VIDEOS: Movies for Kellen

Whenever Kellen see me on the computer he signs "more" and repeats "more movies..more movies" until I let him watch the ones we have on the blog. We've been watching the same ones for many weeks now so I thought I'd throw a few more up for him.

"The Amazing Race"

One of the most repeated phrases in our home at the moment is "on your marks, get set, go!". Aidan and Kellen like to race between the kitchen and the couch. Kellen is quite the imitator not only mimicking what we say but also our actions (as you can see by the twin elevated rear ends on the starting block).

"Spinning Baby I"

It's hard to catch Kellen doing anything on camera because he wants only to see himself on the viewing screen. I was messing with him a little bit this morning making him chase the screen. We did a little decorating in the living room/dining room area this weekend so if you can find a way to slow the video down you'll get a bit of a panoramic view of things.

"Wii Demo/Spider Man Dance"

Speaking of imitation...Kellen demonstrates how to win a Wii race on the popular Mario/Sonic Olympics. Among other actions, the track races require you to vigorously alternate bouncing the two ends up and down. This typically leaves Aidan panting as you hear Kellen mimicking.

Aidan also gives us a brief glance at his Spider Man Dance. We've got a wedding this weekend and he has been practicing.

"Elmo Karaoke & Baby Spin II"

How is it that the adults in the house can't get the microphone on this toy to work and the one year old has no issues with it? And for good measure we make him chase the camera one more time. Kellen is always asking "where's mama?", "where's Adum (Aidan)?", "where's Steve (you watch Blues Clues, right?)?"

Monday Morning Gallery

We did a little finger painting this morning...

Aidan stayed in the abstract mood when the Crayons came out...

"Squiggles"

...until prompted to draw something specific.

"Le Voilier sur les Vagues"

or

"Sailboat on the Waves"

Bunk Beds

AIDAN: “Dad, when am I going to get bunk beds?”

ME: “Excuse me?”

AIDAN: “Bunk beds! When am I going to get bunk beds?”

Aidan asked me this question about the time I turned to find Kellen in his high chair…and I hadn’t put him there (I later witnessed him (within arms reach so I could catch him (can I put parentheses inside of parentheses?) ) move a folding chair, climb up on the high chair tray and into the seat (sorry if the parentheses made that confusing) ).

Bunk beds with Kellen in his current climb-happy state? Not a good idea. I can imagine Kellen taking all of the couch pillows off the couch (as he already does), moving them into the bedroom and Olympic platform diving from the top bunk into a pile of pillows.

Aidan asked me two more times within a five minute span so I did what any good parent would do after finding that ignoring the initial question doesn’t make it go away…I told him to ask his mother. So we immediately called her at work.

Later in the morning we Googled bunk beds just to look for future reference.

I have some thoughts…

How could I ever send them to their room as a punishment if they had a slide and tent as part of their bed?

Same thought...this time it's an indoor tree house.

Do these people make their kids sleep outside..that is some pretty noticeable foliage and a street in the background, right?

Obviously not a boy friendly place to sleep but impressive it its elaborateness nonetheless (there's a bunk on top of the archway too).

Again, not so boyish, but impressive.

There we go...space sleeping!

And if we accidentally have six more children in the future like that show Rachel and Aidan are always watching, a couple of triple bunks stacked in a room would work nicely.

VIDEO: Epic Homemade Waterslide

After seeing the picture of the bunk bed with a slide Kellen kept asking to see slides. Still pictures were not entertaining enough so we YouTubed "slides".

GO CUBS GO!!!

You may recall my Opening Day post when I recounted my hot dog and hot chocolate lunch honoring a previous Opening Day experience. I happened to have a quick hot dog after mowing the lawn today (one of those grab anything you can dining experiences) and I fully intend on having some hot chocolate tonight to celebrate the division title (even though it was very warm today).

When the playoffs begin I just might have to make it a daily regimen...on second thought maybe not. Perhaps one such "meal" on the first day of the playoffs and one to celebrate winning it all.

Um...Yeah...I Knew That

I ran some errands with the boys this morning and was in need of a new camera battery. I found a two pack of lithiums that looked just like the battery that had just gone dead. I carefully studied the package to ensure I was getting the right batteries matching all of the numbers I could find. The only difference between the two was an "03-2018" printed on the battery as opposed to the "03-2017" that I had previously.

"This looks like what I have," I said to the helpful camera counter dude, "except the last digit on this number is different." He looked closer as I asked if the serial number on this model of batteries had changed. He informed me that I was looking at the battery expiration date. I guess I was not thinking of shelving this necessary item 10 years.

He chuckled and said some people will come in asking specifically for an "03-2017" thinking that's the battery number. Um...that's kind of what I just did camera guy. Your anecdote has not been helpful in making me feel any smarter.

I later called another store asking if I could replace a dead watch battery at their location. After being passed around and asking the same set of questions three times I was connected to an informed and helpful young lady. She told me they didn't do such things on site but I could pick up a prepaid envelope at the store and send it off for repair. I proceeded to ask how much the postage cost on such a thing just as the concept of "prepaid" registered in my mind. I quickly got out an "uh...nevermind" and told her I 'd be right over.

I've been feeling quite fuzzy headed today. I hope the bug that has gotten to Rachel and Kellen is not headed for Aidan and me.

Can the Force Cure a Cough?

Kellen's been slowed by a cold this week and is feeling a bit roughed up today. I thought perhaps if I empowered him with a lightsaber he could fight off the bug and get back to normal.

Toothpaste Bandit

I'm a novice investigator but I think I solved this mystery by following the clues. This afternoon I smelled something a bit fruity in the air. I then noticed...

...an open bathroom door with the toothpaste drawer ajar...

...a tube of children's toothpaste lying on the rug...

...and one year old lips with a pasty residue on them.

This time around our suspect was caught red handed (or white lipped). His breath did smell fantastic though.

VIDEO: Afternoon Icicle

I'm hoping this video will be a preview of a future fuller length feature. Aidan was having a popsicle for his snack today and Kellen indicated that he would like an "icicle" as well.

Before I grabbed the camera he was putting on quite a show. He would say "icicle cold" and contort his face quite comically. He was visibly shivering before the popsicle even touched his lips. When he finally got the courage to engage, it looked like a snake having an afternoon snack as he cautiously consumed what little bit he ultimately tasted with lightning quick licks. Of course when the camera came out he just wanted to see his picture. We'll see if some hidden camera work catches the good stuff the next time around.

The Smirking Stranger

Earlier in the month I gazed out of the kitchen window and froze for just a moment. As I looked across the street, I saw something standing there just a foot or so back from the curb. I wondered how long it had been there. What did it mean? Had I overlooked it before or was it something new?

There stood a fire hydrant dressed in red, silently smirking back at me. The hydrant had always been there but I paid no attention to it. Now I was struck with fear noticing he was holding something in his hand…or rather behind his back. It was not concealed well as it poked well above his head. It was an antenna like stick protruding skyward…to alert those who needed to know just where the hydrant stands…when the big snow comes.

He's taunting me!

Perhaps I was a bit on edge because the temperatures had dropped recently and the summer ran away so quickly. Or maybe in the back of my mind I am living in fear of my first Minnesota winter because a friend in Chicago felt it necessary to inform me that Eskimos have a million words for snow (slight exaggeration) and perhaps I should start learning them before I moved here. There are no Eskimos in my neighborhood (none that I’ve seen) but then again he was ribbing me about the snow not the natives.

Is the winter that much more epic in Minnesota? I’ve lived in the Midwest my entire life, I can handle a little bit (or a lot) of the white stuff and the cold that goes with it. Most unnerving in this episode is the fact that the candy cane colored rod (have I purchased a house just across the curb from the North Pole?) appeared just after Labor Day. Are we planning on blizzard like conditions in the early Fall? This very well might be common practice in Chicago and Iowa but for some reason it jumped at me this time around.

Better go buy me some new boots…and a snow blower…and enough canned food to survive being homebound for several months.

VIDEO: Our Ants

Aidan received an ant farm as a gift and after sitting in the box for quite a long time we decided to pull the trigger and order the bugs. I learned an important lesson. Don't announce to the young man that his bugs have arrived before checking out the bugs. Turns out the "shipping shock" the first shipment of ants were experiencing never faded. Thankfully the second complimentary shipment was swift and I was able to stall long enough. Eleven survived the second trip through the mail and we're now having fun watching them as they begin to tunnel.

NOTE: My attempt at ant/aunt humor was not received well. Allison, Andrea (Andi) and Chassity are Aidan's three aunts.

Not Your Quiet Sunday at Home

My buddy and I are partial Minnesota Vikings season ticket holders. We made this purchase for the express purpose of seeing our beloved Chicago Bears live at the Metrodome in November. We decided to sell off the majority of our game tickets (no use going and supporting a division rival) but kept two additional pairs so we could each go once with our wives. Today Rachel and I hit the Vikings/Colts game and I have a few observations…

First: NFL football + stadium with a lid on it = VERY LOUD. I sought out the answer of just how loud it got in the dome at these games and saw the words “airliner taking off”. That particular blurb was in reference to the Twins and it has to be louder at the football games. The crowd itself gets extraordinarily loud and the fact that they choose to jack the music levels on the house speakers (each aimed directly at my seat) up past the level of distortion did not help. My eardrums were begging for mercy early on and many attempts at conversation ended with a “huh?” response followed by a mouthed “never mind” (no use straining the vocal cords when you’re not going to be heard or understood anyway). The noise does what it’s supposed to do as All-World quarterback Peyton Manning was owned by the Viking defense for most of three quarters. I’d have difficulty doing my job with 65,000 people yelling that loud in my workspace too (although Peyton’s got a much bigger cubicle than the rest of us).

Second: Way too many people root, root, rooting against the home team. There were a lot of people cheering for the Colts today which happens but it seemed they had an unusually large representation. I even saw people in purple (the Vikings color) cheering the Colts victorious final field goal. Were they forced into those jerseys against their will? How do you wear one team’s logo and celebrate their loss? When I attended my first NFL game last season at Soldier Field in Chicago there were a few Chiefs fans but they were WAY over matched. I attended a Cubs game in Cincinnati where the majority of the fandom was adorned in Cubbie blue. I get it when it’s one of 81 home games and your team doesn’t sell well but 100+ straight sellouts to your home games (only eight a year) and the girl in the Adrian Peterson purple jersey suddenly loves the Colts kicker…not cool.

Third: I can’t fake support of a team that is not my own. When it got loud and intense I gave some courtesy applause but my heart was not in it. I got excited when I saw the Bears score posted on the scoreboard (until they were on the wrong side of things) and the only times my heart went pitter pat was when the Colts Reggie Wayne made two big plays (he’s on my fantasy football team). I cheer for the Big 12 when the Cyclones aren’t playing them but that doesn’t compete with my team’s postseason chances. Thinking about the Vikings dropping to 0-2 was appealing but I was cheering the Bears against the same Colts last week and they ruined our Super Bowl visit two years ago. I will admit the introductions were impressive in volume. There was a even a Viking looking dude on a motorcycle (pictured below), a few fireworks and the team running out of an inflatable Viking ship along side the loudest rendition of Led Zeppelin’s "Immigrant Song" that I’ve ever heard.

So I will wait and watch weekly on TV until the Bears roll into town in late November. Then I’ll have a partner in crime proudly wearing navy and orange with me as we unashamedly cheer for our Bears. Though it’s been a bit strange to watch the Twins and Vikings playing inside over the last few months the coverage will be appreciated as we’re knocking on the door of December. Hopefully we’ll witness a Chicago victory as we did last September when the Air Force flyover and Devin Hester’s returned kickoff for a touchdown had my heart leaping inside of me. Hester could have run for governor of Illinois that day and won in a landslide…perhaps he’ll spoil election month in Minneapolis.

Run Devin Run!

I'm on the Fringe

I’ve got a show. Well, as much as going on one date allows you to say you’ve got a girlfriend. If things don’t work out like I hope they will, we’ll agree to see and be seen by other people…I’m talking again about TV, I’m not currently dating anyone for obvious reasons.

For several years I’ve not been much of a TV person. Studying through two degrees and tending to two children had me more focused on other things. We still do pay attention to the kids, but the absence of textbooks and the introduction of DVR into our lives allows me to watch shows when I’m ready for them. Now instead of disregarding everything on TV from 7:00 to 9:00 I can alter the known television universe with my fantastic TV time machine.

I did watch a few shows regularly this summer. I watched “The Mole” as my grandfather was quite into it when it ran originally. I didn’t get all psycho about it but discovered that it’s not enough to simply watch a TV program anymore. If you really want to get into the mix with other hardcore watchers you’ve got to log on, follow the online clues and discuss everything in exhaustive detail with the show’s online community. I decided simply to let "The Mole" unfold and mindlessly give it 45 minutes every week (why watch live when you can watch after the fact and kill the commercials?).

So a week ago I took a quick glance at the upcoming Fall lineup. I thought it would be cool to find a new show to dig into and join the movement from the beginning. I needed something I could take a little more seriously without spending the six days between shows discussing where things are going with the citizens of cyberspace…although I did peek for a while. Of course there were some logging in already to laud the brilliance of the program and others trying to determine what would happen on each episode from now until the end of time. And there were detractors negatively scrutinizing every detail and rolling their avatar eyes at lines of dialogue that were the slightest bit odd. I will choose to suspend disbelief enough to enjoy what I’m watching (it is TV people) and try to find a happy medium that allows me to take an ongoing interest without letting the show affect my emotional state from week to week.

The show is “Fringe”. It’s got suspicious activity, the use of science to answer questions and weekly mysteries wrapped inside the big mystery. Sounds like most of the TV dramas since science became cool again, but I was intrigued enough by the concept and the pilot to tune in again next week and hopefully throughout the season. Perhaps by November I’ll have bought into it so much that I’ll cast my presidential vote with consideration of which candidate is least likely to be wrapped up in a worldwide conspiracy of pseudoscientific proportions.

The show is produced by the same guy who cranks out the widely popular “Lost”. At the end of the last TV viewing season we watched the finale of “Lost” with friends. None of us were regular viewers. I had watched the first few shows way back when but left it alone when the busyness came. It was hard to jump in without the deep back stories. The fact that the episode leading up to the finale was rebroadcast with constant pop up text explaining the complicated interwoven clues and details had our minds spinning and supported the idea that it may not be an easy show to join already in progress.

This one has me there at the beginning and will hopefully have me keeping up with the stories. The producer and reviews have said it will not be as intensely complicated as some of his other work. Of course I can check in with my virtual friends who have dissected every second of each episode after multiple weekly viewings if I have any questions. Or perhaps the show will swallow me and I'll be the home based agent briefing my cyber colleagues.

Cell Phone Bandit

The evidence would support that we have a second bandit roaming around in our house. Then again it may be a single bandit with a wide range of skills. Perhaps it is just the 18 month old that climbs on tables, squeezes through small spaces and comes out of his parent's room clutching jewelry while he guiltily smiles and says "pretty" (the word we've tried to use to discourage him from grabbing certain things).

My cell phone now has four new numbers programed into the address book under the names "Nle", "7", "*-" and again "7". I don't show outgoing calls to any of these new friends but then again one of the numbers is only seven digits (mostly 3's).

For our safety we are keeping watch again for another 30ish pound, 30ish inch vandal.

18 Months and Exhausted

Kellen woke up last night around 10:00. Instead of laying with one of us on the couch and falling quickly back to sleep he was fussy and a bit confused. He was passed back and forth numerous times and ultimately decided he'd prefer to put himself back to sleep...on the floor.


Yesterday marked 18 months for Kellen. His check up showed him to be just shy of 31 pounds and a just over 33 inches.

PHOTOS: Aidan's First Cyclone Game

PHOTOS: SD (Christensen Camera)

PHOTOS: SD (Van Steenis Camera)

South Dakota Trip

Friday

After making the drive from Minnesota to Sioux Falls, South Dakota I am convinced that driving west into a setting sun with two inches of bug splat on the windshield will soon be part of the Olympic competition. Level of difficulty…whatever the max is. Level of disgusting…again, whatever the max is.

Friday night was déjà vu of our recent visit to Chicago as our hotel room proved once again to be the equivalent of caffeine to our favorite one year old. Kellen tore around the place at full speed and did not settle down until at least 10:30. This would be the norm throughout the next four evenings.

Saturday

Our chariot arrived. Some of the initial banter related to trekking across South Dakota as a family included the mode of travel being an RV. We finally settled on what one person suggested made us look like a church youth group out on a serve project. It was roomy and carried six adults, two children and plenty of luggage and snacks for all of us.




The journey from the east end of South Dakota to the west end was highlighted by Aidan and my dominance in Car Bingo. We would not only score the first Bingo of the day, we would not stop our search until finding all 24 items (which ran us into Sunday). Who would have thought that seeing an airplane in South Dakota would come long after spotting an Idaho license plate?


One thing I did not get a great picture of was some of the impressive yellow fields of sunflowers along I-90. We passed many on our way to the Badlands. Aidan in obvious anticipation to the following day's visit to Mount Rushmore swears he saw faces in the erosion driven scenery of the Badlands. We did a little hiking through a few spots along the way and stopped in at a diner for lunch where I had my first Buffalo Burger.


You would think driving through South Dakota that the Wall Drug Store is the most amazing place on the planet. The near one million billboards (very slight exaggeration) touting its existence from the east end of the state to the west would make you think you were about to discover the greatest and happiest place on earth (with free ice water and five cent coffee). It made for some good photo ops (included in the slide show below) and the ice cream was delicious.

Saturday night Kellen swam in the big boy pool for the first time. He was not exactly fearful of the water splashing as much water as he possibly could into his own face and mine. The momentousness of this first swim is documented in video in its own post below.

Sunday

Before heading to Mount Rushmore we stopped at a local park to see a piece of the Berlin Wall. It was given a more fitting tribute in South Dakota than the chunk of wall I previously saw displayed at the front door of the Hard Rock Café in Orlando.

Mount Rushmore was exciting to see. It suddenly appeared as we winded around toward it and I must have snapped 80 pictures (slight exaggeration) of it from every possible angle. I am told that the area around the monument has been developed significantly over the years. I got to met one of the men who worked on the monument many, many years ago.


On our way to our final stop of the day we wound through Black Hills National Forest and Custer State Park. On three occasions you could see Mount Rushmore perfectly framed by tunnels on the road (video below).

We did spot a lone buffalo on our way through this portion of South Dakota ending our day at the developing Crazy Horse monument (actually we ended our day at T.G.I. Friday’s but that didn’t seem historic and noteworthy).


Monday

We made a few final stops in the Rapid City area on Monday before heading back east. We toured the Black Hills Caverns guided by a pair of young boys who indicated they would be starting fifth and eighth grade the following day. I don’t recall ducking and squeezing so much on previous cave tours but then again I may have been much shorter the last time I had done such a thing. The boys had a chance to feed some rainbow trout at a local fish hatchery before one last stop at Dinosaur Park.


The evening was capped at an amazing hotel pool. I’m not sure who was more excited, the adults or the kids. The water center featured a giant pirate ship complete with slides and water guns for the shorter people and a two story water slide which got its full use by the adults.

Tuesday

This morning we hit the Corn Palace in Mitchell before splitting our group in Sioux Falls for the return to our respective homes. Aidan had been waiting anxiously to see the “building made of corn” for the entire trip and many days prior to it.


We are now back at home ready for the comfort of our own beds having had a wonderful time with Nana and Papa, Andrea and Luigi (or Dave if you know him by his given name).

I've posted a slide show of pictures from the trip from our camera and will add shared pictures from the rest of the family once we get them.

PHOTOS: SD (Deur Camera)

Papa and the President

Aidan is convinced that the third President on Mount Rushmore looks just like his Papa. After looking at the two of them side-by-side who could argue?

Roosevelt, Christensen. Can you tell the difference?

VIDEO: Kellen's First Swim