photos yet from his camp, mostly because we keep devouring whatever he brought home from cooking. And his favorite trick learned from self-defense involves pinning my arm behind my back, making it difficult to photograph. But my favorite image is pulling up for pickup, and seeing him light up with a smile on his face and a plate with a treat he wants to share.

Finn just ended a week at Camp Galileo, learning about Australia and making some creative stuff, including this moray eel projectile toy:

and a bird of paradise:

Camp G is one of our favorites. Finn argued at first that there's no learning at summer camp, but after he explained to me about lift and sugar gliders, he conceded that he learns a fair amount at this camp — it just doesn't feel like school. I love that this camp celebrates creativity, mistakes, collaboration, and experimentation. Finn loves that it's awesome.

He goes back the week after next for a road trip-themed camp. And Calvin has matriculated to the camp's program for older kids: He'll spend a week learning to make Minecraft mods and another creating with a 3D printer.

We do a few camps each year, and there's always one or two where I cross my fingers and hope it won't be awful. That's never a problem with this camp — the boys always get caught up in the energetic spirit. Finn relayed stories and songs, explained concepts he learned each day, and was delighted his campmates selected his proposed team name: the Lime Green Zombies!

The camp's mascot is a rubber chicken. (I don't know why. It's a thing.) So Finn wanted to give the camp director a picture of a his chickens and some of their eggs as a thanks-and-see-you-soon gift. (He's costumed as Brazil's Hulk for dress-up day.)

 

Show and tell

What we knew as "show and tell" has morphed into "sharing day" at our school, and even then it seems to have been phased out recently. But Calvin was eager to bring in one of his chickens to share with his class and his teacher, always happy to follow their interest, said yes.

So Calvin brought Blackberry, our most easygoing hen, to school Monday morning. He enjoyed the attention as we carted Blackberry to class. One of the great parents at our school took the time to ask all sorts of questions, putting Calvin through a pre-game warmup without him realizing what she was doing.

Calvin took some questions, and really relaxed when he classmates to meet her up close. The kids crowded around to pet Blackberry, hold her, and feed her some scratch and lettuce. They begged to bring her over to the grass, where she happily devoured as much clover as she could between hugs. Blackberry was remarkably good-tempered about the whole thing. And Calvin was delighted.

The chickens are nearing their first birthday this month. We're in our third spell of high heat (low 90s) and they're handling it well. Blackberry decided she was in the mood for motherhood and spent a few days in the most-favored nesting box. This box is so popular that sometimes hens hogging the box end up getting crowded — last month we caught Shadow barging in after Blackjack spent hours in the box and ignored her squawky protests:

Blackjack eventually moved along, but Blackberry was in there day and night. So the boys had their first experience at breaking a broody hen. Finn put up a de-motivational poster, but it didn't do the trick.

So we dragged Blackberry off the next and put her in a cage for two days with food and water. Blackberry was very angry and bashed her head on the top of the cage to the point of bleeding, but then she settled down. And the other birds fussed and fretted over their confined friend. The third day, we let her out and she bolted to the run with her friends. Adventures in chicken-raising...

The brothers grim

The years of cute, adorable Halloween costumes are solidly behind us.

Inspired by Minecraft, the boys both wanted to be grim reapers. They chose matching outfits and sorta-glow-in-the-dark scythes.

They hosted their annual Halloween party the week before the holiday. It was such a fun and busy night I've lost track of how many kids were here. Suffice to say, it was in the double digits and there was only one girl. I had gathered and hidden all the toy weaponry, but in the time it took me to greet guests and set out food, they had outfitted themselves with assorted foam and plastic light sabers and shields made of plastic, wood, cardboard and foam and taken to the back yard for an epic battle. It was a fun party, veering from classic (bobbing for apples) to modern cool (zombie tag with glow bracelets).

Halloween was eerily quiet compared with previous holidays. Everyone was probably scared off by the petite Death brothers stalking the streets.

Walkathon fundraiser — kids set new personal bests!

Photo op before they got too sweaty

The boys made an impressive effort Friday at their school's annual walkathon fundraiser. Honestly, I lost faith as the temperature neared 80 and the kids started to fade just 10 laps in ... I was certain we'd be heading home early.

Comparing results

But the boys rallied and were among the greatly diminished group of students still walking when the event came to a close after four and a half hours. Calvin met his goal with exactly 35 laps and Finn beat his with 40 — that totals about 11 and 13 miles, respectively. In addition to besting their past records and meeting their lap goals, they were motivated to try to raise $275 apiece — enough to earn a seat at a celebratory school pizza party.

Many of you have generously supported the kids' efforts in years past, and they're very grateful. Unfortunately, I bungled the online donation options this year by waiting too long. You can't set up them up after the event, it seems. Oops.

So we're limited to checks this year. The boys are turning in their donations by Nov. 4 to qualify for prizes like water bottles and that coveted pizza party. If you'd like to donate, you can a) email a pledge followed by a personal check we can fold into the check we write, or b) send a check made out to the Cumberland PTA. (Any PTA checks received after Nov. 4 will still be gratefully accepted by the PTA.) And donations can be lump sums or per-lap amounts. The latter seems anticlimactic after the event, I suppose, but they boys do keep track of how they did from one year to the next and they're getting competitive. (Finn was motivated to best his brother and earn the right to choose where we'd go for dinner.)

Thanks for considering it. The PTA funds all the really fun stuff at school, including the science fair, garden, and clay programs I help with, and great arts programs the boys really enjoy. (And I confess I enjoy hearing my boys talk about composers in the Romantic period and trompe l'oeil painting...)

Still going on his 40th — and final — lap!

 

Fanged Finn

He lost his other front tooth on Sunday, and now he has quite the smile...

Busted

What is it with first-graders and broken bones? Finn tumbled off the play structure just before school started Monday. His wrist started swelling and he was blinking back tears, so we ditched school to go to urgent care. He has a hairline fracture, and luckily it doesn't hurt much now.

 Today he got a bright green cast and collected his first autograph at the ice cream shop across from the medical center.

Finn only has to wear the cast  for four weeks, and then he has to wait another two weeks before getting back into jumping, running, scootering, bouncing, and the like. Unfortunately, he was halfway through a gymnastics class he's been loving, and he was due to start an ice skating class in a few weeks. Disappointing, but we're lucky it wasn't worse.

Coming home to roost

Move-in day!

The chickens moved into their coop around the time school started. They're nearly 12 weeks old, and they've grown huge.

We had a tremendous amount of help from neighbors who are more savvy than we are about building things that actually stand up. Calvin helped a little with painting, and Finn happily hammered in some of the 10 million staples.

So many staples to hammer in ...

The birds are very happy with their spacious accommodations. The kids love watching the excitement as I open the door to the run each morning. The birds love pecking at tomatoes, lettuce, and my diamond ring.

Such a roomy coop, but they huddle together in a corner to sleep.

The boys have so far been willing to help with chicken chores, but unfortunately they're still physically difficult for the boys to manage. I'm working on make them easier — I could use the help, though honestly it isn't much work.

We had one minor crisis: Blackberry broke her leg. We're not sure if she slipped off the freshly painted ramp into the run, fell off the unsecured temporary roost, or got stepped on. There's not much to do for a broken chicken leg (insert soup joke here), but to try to keep her off the leg and hope the bone knits well enough to support her increasing weight.

She spent six days in an animal carrier, getting ibuprofen twice a day and lots of love (and fresh worms) from the boys. Finn even read to her to keep her company. She's now back in the coop and getting around well so far on a crooked leg. And we've since installed a better roost and improved the traction on the ramp.

Reading to Blackberry about revolutionary heroes.

I have a few finishing touches to make on the run to ensure it's safe and secure from predators, but it's almost there. And then it will be time to make nesting boxes: We should start getting eggs in another month or two.

Yeah, that ramp isn't white anymore.

Busy learning stuff

We're already 2 1/2 weeks into the school year — I'm not sure how that happened, but it's going well so far.

Finn has a few friends from last year in his first grade class, and so far he likes his teacher. He says it's been all review and he hasn't learned anything yet, but he is figuring out how to read a clock. I suspect there's more new stuff lodging in his brain, but we'll wait to see.

Calvin is in a combination 4th & 5th grade class — our school is growing fast and using every available space, and they have several combo classes just to manage it all. He really likes his teacher: He reports that she's funny, and she likes using technology in the classroom. She also prefers projects to worksheets, and the lighter homework load pleases him very much.

He's especially excited his classroom has an iPad for each student. And he's very happy with this pouch he stitched together in class: