The Time Machine

A little while back, I won a bid on eBay for a box full of illustrated classic books for kids. I’ve been working my way through them with Hunter and Emma, reading a chapter or two to them each night as part of their “bedtime routine.” We just finished reading The Time Machine and the kids really got into it. When we were done, I figured it would be fun to go rent the old Time Machine movie they made back in the 60’s and watch it with the kids. We had this movie when I was a kid and I probably watched it a dozen times at least. I had all these memories of the cool effects and of how scary the morlocks were.

We had a fun time watching it with the kids who remembered parts from the book and thought it was all fun but let’s just say, this is one of those movies that the years have not been kind to. Amy and I had a hard time not laughing at all the cheezy effects. The best part, I think, was one scene showing a city being destroyed that was clearly some kid’s train set with matchbox cars being set on fire. Hilarious! There were other problems too. It seemed like the time traveler just spent the whole movie yelling at people for being from the future. Plus, the morlocks all looked like they came straight out of a John Goodman look-a-like contest (that they didn’t win for being too fat. Zing!).

It’s kind of sad, actually. I had such good memories of that movie. There are other movies I liked when I was younger that I avoid watching again just because I don’t want to be let down like that. Does anyone else do that?

By the way, I know Uncle Rico’s time machine has nothing to do with The Time Machine movie, but I just couldn’t resist (Oh, it kills, it kills! Turn it off! Turn it off!).

Gotcha??!!

Ok, so Banna, Heidi and Heather called our bluff. April Fools!

We saw Melanie’s post late last night and were totally fooled. We did the math and talked about how close together the two babies would be, etc. Then this morning I woke up to Hunter and Emma plotting some April Fools pranks, and thought, “Hey, wait a minute! I bet that Mark and Melanie are pulling a joke.” As soon as Rob woke up I revealed my suspicions to him. We said, hey, why don’t we play along? So we got the kids that were awake in on it too, and staged the photo. And yes, it is a digital thermometer. I didn’t think the photo would be so closely scrutinized. (And you’re right, I am not the tink touching kind, but, because I am a mother, I have touched it all before.) Because there has been a “procedure,” it is nearly impossible for me to get pregnant again, so I don’t have pregnancy tests lying around the house!

So if we got you, sorry! But you have to admit, that is the perfect picture.

Jog A Thon ’07

This morning was the Jog-A-Thon fundraiser at the elementary school. Hunter and Emma did such a great job running! It reminded me that they need to do it more often on their own. They went to their classrooms to take roll, and 15 minutes later the whole school came out to the back field. There were two tracks, one for the upper grades, and one for the lower. Everybody ran for 45 minutes, and the kids seemed to have a lot of fun as some volunteer parents counted their laps. I took a ton of photos, but only posted the best ones. There are some fun pictures with great action in the gallery!

Office Party

On Saturday, Rob’s office had a party for the associates and their families at Dave’s and Buster’s. It’s sort of a cross between a bar, a casino (only in decorative atmosphere, there’s no gambling or smoking), and Chuck E Cheese. There are some party rooms with pool tables and a little buffet, a restaurant and bar section, and then the game room. There were traditional arcade games and a lot of the ticket giving games where you basically put in a coin and watch it fall or push a button to see how many tickets you will get. It was a ton of fun! Even Hannah and Sabrina were so good and enjoyed the crazy, loud activities. Hunter and Emma tried out pool for the first time, and we did a little chatting with the adults. Then we just went crazy in the arcade.

We ended up with a ton of tickets and two people gave us their extras when they saw us with four kids. There is a little store where you can spend your tickets, and everyone got something fun to take home. In the mix, we ended up with three extra long slinkies: green, red, and purple. They were all instantly messed up as soon as they came out of the box. I spent 20 minutes untangling one for Emma yesterday, only to have her come back with a tangled mess again 2 minutes later. I looked at her like “don’t even ask” and she said, “I’m going to fix it by myself.” Smart girl. So now that I will not untangle the slinkies, I decided to try them out as art. We got a couple of digital photography books, and I tried some things I read. I still need to work on a sharper focus (time for the tripod), but I think I got some nice abstract images. I’m planning to post on the books later, after I try some more of the advice.

What? Develop Photos?

I have a whole bunch of film that needs to be developed just sitting in my fridge. There must be 20 rolls. I still used the film camera a lot before I got my new digital one because the pictures were such a nice quality. Now I hardly ever use it, but still have this backlog to get through. I finally took in four rolls to Sam’s Club and got them done. (This first one is with Sabrina and Adrienne, not Hannah)

Two were the disposable cameras I gave to Hunter and Emma when Sabrina was born! They took pictures in the hospital when they would come to visit. I did this same thing when Hannah was born and loved the pictures they took. They would get things like the flowers and the dry erase board the nurse would write on, and the morphine machine. All things that help really bring back the details of the experience and see it from their point of view.

The third roll was from when Matt came home from his mission. This is the last time all of the cousins from my side were together too. The fourth one had pictures from Christmas that Hunter took with the “Cars” camera Emma gave him. I thought I’d post a few of them. I will also post some in the February Folder. Good times!

The cake said, Happy Birthday ENNA!

Emma had her birthday party with her friends two weeks ago. Ok, so it was a month late, but she had a blast. The morning of a birthday party I am always stressed and nervous about keeping the kids occupied and happy, and having everything ready to go. One of the last things on the list was to get a cake from the nearby bakery, and as I was standing in the checkout line I realized it said, “Happy Birthday Enna!” I was a bit annoyed since I had even spelled it out for the girl after I said her name. It was in cursive, so I figured the girls wouldn’t notice, and they didn’t. They played charades, freeze dance to the music videos on the High School Musical dvd, memory, made bracelets, pinata, cake and ice cream. Wow, and we ended right on time so there wasn’t a whole lot of crazy running around. Rob and I were congratulating ourselves on a successful party and the girls were starting to leave with their parents. I was saying goodbye to the second girl to leave when I heard someone yelling a girls name over and over. I turned around to see the girl throwing up into her hands. She wasn’t sure where to go and was crying for her mom. I got her into the bathroom and got her cleaned up. Then her mom arrived. (Later her mom told me that she must have been over tired from her soccer game or something because she didn’t show any signs of sickness afterwards. That was great news for her and all of the other girls that had been playing with her too.) She helped me finish cleaning things up and Rob sent the rest of the girls outside. So, we almost made it without a hitch, but overall, Emma was happy and had fun with her friends. That’s all that matters right?