Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Kevin and Thomas got to play with the high school band at a football game last Friday night. I really enjoyed my birthday dinner washed down with M&Ms and a soda at the game. They said they had a good time; Kevin sat next to Rebecca, who gave him pointers and showed him how to play all the fight songs.
Right before half-time, when the band had left to get ready for the halftime show, Savanna scored a touchdown. The jr. high group got up and played a quick tune in support. I'm sure they were shaking in their boots, but they didn't sound half bad.
Cub Scouts is in full swing again. We did a Halloween craft - Matt and his friend Mason did designs more reminiscent of Easter and Christmas. Oh well. You can lead a horse to the glue, but you can't make him create a ghost.



Wednesday, October 15, 2008

This is why we still live in Southern California...

Cindy and I are both off on Fridays - woo hoo!! Last Friday we went topless down to the beach to check out the Crystal Cove cottages. To you uninitiated folk in parts back East or the great North, that would be us driving the PT Cruiser with the top down. Get your minds out of the gutter, and wipe that picture from your brain. HA!

Now check your calendars. Last Friday was October 10 - and the weather was 85 degrees. We parked, got out our map, we hiked down the trail, and found this:
Double HA!
Anyway, back to the subject. We have talked about getting a beach house for some time during a random summer week, and figured we should check these cottages out. These were built and lived in by folks over many years, and the State of California, seeing a good thing, decided to kick these folks out and take over. Now anyone can rent one of these beauts. Well, if you can stand the smell of old... and salty.... and musty wood... then you have the start of a dream vacation. One without phones, TV, or internet access. But a gor-gee-ous view just minutes from a Ruby's shake shack.
You can see several houses in the picture above; there are only about 18 out of 30+ that are actually renovated and livable. The brown one on the far right with the green fence was used in the movie Beaches. I think it's all of 8 feet across, and not in a livable state. If I remember that movie correctly, what I saw was a mansion much much bigger than this little shack. Hollywood movie magic, I guess.

These three are the nicest of the bunch. But since Huell Howser has made more folks aware of this golden California gem hiding on the bluffs in So Cal, you'll have a hard time getting in. But if Cindy and I don't come home on time some Friday evening, you might find us sucking down a vanilla milkshake with our feet in the tide pools.

Saturday, October 4, 2008

The Last Few Weeks

I guess there have been a couple things that have gone on the last few weeks. I looked up and September is OVER ! Couldn't tell you how time passed, but it is now October - eek!

The boys are settled into the school routines, back-to-school night is over, Kevin became a teenager - wait, what? Yep, we now have two of them in the family. He got some new wheels to ride to school every day.

We also got up bright and early one Sunday morning and worked the VW Panic car show that Gary put on. Quite a crowd, and quite fun. Kevin and I sold raffle tickets and t-shirts, while his friend Thomas worked the kid's coloring contest.


And then we spent another Sunday afternoon having a water play day with the Cub Scouts. We had food, games, a slip n slide, and then a giant water balloon fight. When I said "go", my three offspring decided to gang up on mom. Yeah, I can still take 'em, even to the point of wrestling them to the ground and popping a water balloon inside their shirts.


Not that they didn't get a few shots in themselves...

Thank God There's no Sound on this Post...

Alanna has started to play the saxophone in her school band. She has her own instrument, but the instruction is one teacher to many students. Tonight Curtis brought her over for a lesson on the finer points of blowing the horn. We started off with just learning how to blow a note solidly without unwittingly jumping up or down the octave. Cause that hurts the ear, you know.

Then we went over fingering and a basic scale, and how to tongue the notes. Jacob wanted to play, too, so we pulled out Sammy's sax. Since the neckstrap for that is MIA, I pulled out the tenor sax.

What the heck, let's play that a little, too. (As it is pushing 80 years or so old, I didn't let the young'uns play it.) You don't even want to know what this sounded like. The neighbors were probably sooo happy when we finished killing the cows.

Earlier today Matt and I and some of the Cub Scouts were selling popcorn for the Pack.

Wanna buy some popcorn?.... wanna buy some popcorn?... wanna buy some popcorn?... thank you, have a good day!