Making Deals at CEC

We had a family night at the kids favorite "restaurant" - Chuck E. Cheese's.  Aaron and Becky are seen here enjoying a new ride that has you recline in the seat, then a video screen shows you blasting your jet pack through multiple environments in a first person point of view.  The seat vibrates and bounces with the action on the screen - actually quite fun.

He then helped me with the Deal or No Deal ticket game.  We got 40 tickets - very respectable.

Becky however made a bad deal and ended up with only 2.  It's OK honey, only 1 token will buy you another chance. [fist bump]

Happy Birthday Aaron! - 4 Years Old

Our littlest munchkin turned 4 today. As usual, he's been acting like a 4 year-old for several months now. He is a big time reader, loves to play just about any game and go on any adventure. Since it was a school day for Alex (but not for Aaron on Mondays), we saved most of the celebrating for after school. Remember, we had just come back from Kalahari Resort the weekend before. We did take him to breakfast at Cracker Barrel - I think we may have him convinced that it is his favorite place to eat breakfast out, while really it is ours.
He had a lot of fun opening up his presents, as expected. It blew his mind a little when a wrapped package compared his 48 months old to his Grammy's 708 months and Grandpa's 814 months. Don't worry, you'll get there too someday kid (if you eat your vegetables).
When we let him pick where he wanted to have dinner, it was no surprise that it was at Chuck E. Cheese's. Maybe he'll try pizza as a 4 year old. It is a little odd packing him a meal into his favorite restaurant. Though to his credit, the pizza probably is not the best part of Chuck E. Cheese's.
The highlight of the night was Aaron's Grand Star Cake that Becky made him. Of course, both boys are big fans of Mario videogames, and the Grand Star is the big prize for completing major levels of the newest one, Super Mario Galaxy. Becky found a large star cake pan, made him a cake filled with candied "star bits", frosted it with the right color of golden frosting, sprinkled it with sugary glitter, and gave it Pepperidge Farm cookie eyes. Needless to say, it was a big hit and capped off the day in a really fun way. Time is so compressed at this age. This last year constituted a full quarter of his life so far. While the first quarter was cute and sweet, this last quarter has been the most fun for us, and I think for him.

Fixing With Daddy and Off-Roading With Mommy

Aaron and I went to his Saturday class today. He spent a lot of time with the shapes puzzles and the tool table. In his mind he was rescuing the shapes from a volcano and repairing important equipment. He was hard to channel toward other things, but I got him to explore the room a little. He participated in the Farmer in the Dell game during circle time and listened to the animal sounds story, calling out when he knew which animal was making the next sound. He finished the morning with a pumpkin spice donut hole. When we came out, he said, "We had a great day!"

Alex and Becky took this opportunity to go on a date. I get one on one time with him if he goes to the office with me on the weekends and Becky gets to go solo with Aaron every day that Alex is in school. She seldom gets time with just her and Alex and she wanted to reconnect with him. They chose Chuck E. Cheese for their date - food and entertainment. They ate pizza, played a lot of skeeball and air hockey, and even rode in a monster truck - OK, just Alex. They had a good time and it reinforced for us our desire to have one on one time with each kid.

School Orientation 2006

This evening we met at Alex's school to see his classroom for the next year. His class is made of 1st and 2nd graders and their are 3 of these classes - the primary grades. Their classrooms are actually lined up along one wall of an enormous room, with each teacher's space marked apart from the others by filing cabinets and other dividers. Another wall houses the 3rd and 4th graders - Lower Intermediate - and another wall contains the 5th and 6th graders - Upper Intermediate. The 4th wall is the area where the whole school meets for a weekly meeting. The middle houses a library/resource center/computer lab. Like I said, a huge room. The top picture is the kids in a covered wagon and near several western facades that have been recycled from the Western-themed auction earlier this year. After a couple of hours of hard orientating, we unwound at Chuck E. Cheese's and beat things with padded hammers.