Train-loving Hen was really hyped to check out the once-popular Sugar Cane Train. This narrow-gauge (“Two feet six inches!” Hen would interject) system would take tourists on a leisurely 6-mile crawl across Maui. Sadly, train service is on hiatus, but undeterred, our little train enthusiast wanted to check out the train cars & buildings we could glimpse from the road. Grandma Nack was a great sport (just as she’d been in my childhood, indulging me in so many explorations) and joined us in sneaking around the private property just a bit. Here’s a little gallery.
I meant to post this last May when Finn & his bilingual amigos dropped some science on the San Jose district staff. As team leader of the group focusing on igneous rocks, Finn was really dedicated to creating a great poster & presentation—to the point that he skipped Take Your Kid To Work Day at Google so that he could ensure they finished the job properly. Here’s a little taste of how things turned out:
You know what’s kinda great? Having fellow goofball photographers as friends. 🙂 Our buddy Michael celebrated his birthday this past weekend in part by inviting friends to dress up a bit & have him take their photos. Here’s a little selection of our silly fam in action.
Hot (or maybe cold?) on the heels of seeing Hawaiian turtles, Finn here reads our latest storybook, “We Found A Hat.” He did it for our friend Sam, but I thought you might like it, too. 🙂
Okay, Hawaii is officially 🍌🍌🍌: I mean, where else can you walk outside of your room, clamber over a few boulders on the beach, and come across nearly a dozen giant, ancient sea turtles basking in the sunset glow? And yet thanks to a thoughtful neighbor giving us a heads-up, that’s exactly what we discovered. Check out a few pics of the fam getting up close (but not too close!) with these old gentlemen.
Our Henry is a quirky little dude: Sometimes he’s super fearful in cases where Finn would rush in (e.g. snorkeling), but in others the boys’ positions reverse. Here’s an example of the latter, where Hen got right up on stage with Mom-O to learn some hula moves at our Hawaiian luau:
The dudes have been busy “basementing” up a storm lately, crafting all kinds of Lego maritime misadventures using teams of hapless soldiers, pirates, sharks (real & mechanical), and more. Here’s a little stop-motion film that Finn created last night:
Labor Day Family camping at the Boy Scouts’ Camp Cheesebrough is legendary. We missed it last year but made sure we took the boys this year so they could get in on the fun. The camp is only about 30 minutes away, along highway 9 in the Santa Cruz mountains, has a nice big lodge building and kitchen, and tons of tent camping sites.
Many of the boys’ friends and their families also attended, so the adults actually had time to chat and get to know each other a little better while the boys honed their skills at whittling, archery, bb guns, rock climbing, blacksmithing, slingshots, and “human fooseball.” Here’s the gallery of their adventures.
Other highlights from the weekend included campfires with s’mores, running around in the woods (while hopefully avoiding poison oak), “battling” other groups of scouts, and putting on skits in front of the Saturday night campfire. Cami, the 3 year old sister of Cub Scout Colton, offered to count in Spanish: “One, Spanish. Two, Spanish.” Cub Scout David (whose dad Sabu was managing the bb gun range) kept in contact with his dad via CB: “Dad, whittling time is over, over.” Sabu: “You are free to play, over.”
As we prepared to depart on Sunday afternoon (after picking up trash and cleaning bathrooms), we realized somehow Henry’s pillow pet “Peendee Bee” didn’t make it from the campsite back to the car. We retraced our steps, hoping we’d either spot him or that he’d been turned into the lost and found. As we rounded the corner on the way back to our campsite, Henry spotted Peendee, who’d been set atop the large propane tank near the lodge, and absolutely shrieked with relief and delight. Phew! Crisis averted.
Upon returning home, we spent the next several hours washing the dust and grime off ourselves and doing load after load of laundry. We had a blast but were all excited to be sleeping in our own beds.
Each year brings a return of the giant (and growing!) Lego brickstravaganza held at the convention center in nearby Santa Clara. Here’s just a glimpse of this year’s gathering, in which the boys scored a few fun little pieces while seeing various friends:
No childhood would be complete without a nice baking-soda-and-vinegar volcano, and as part of their super fun times with Grandma Nack, the boys constructed one along with a whole set of Lego mining vehicles. Here’s a quick handful of shots (click any one to see it larger):
Last night’s pack meeting focused on physical fitness & challenges, including performing various long jumps, push-ups, and jumping jacks. Later the pack split in two to duke it out in a tug-of-war in which Team Micronaxx prevailed! (see below) That was just a warm up prior to all the kids teaming up to beat down the adults, though we suspect that their end of the rope just might have been tied to a pole outside. 😉
Another year at Steve & Kate’s Camp, another round of charming if incomprehensible stop-motion Lego vids from the guys. 😉 Note the “flying stick” effect, of which Finn is very proud:
As if we hadn’t crammed enough adventure into our Colorado trip this year, we crowned the whole shebang with a trip to Denver’s legendary Casa Bonita.
For those of you unfamiliar with La Casa, it is an enormous Mexican restaurant-cum-amusement park. Not only do you get heaping plates of food, and a potentially endless supply of hot, fresh sopapillas (courtesy of the signal flag on your table), there is cliff diving, an arcade, a cave room, a mine room, magic shows, strolling musicians, and skits featuring pirates and gorillas!
Since it was Henry’s actual birthday, we decided to hit the Casa after a fun afternoon at Elitch Gardens Water Park – a perfect way to wind up our day. We were seated in the magic show room, and our man Henry got up and planted himself smack dab in the middle of the first row so that he would be picked to get up and assist the magician – and boy did he have a good time doing it! He hammed it up like crazy and proclaimed the magic show the BEST part of his birthday. Here’s a video (below) and a gallery of highlights from our evening.
Yesterday the guys gamely braved the heat & elevation to traverse the slopes of San Jose’s Almaden Quicksilver County Park, home of the country’s first working mercury mine. Being kind of nuts, they & their pals insisted on periodically trying to piggyback one another up the hills. Here’s a 30-second taste of the day:
This year, at Henry’s request, we finally toured one of the old mines that Leadville, CO is famous for. Much to our delight, it was fascinating, and far exceeded our expectations!
We were led by Bob the Miner, who owns the Hopemore mine a few miles out of town. The Hopemore was established over 100 years ago, and produced gold, copper, silver, and iron, in addition to lead. Bob told us the Leadville area is one of the most richly mineralized areas in the world—a literal goldmine for prospectors!
We got to watch Bob demonstrate all sorts of mining equipment and machinery, including drills, a tunnel mucker, the cage that took us down the mineshaft, pulleys, and ore chutes. The boys were absolutely rapt. He pointed out the vein of ore slicing through the granite on either side, and showed us pictures of a huge ore pocket when it was being mined out – it was dozens of feet high and a hundred feet deep!
We all had a great (and very cold – 42 degrees!) time 600 feet below ground. Henry and Finn even got to push around an old ore car on the narrow tracks. On our way back to the shaft, Bob shone his flashlight on the ceiling of the tunnel, where we could see a bright vein of gold gleaming in the light. (“I never show dentists until the end,” Bob chuckled.)
We could really tell the boys soaked it all in, because once we got back home to San Jose, the boys immediately went downstairs to the basement and built their own Lego mine, including tools for blasting through veins, an entry chute, and a mine car riding on tracks!
Part of Henry’s birthday present from his Colorado family was a visit to the Colorado Train Museum in Golden, CO. If ever a kid loved trains, it’s Henry Seamus Nack, so it was a perfect gift.
We spent the entire afternoon (gallery) looking at, wandering around, and venturing inside various types of rail car, locomotives, cabooses, and even a push-me-pull-you! We also got to take a ride around the property on a coal-powered steam train. Oh – and there was a spectacular model railroad (featuring Legos!) in the basement of the museum that the boys really enjoyed checking out.
Thanks to the Lingles for the tickets! Our newly-minted seven year-old was beside himself!
Well, if you can’t sleep at 10,200 feet—as I surely can’t for the first couple of days—you can at least have fun passing the time with Photoshop & a photo of your sprawled-out son. 😉
