Good-bye Season

The spring soccer season ended last week. Daniel's last game was Friday (in which he scored an awesome goal, which I wish I had a video of), and then we had the end-of-season party at our house Saturday.

The plan was for a nice, relaxing evening -- toss some burgers on the grill, let the kids run around in the yard, or maybe even swim, while the parents kicked back and talked and enjoyed the greenery and the warm evening breezes and the setting sun photogenically illuminating a few puffy clouds.

It was a nice plan, but Mother Nature wanted no truck with it.

Instead what we got is 37 degrees and pouring rain (can you believe it's almost June???). So, the party good moved indoors. It was a bit crowded with 50 people (with 12 of them being highly energetic 11-year-olds), but it seemed to work out, and everyone seemed to be having a good time.

Just for fun, here are a few photos of Daniel's season.

The first couple are of Daniel totally owning guys that are much larger. They didn't have enough kids sign up to have a "select" league, so to compensate they had a few of the younger teams "play up" into the U13 bracket. So Daniel sometimes ends up going head-to-head with kids that weigh at least twice what he does. He doesn't let that intimidate him, though -- he just charges in anyway.

This next bit of ownage is even cooler because not only did he blast the ball past the big kid...

...but it went past another defender and the goalkeeper and in. Woo-hoo!

Here are a few random shots of him kicking the ball. Check out that power on the last one!

Seminary graduation

Woo-hoo! Way to go, Rachel!

Grand Designs

Rachel and Daniel have been busy putting their artistic talents to work.

Every year CHS makes t-shirts for the graduation party, and they have a contest to determine the design. Rachel entered a couple of ideas, and one of hers won.

Here's what the design will look like, printed on a black shirt.

For extra fun, you can pick out what the various pieces of the design are, including a couple of "hidden" messages. :)

The first draft of her design also got used on the graduation party advertisements, like this flyer:



Daniel's school also does shirts for the kids in their final year. Daniel liked Rachel's idea, and did his own spin on it. This is his artwork, which also won the design contest and will be printed on shirts for the "graduating" class. I don't know what color it will be, so this is just his original black-and-white artwork.

Dancing Queen

A few photos from Prom last week.

Pale green-gold with pink accents.

Fancy fingernails.

Rachel and her friend Julia.

The theme was "masquerade", but these two thought actual masks were kind of creepy, so this is what they brought instead.

The whole group.

Some of the "paparazzi".

Yeah, he's a little taller. And this is with Rachel wearing some serious heels.

Don't know much about history...

... but Lisa does.

Every year there is a History Day competition. Andrew and Lisa have participated in it a couple of times -- our middle school usually participates for sixth and seventh graders. There is a regional competition, with the top two winners from each category going on to state, and then the top two going to nationals. So far, the best they've ever done is third place.

This year, Lisa and a friend decided to do a performance. They chose the topic of vaccinations, did research, wrote a play, gathered props, and performed it. Between the two of them, with some quick changes of costumes and props, they provide narration and portray modern doctors, patients, and historical doctors like Salk, Pasteur, and Jenner.

Here's how they did in regionals:



So, for the first time we got to go to the state competition. Here are a few photos from the day.

Setting up for the performance:



No pictures of the performance itself... Lisa wouldn't let me stay in the room for it.

Here's Idaho's First Lady, Lori Otter, speaking at the awards ceremony at the end of the day.



Lisa waiting for the announcements.



After some nail-biting, they finally read the winners... and Lisa's performance took first place!

On stage receiving their medals and greeting the First Lady.



Two happy historical performers with their medals!



Now, on to the national competition in Maryland this summer.

Congratulations, Lisa!

Sakura saku

It's spring, and the sakura are in bloom. Here are a few random photos...

Plus a bonus snapshot of some of our back-fence neighbors.

End of the Season

Last Friday Daniel was out of school, so we headed up to Bogus one last time before they closed for the season. It was a beautiful day, it wasn't too crowded, and the snow was great.

Here are a few photos, and if things go well, maybe even a video or two from the HeadCam™.

Here is our first of two runs down Silver Queen. The second run was faster, but a due to a HeadCam™ malfunction I don't have video of that one.

Unfortunately, these videos lose a lot when compressed down small enough to put on the Web.

Here is the last run of the day. And season.