Catching Up

I know, we're hipocrites. We keep harrassing people to update their blogs and yet we fail to keep our own updated. Paulette is a "blog stalker" and checks everyone's blogs several times a day. Even when we are not home she will check them on her phone since she has a fancy phone with the internet. So...

The day after we got home from our Christmas vacation, Dylan remembered that he had rollerblades waiting for him and he couldn't wait to try them out.

As most of you are aware, my kids seem to pick things up rather quickly, especially if it doesn't involve books or vegetables. After just a couple days of practice and a couple of bruises on his rear, Dylan has mastered (as well as a 6 year old can master) the art of the rollerblade. For a 3 year old, Hayden is no slouch either. We acquired some kids rollerblades from our neighbors garage sale that are adjustable. When we got them they were setup like a tricycle, one wheel in the front and two in the back. Hayden skated like that for several months until he was just playing around one day and put on Dylans which are true rollerblades and it almost seemed like he was skating better by having the wheels inline so we adjusted his skates and he is doing pretty well at keeping up with Dylan.

Not long after we got home, Paulette finally took the plunge and joined the family up at the YMCA. She has been working out almost every morning. She drops Hayden and Kolton off in the kid watch area and then goes and does her thing. She started by just going into the women's center and doing miscellaneous cardio and strength excercises. Recently she has discovered the classes and looks forward to attending her step, kickboxing, abs and all other sort of classes. She keeps trying to get us to go as a family in the evenings because I have yet to go but something keeps coming up preventing us from going. Part of it is me dragging my feet because it is something I have never done before and never pictured myself doing. I am sure that once I go one time I will probably keep going, especially since it is on the way to work and I could just work out and shower there before going to the office. Anyways, now that we have joined the YMCA, Hayden has been taking swimming lessons and Dylan has recently started soccer. Both of them love their activities, plus it keeps them active. Dylan doesn't have too much of a problem with that since Wednesday is our crazy day. I have to be home from work "on time" so Paulette can make it to the school in time to pick up Dylan only to rush him to gymnastics which is 20 minutes away and starts 20 minutes after he gets out of school. She has to get him out of gymnastics 5 minutes early so she can rush him to the YMCA so that he won't be too late for soccer practice. During this time I am fortunate enough to be at home with the other two boys while I try to double up on my school work so I can be more edjumacated.

We celebrated Grandpa Carroll's birthday at our house and had a lot of fun. It was the big 65 that he had been looking forward to for some time because it means that he can finally retire, except I think that he forgot to actually retire because he still gets up every morning to head to work.

Somewhere along the way, Kolton discovered that he can have more fun if he learns to move around. He hasn't mastered crawling yet but he is really good at his version of the army crawl. Leave him alone, so what if he is behind when his brothers learned to do things.

Grandpa Danny and Grandma Koren came to visit just for the heck of it and we had a great time. After they arrived we were discussing some things that we could do during their trip and somehow Galveston came up and at first we kind of laughed it off because it is not as close as some people may think and because it hasn't quite finished recovering from Hurrican Ike. That second reason not to go soon became the primary reason to go. It was quite interesting to see how much work there is still left to do down there. My sisters will remember going down and going into the shops that are on stilts over the water and looking at all of the nic-nacs that people are selling. GONE!! Many of the nice homes along the beach. GONE!!

We had a lot of fun though, the kids got to play in the sand a little and pick up seashells.

Paulette was paranoid about the kids falling in the water.

From Galveston there is a ferry you can take to get over to the Bolivar Penninsula that we always enjoyed riding on as kids. Paulette had never been on one before so it was a new experience for her and the kids. She did mention though that if this were the ferry that we would have had to ride she would have stayed on dry land.

Even Kolton got to have fun at the beach.

Do you like our new boat? We found this boat in someone's front yard in the town of Crystal Beach. Something tells me this is not where it was supposed to be. For more pictures of our Galveston trip go to my mom's blog at http://klinelife.blogspot.com/2009/02/our-warm-getaway.html

Our soccer star!

He is quite the agressive fielder and a great goalie too. Today he scored a goal (sorry no video of that) and blocked two shots on goal.

As much fun as soccer is, there is no better time that the treats when it is over.

Bodie (Lesley Zentz' (Haines)) son had a birthday party at the place they keep their horses.

The boys both had fun and Kolton waited patiently for his turn on the horse, but for some reason was never allowed to ride.

Alas, we come to Valentine's Day. Our Valentine's festivities started yesterday at Dylan's school when they had their Valentine's party. As usual, the kids bring little things to pass out to the rest of the kids in the class so Paulette stayed up all night Thursday preparing the treat (a small candy and a crazy straw) for Dylan to give to his friends. Here is a picture of him with his teacher Mrs. Harl.

While Paulette was at the school she was suprised to find out that Dylan is quite the little artist. His teacher told her that the art teacher chose some sort of fan Dylan made to put in the fine arts festival. (I think he was the only one from his class) Mrs. Harl showed it to Paulette and she was very impressed. I guess we will have to post some pictures of that when it comes back from the fesitval.

We started off our Valentine's Day today bright and early with an 8:15 soccer game. That's me standing next to the goal. I don't know if I am actually supposed to do that but everyone else stood next to the goal when their child tended so; monkey see monkey do.

What Valentine's would be complete without Paulette taking pictures of us matching.

The remainder of our Valentine's has consisted of Papasito's lunch, car repairs, hair cuts and Wii. We bought the Wii Fit a couple of weeks ago and today I got "Skate It" from Paulette so we got to skate board in the house for a while and then Dylan, Hayden and I played Spiderman. Hayden just uses the "classic controller" that is not hooked up to anything and is certain that he is playing along with us.

Speaking of the Wii Fit, I think that may have been one of the highlights of my parents visit. We played several times during their visit and had fun checking our Wii Fit Age. I won't spoil it for anyone so I will let mom and dad tell you their age. I wish we had a picture of my parents doing yoga, running in place and, most of all, ski jumping. You know in the Olympics when the people go down the really steep, really long hill and then see how far they can jump? That was everyone's favorite game and you don't know what they are doing then they look pretty silly doing it. First you squat down kind of like you are visiting the porcelain palace, then you stand up really quickly, lean forward, stick your chest out and "fly" with your arms behind you.

Sorry we don't have any interesting news, like a potential volcano, but at least now you are caught up on our lives since Christmas.

THE END!