Holiday Spirit

Another busy - and fun - weekend. We kicked it off Friday with our annual trip downtown for a picture with Santa and some holiday shopping, followed by dinner at the Icon Grill.

First stop... The Bon Marche for a visit with Santa...

Ho Ho Ho

The trendy place to see Santa in downtown Seattle is at Nordstrom. They setup 'Santa's Workshop' right at the corner of one of the busier intersections of the shopping district (Westlake Center) and people line up for hours to get their picture taken with him. About 4 years ago, we figured out that The Bon Marche - a block away - has a great Santa, friendly staff, and NO LINE. We've been going there ever since! Karri and I are just thankful that the kids - especially the boys - are still game to get their picture taken with Santa.

After Santa, we split up so the siblings can shop for each other (and for their parents!). The kids really love this part... and so do we. I'll take one and Karri will take the other two. We'll shop for a while, regroup, switch kids, and shop some more. It's always fun and especially nice to see the kids sincerely try to find something that their siblings will like.  Victoria and I had an especially good time. We stopped to snap a quick picture in front of a massive Christmas tree.

Shopper Girl!

After shopping, we walk a couple blocks north to enjoy a holiday dinner at the Icon Grill. We stumbled onto this place 5 or 6 years ago after the kids had a holiday piano recital downtown. We've been back every year since. The restaurant is normally home to some great artwork - paintings, lots of blown glass, and a variety of interesting artifacts. They double-down for the holidays and fill the place with trees, ornaments, lights, presents, figurines and more. They have a pianist playing holiday songs on a baby grand piano. And a great holiday menu, including the Grinch's own 'Roast Beast' (which Matthew enjoyed immensely this year).

Love their mama!

The kids love the whole experience, but their favorite part is the holiday desserts. The boys always split the Hot Fudge Sunday - a mountain of vanilla bean ice cream served in an edible cookie 'bowl' with an edible cone filled with hot fudge, accompanied by choice of toppings (e.g. crushed Oreos, M&M's, whipped cream, etc.).

"You gonna eat all that?!"

Victoria loves the 'Build Your Own' Holiday Cookie Plate - a large plate of sugar cookies and gingerbread men served with colored frosting and a variety of toppings for decorating.  We always come home with a box full of beautiful holiday cookies.

(Yes - the tree behind her is decorated with neckties!)

Karri and I enjoy the whole experience. It's fun to be able to take the kids out to a 'nice' restaurant once in a while - especially to a place that's brimming with holiday cheer. It really puts us in the holiday spirit (the pre-dinner martini's may contribute to that too).

The rest of the weekend flew by. Saturday Victoria had a basketball game (lost a close one) and Thomas had practice. In the evening, Thomas went to an 'ugly sweater' party at a school buddy's house while Karri and I went to a Holiday party here in West Seattle.  We spent most of the day Sunday getting holiday preparations done around the house (and I had a bunch of work to do). Matthew had a game in the afternoon (also lost a close one). And then poof... the weekend was over.

It's going to be a hectic week. Karri's parents arrive Tuesday night for a week. Matthew and Victoria get out of school on Wednesday. Thomas - not til Friday. Thomas also has 3 basketball games this week. Yikes.

Hug Your Children

My heart is heavy thinking about the parents who lost a child in Newtown yesterday. And the children who survived and will have to live with memory of that horrific tragedy for the rest of their lives. My thoughts and prayers are with all that were affected.

Christmas Show

Matthew and Victoria's elementary school, Holy Rosary, puts on a Christmas show every year. Each class typically performs two songs, the kindergartners charm everyone with a nativity song - all in costume, from Mary & Joseph, to the angels, cows and sheep - then there's a grand finale, usually a sing-along of Christmas classics.

We've attended for the last 10 years (since Thomas was in kindergarten). It's a fun event that the kids always look forward to. But it is always packed (standing room only in our massive church) and always runs long. When our kids were younger, we'd arrive early to get a seat near the front so that we could see better and take pictures or video. With each passing year, we seem to be arriving later and sitting further back. Last night I stood in the back while Karri sat with a couple friends just a few rows in front of me.

This year they introduced a few changes: no grand finale with all the kids, each class returned to the school after they performed, and a 5-minute intermission after the upper grades (5-8) finished and before the lower grades (K-4) performed. The music teacher who leads the program even explained that they did this so parents with older kids didn't have to stick around until the bitter end - duck out at intermission, go retrieve your kid(s) and head home. Brilliant!

It was great to see the kids get dressed up and perform. But it sure was nice to be out of there in an hour. Do I sound like a Grinch?!

All dressed up & ready to go!

Happy Birthday Matthew!

Matthew turned 13 today (Monday)! Another teenager in the house. How did that happen so fast?

We had Tim & Eang over for dinner. Matthew opened his presents first. Quite a stash...

Birthday boy with some of his gifts

When the kids were little, we frequently created some type of puzzle or treasure hunt for them to find one (or more) of their presents. We had a rather large, difficult-to-wrap birthday present for him, so Karri and I decided to revive the 'present hunt' idea! Matthew is into music (plays guitar and piano... itching for a drum set), so I created a rock-and-roll themed puzzle, including some random trivia that even I had to look up online. The trivia answers formed instructions for where to find his present. Google saved him...

Researching

The clues led him to the basement, where a decoy present... and more clues awaited.  We nearly had him with the 'homemade' drum set of pans, aluminum tubs, a garbage can lid... and a set of new drumsticks. But he found another clue that led him to page 368 of his new '100 Greatest Hard Rock Songs' music book, (The Who's "Won't Get Fooled Again"), which led him to his new, electronic drum set!

He found it!

The set was assembled shortly after dinner and the kids had a ball playing with it. Its really cool and I think will be a great starter set for him to see if drums are his 'thing'. The best part is that he can plug in a headset, so we don't have to listen to him "Bang on the Drums all Day" (Todd Rundgren - should have used that in my trivia!).

We finished off the night with chocolate cream pie.  I think he had a great day.

Matthew is a great kid - kind, caring, helpful, smart, funny - and a good brother to Thomas and Victoria.  We are so proud of him.

I'm Still Here

Travel always throws me off my routine. Always.

I had a work trip this week - 3 days in LA to attend a conference.  I left early Tuesday, got back Thursday night and now it's Sunday. Since I left, I haven't blogged once and my (limited) exercise routine is out the window. I'm hopeful I can find a routine again quickly.

Plenty has happened since my last post. I can't cover it all, so will hit the highlights and throw in a few pictures where I have them...

Karri's mom, Donna (affectionately known as Mimi), offered to come up and help Karri while I was out of town. Since I work from home, I do much of the shuttling of kids to/from school and activities. Karri's work schedule is somewhat flexible and we have friends we can count on to help, but its always a nice treat for the kids to have Mimi come up and stay.  I think Mimi enjoys it too.

Thomas' basketball team has had 4 games - 2 of which I missed while in LA.  They won 3, including a fun one over Kennedy High, where several of his grade school classmates attend, including 2 who are on the freshman team. Karri tells me there was a large contingent of Thomas' grade school friends in attendance for the game. I'm sure Thomas ate up every minute of it. He's been seeing more playing time - even started the last few games. The team is starting to come together and the games are fun to watch. It's the first time Mimi has seen a game - sounds like she loved it.

Matthew turns 13 tomorrow. For his party, he asked if he could have 5 friends sleep over this weekend. Yikes. The party was Saturday night. We took them to play laser tag - which was a big hit with the kids - then home for pizza, presents, cake, some time on the trampoline, a movie, lots of general teenage boy silliness and, eventually, bedtime. I think it was a hit, as all the boys seemed to have fun and we are hearing reports of same from their parents.

Matthew and his buddies (and Victoria) - in a rare moment of sitting still

 

All the kids had basketball games this weekend. On Saturday, Victoria's team won their first game and Thomas' team lost a tough one by 1. Matthew's team got another win - a close game against a very good team - on Sunday.

Sunday afternoon, we went to get our Christmas tree. Thomas had been invited to go snowboarding up at Snoqualmie Pass with some buddies, so he missed out on this annual tradition. We picked out a beautiful 8' noble fir.

Matthew and Victoria - ready to decorate

 After dinner we got the lights on and then let the kids place a couple ornaments.

Victoria's favorite angel ornament

We'll finish decorating this week. We are all exhausted from a busy weekend. And we've got a busy week ahead with Matthew's birthday, more basketball, my birthday, the Christmas show at Matthew & Victoria's school, and more. Time for bed.

Back to Lakeside

Our weekend finale was another basketball game at Lakeside School - this time the middle school just down the street from the high school where Thomas played yesterday.  Matthew's 7th grade CYO team played Lakeside today in their first regular season contest (last week's game was a scrimmage).

The game was close all the way and tied with less than 2 minutes to go, but Holy Rosary hit some clutch shots late in the game - including 2 free throws with less than a minute to go - to pull out a 4 point win. The boys looked good and it was a fun game to watch.

Hands up on defense! (creepy eyes though)

Matthew played well. He hit a clutch 3-pointer in the first half and added several rebounds and a blocked shot. Unfortunately, he pulled up lame late in the game, with an injured heel. He sat out the last few minutes with an icepack on his foot.  A milkshake on the drive home helped him forget about the heel for a bit.

Tim and Eang joining us for dinner tonight. I have a growler of Ol' Hare Stout from Georgetown Brewing company that I need Tim's help finishing off.  Karri put a pot roast in the crock-pot this morning and so we will enjoy her delicious shredded beef tacos for dinner. Always mui bueno.

And a rare road win for the Browns today!

Not a bad finish to the weekend.

Saturday Scramble

As is the routine around here, we had a hectic day yesterday (Saturday). Matthew had his last soccer game and Victoria and Thomas had basketball games. In the evening, Victoria had a sleepover at a friend's house, Thomas had a date dance at school and Matthew had a babysitting gig. All-in-all a fun day, but far from relaxing...

In their season finale, Matthew's team lost to a very good team that had beaten them earlier in the season.  We played well, but were out-matched in size, speed, skill and depth. The boys played hard, but also made sure to have fun, knowing it was their last game of the season.

Positioned for a corner kick

Taking a goal kick

Celebrating with teammate Kenny after a Crush goal

We had to divide and conquer in the afternoon, as Thomas had to be at school at exactly the same time as Victoria's game started.  Matthew and I dropped T off with plans to catch the 2nd half of Victoria's game, but there was horrible traffic and it just didn't make sense.  So Karri watched Victoria's game - a loss, but fun nonetheless.

Victoria headed off to her friend's house and Karri met us up at Lakeside School (whose alumni roll includes Bill Gates and Paul Allen) for Thomas' game. This was their 3rd game of the season - the first 2 were losses, but they played much better in the 2nd game and so we were optimistic for continued improvement against a tough conference rival. They didn't disappoint. They won the opening tip-off, scored a quick basket, and never looked back - establishing an early lead and never letting Lakeside build any momentum.

Their coach teaches a very up-tempo style of play with lots of fast-breaks, full court pressure defense and constant movement. It's fun to watch (when its working) and results in a lot of boys getting playing time - because the boys are constantly running and need to take a break every few minutes. Thomas hasn't started, but he's seen a lot of playing time and made the most of his opportunities.  Yesterday he played about 10 minutes and, I think, scored 10 points with a couple rebounds and a blocked shot. It was fun for the boys (and fans) to get a win. You can tell the team is really coming together.

T calling for the ball

A decisive win

After the game, we hustled home so everyone could get ready for evening activities.  Thomas was going to the 'Tolo' dance at Prep (aka 'Sadie Hawkins') - where the girls invite the boys. It's a dress-up event and, like Homecoming, there was a pre-dance dinner hosted by a school family with about 10 'couples', with parents invited to join.  The home was on Capital Hill - an old section of town with beautiful Victorian homes. The house had a 3rd floor open room for the kids to hang out and have dinner while the parents mingled on the main floor.  It was a beautiful home and perfect for an event like this. We enjoyed meeting a few more freshman parents and seeing the kids all decked out and having fun.

Thomas and his date, Elise

T and buddies

The crowd

I volunteered to pick Thomas up after the dance. He had arranged for his buddy Axa - the tallest one in the above pictures (at 6'7" and on the freshman team) - to spend the night. Matthew was still at his babysitting gig when we got back around 11, so I waited up till he got home around midnight. A long, but fun day.