Frozen Finny rawks out with the giant icicles he pried from Leadville eaves:
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Today’s Tom Sawyer
Amidst our snowy explorations on Thursday, Margot & I took Henry out for a restorative donut. While chowing down he noticed a lady shoveling out front. Luckily I caught his expression of bonkers delight the moment I suggested that he could join her. (Here’s the tiny gallery.) Back on went the boots & out he went. I told the owner that like Tom Sawyer’s friends whitewashing his fence, Henry would likely pay her for the chore privilege!
As it happens the bakery sits adjacent to the town newspaper, and upon hearing our story (San Jose Shorty Slings Snow?), the editor said that she might find a way to feature Henry in print. Stay tuned for the late edition!
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Snowbound!
This year for spring break we traveled back to our favorite mountain town, Leadville, Colorado. We’ve spent the week up here enjoying time with my folks in the high mountain air. The first couple of days were sunny, summery, and dry as a bone—spent in shirtsleeves at the park, tossing rocks into the river, and galavanting around town. The boys, especially Henry, were a bit bummed that the snow tubing and skiing opportunities were slim: it’s late in the season, many of the resorts are closed, and the only snow left was in shadowy, unmelted, crunchy drifts.
They still managed to goof around in the snow and even get a little tubing in on the hill across town. Then, much to our delight, Leadville got smacked with an enormous spring blizzard that started yesterday and has carried through today. We’ve gotten at least 18 inches of snow so far, and it’s still coming down. The boys, to put it mildly, are thrilled to see all that snow! Here’s a gallery of our snowbound antics.
We were actually supposed to leave for California today, but the interstate between here and Denver was closed, and driving conditions were so bad we decided against even trying to drive down the mountains. We’ll be here another full day so the boys can get their fill of powdery good times.
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Of Eddies & Yetis
At noon yesterday we were in shirtsleeves, happily tossing rocks into Arkansas River rapids. This morning we’re in a whiteout, pulling on boots before more sledding. What a great trip!
“Did you say ‘eddy’ or ‘yeti’?” asks Henry, below. I’m just proud that he knows both terms. 🙂
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Slide of the Happy Idiots
Two squirrels, one tube—”and now Finn’s glasses are bifurcated!!” declares Hen. Check out some big, if somewhat destructive, fun we had yesterday:
[YouTube]
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Leadvillans 2015
We arrived in Leadville yesterday to find amazingly warm weather yet enough patches of snow to keep the guys constantly entertained. In this gallery you can see them drawing with Grandma, firing snowballs at me & Grandpa, enjoying some root beer floats, and horsing around in rusty old mining equipment (“I didn’t get lockjaw!!” declares Henry with great pride 🙂 ).
The boys are raring to go visit the fam in Colorado next week. In anticipation of that, here’s Skiier Hen hitting the slopes two (!!) years ago (man, can it have been that long already?).
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Cable Cars!
Somehow despite living so close to San Francisco, we’d never actually gotten the lads aboard the famous cable cars. Today, following a fun visit to the Exploratorium, we put that bit of bad parenting to rest. 🙂 Check it out:
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The Cat in the Hat
Finn’s been reading up a storm lately, and the other day I heard him, Margot, and Henry cackling as he blazed through an out-loud reading of The Cat In The Hat. Naturally as soon as I tried to take a video he clammed up & they boys started clowning around, but I was able to capture a few shots of the proceedings.
I never quite got around to posting this footage last summer after we enjoyed a thrilling ride in a vintage powerboat own by our friend Pauline’s friend John. Now, courtesy of the video-making technology I’ve been working on at Google, here’s a brief peek at Micronaxx on the waves:
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Throwback Tuesday: Hearts Aflutter
From the days when El Finnster didn’t fight off a good smooch. 🙂
Seven years ago today: Four “Jeeps” (GP’s, i.e. grandparents) + one very micro Finnster. 🙂 Not shown: the part where, if I recall correctly, Finn then peed on my dad. More photos from that day.
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Sunset Beach
“The best thing about San Jose,” I always tell people, “is that you can easily escape & quickly go somewhere more interesting.” We did just that last Sunday, taking the boys to horse around with sand crabs & each other at Sunset Beach (a bit south of Santa Cruz). Here’s our gallery.
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Home Run Hitters
The Bash Brothers’ mini-slugfest continues at T-ball. 🙂 Note the moment where Henry decides that a missed high-five is reason enough to reverse course.
[YouTube]
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Choco-boca
Glug glug glug glug. — Son #1 🙂
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Leprechaun Traps!
In advance of St. Paddy’s day today, the boys explained that they wanted to try and trap some leprechauns. This is not something John or I had done as kids, but apparently building leprechaun traps is a new practice for kids these days.
Finn explained how the traps were supposed to work, and we did some online research to see examples before we started building our own. Critical trap components include Lucky Charms, which Dad-O & Henry ran out to get, fake rainbows, clouds, and of course, the trap. Finn and I stayed home during the bait run to devise cereal bowl and Lego-based traps. You’ll see in the gallery what we came up with – paper rainbow entrances with Lucky Charms and fake cotton ball “clouds” to lure the leprechauns into leaving gold at the end of each rainbow, before the cereal bowl trap fell onto them.
We set the traps out on the back steps before bedtime and listened for suspicious rustling on the back porch. John thinks he might’ve heard something but was too sleepy to go out and check. This morning, as soon as the boys awoke, the first words out of Henry’s mouth were: “Dad-O, could you shut off the burglar alarm so we can go out & see whether we captured any?”
Lo and behold, our traps worked! Well, partially… Although the little bootprints left at the scene indicated the leprechauns eventually escaped, they did leave a pile of gold coins (old Mexican pesos), and chocolate coins under each trap. The boys were ecstatic! Henry exclaimed “Now I know that leprechauns are REAL!”
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Ancient Hibernian Greetings
Erin Go Bragh, 2009-style! 🙂 (See previous St. Paddy’s images & videos.)
What happens when the Micronaxx take some Macronaxx to the Children’s Discovery Museum for some celebrations of the lunar new year? Why, a little trip through Saigon, of course. (More pics to come soon, I hope.)
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Hams by the Sea
Well someone is excited to visit the cliffs of Santa Cruz. 🙂
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Play Ball!
Yesterday marked the exciting first day of Little League season. We signed the boys up for T-ball this spring, to give them an opportunity to try something new, learn how to play a team sport, and do a lot of running around. Since neither guy has ever played ball before, we are starting with T-ball so they can learn the fundamentals without any pressure. They’ve been really excited about going to practice with their fellow Mets (inexplicably represented by the letter “B” and a cartoon bumblebee).
Prior to yesterday’s opening ceremony and first game, shown in this gallery, they’ve been learning base running, “base position”, catching, batting, and throwing. They’re both catching on pretty fast, and they are really enjoying themselves. Henry is actually pretty fast on his feet when he’s focused enough to remember to run! And Finn has a pretty good arm!
They had a blast yesterday, playing their first game against the Dragons, and are looking forward to Saturday match-ups with the Scrappers, Tin Caps, and Sea Dogs. We had an equally great time cheering on all the players and watching the constant tangle of outfielders, all trying to get the ball and throw it back to first base.
