Video Dump (and a spring show too)

I see lots of blogs doing photo dumps from time to time.  This is similar – but it’s more of a video dump. 

I logged into my YouTube account to upload videos from Miles’ Spring show last night and noticed that I had others to publish online.  Oops! I’ll spare you 10’s of minutes and only show you my favorite video from the archive.

So…. let’s go back to March.

Warning – this video contains SNOW!  After this winter, I know that’s a swear word.  Sorry! Consider yourself warned.

Miles, Nate, Caleb and Laura found a rare sledding hill in Chicago so that Miles could give snowboarding a shot.  Impressive!  Now we need to find a real hill! That’ll have to wait for another winter.

Now, here’s the event that inspired this post… 

Yesterday was not only Miles’ half birthday, but it was also his LAST spring show at daycare. He loves these things. See 2013’s Sound of Music themed show here.

You heard me right!  Miles is a 5.5 years old AND a singing fool. Enjoy!

This next song goes out to:

• all of Miles’ Aunts and Grandmas who are young at heart
• all of Miles’ girly little cousins
• all of the pretty ladies in Miles’ life who are princesses at heart

You know who you are!

The cold never bothered us anyway!

Happy Spring!

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Posted in: birthday,Chicago,Miles,Video

Chef Miles

For Christmas, Miles got a seriously cool cookbook written specifically for kids.  (Thanks, Grandma)

He browses the recipes from time to time. Most recently, he’s been asking to make an Apple Tower!
Today, we made his request a reality!

First, we assembled the ingredients and necessary tools, including the kid-safe knife.

Then, Miles cut,”frosted” and assembled his snack. In Miles’ words, the peanut butter is the mortar that holds the bricks of his tower together.

We had fun working together on an easy, edible project today.   It was tasty too!

The apple tower was a great reward after such a busy day.
Miles played basketball in the morning (sorry, no new videos to share this week) followed by our eye appointments.  Miles barely failed his eye exam at the pediatrician's office in October. He was required to have a follow-up with an eye doctor before kindergarten.
So now it’s real – Miles does need glasses, but like his mom, only for reading. I really liked the green glasses. I think I would have pushed harder to get my way if he was going to wear these glasses everyday.

Miles really wanted his new glasses to match is dad’s glasses (of course!).  We settled on the black pair below.

To our surprise and delight, the glasses Miles wanted were 1/3 the cost of the pair I preferred.  I’m so glad I didn’t employ my remarkable power of persuasion.
Well, this fun and busy day is just about over. Tomorrow is another day – Super Bowl Sunday, to be exact!
Go Broncos!

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Posted in: Miles,recipe

100th day

Wednesday was the 100th day of school!

As we learned last year, this is not something the Pre-K class takes lightly. There are snacks, activities, and presentations from each of the kids.  The entire class was tasked with creating a project that has one-hundred of something. All of the other classrooms toured the 100-Day-Museum created by the pre-K class. And just like last year - Miles dressed up. He loves finding reasons to wear fancy pants and ties to school. If you look good, you feel good, right?!  Such a doll!

Last year, Nate lead the creative process by thinking up the "flip book."  I took rapid photos of Miles dancing in front of a white door. We printed the pics out and Nate bound them together. It was kind of like a movie, but in book form. Miles numbered the back side of each photo from 1 to 100. He loved it. His class loved it!

This year, Nate passed the project off to me.  I'm not nearly as creative and l had a lot to live up to.  The bar was set so high. I decided to go a little more academic.  I asked Miles to make up a story. We limited it to exactly 100 words.  I transcribed the words onto several pages of cardstock and passed them off to Miles for full color illustrations. He's not only an author, but an illustrator as well!

Here he is, posing right by his book - Super Secret Hero!

At one point during the day, Miles was given 100 cups to play with. Guess what the son of an architect decided to build - all by himself?  Miles named it after his favorite skyscraper, the Hancock Tower. He asked his teachers to leave the tower up all day. He really wanted to show us his creation.  I'm not going to lie - I was (and still am) impressed!

Such a proud mom moment.  

BUT, boy am I tired after all of that creativity.  Definitely not my thing.  

I saw this coffee mug on my instagram feed today and fell in love.

Is the completion of this project gift worthy?

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Posted in: Instagram,Miles,School Stuff

Legoland Discovery Center

We had a stellar weekend!

Friday night – we had a low-key night in, eating pizza and watching Angels in the Outfield.  Miles LOVES sports movies from the 90’s. Thanks, Netflix! We may have to buy it.  SpaceJam, Rookie of the Year, Mighty Ducks 1, and the Sandlot have been watched way too many times for my liking.

Saturday – the big basketball day (details here). We also met up with newest Chicago Klinge’s, Aunt Laura and Uncle Caleb, for a nice dinner and NFL playoff games. Unfortunately, the Bears were not playing, so we actually spent lots of time playing UNO, Guess Who, and Tic Tac Toe instead.

Sunday – Miles took his Kindergarten exam right away in the morning.  He took the classical and gifted exams. We’ll know how he did sometime in March, I think.  Afterwards, we went to church, ate lunch at home, and then drove out to Schaumberg for a fun day at Legoland Chicago! We had been wanting to check it out for quite some time when Nate was offered a few free tickets at work.  How could we pass it up?!?

We were greeted with open arms….

The Lego model of some of Chicago’s greatest buildings was really cool!  The lights even cycled to give you views during the day and at night!

Who wouldn’t want to pose by these characters?!

We went on a brief factory tour that explained how legos are made. Miles was fascinated!

We saw a couple 15 minute 4D movies too.  When the lego man’s fire hose appeared to spray us, we were actually lightly sprayed with water!!  When the helicopter flew over our head, the breeze in the room messed up my hair.  It was a wild experience.  Nate and I giggled as Miles kept grabbing the air, trying to touch the animations popping off the screen.

Next, we stopped at the stations used to build your own race car. Surprisingly, we spent a lot of time here. We couldn’t find wheels in any of the buckets, but the boys still had fun.  A couple cars were built and then launched down the ramps, just to crumble when they hit the net. As we were leaving the area, we noticed that there were plenty of wheels for purchase.  Parent fail!

We made time to test out both rides.

The first one was a car on a rail that carried us through a course to shoot targets and bad guys with laser guns. I had the most points – woo hoo! They took our picture, but I’m too cheap to buy it. Excuse the watermark. Ha!

The second ride went in way too many circles. I just watched, but Nate said that it was actually pretty fun! The seats when around like a carousel, but the faster you peddled, the higher you flew.

 

We were only there for 3 hours, but I was exhausted!  You knew they’d strategically force you to exit through the gift shop, right?  An yes, Miles melted his dad’s heart enough to take home a souvenir. It’s a 195 piece kit featuring a speed boat, IronMan and some ‘bad guys’. He’s been working hard to put it together all by himself. He’s getting so good at following the directions.

On the way out, I had to stop by my favorite Lego creation – AL!

We had a blast from start to finish! What a weekend!

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Posted in: Chicago,Kelly,Miles,Nathan

Bitty Basketball Begins

First of all – let me apologize for my absence.  There is really no excuse for my behavior!

I missed so many important life events in the past 6 months.  Maybe I can do some sort of camera dump and quick recap.  Though, I am not making any promises….

I’m here for 2 very special reasons:

1. I finally have a new-to-me, perfectly functioning computer that allows me to capture our goings-on again
2. Miles started basketball today! You had to know I was going to share this experience with a little digital eye candy.

It’s no secret that Miles LOVES sports. He’s willing to try just about anything. 

Yes, he’s only 5 - but he’s already logged many hours preparing for today’s debut; studying highlights of Michael Jordan’s career via YouTube and the cinematographic masterpiece, SpaceJam! He loves watching the Chicago Bulls on TV and LIVE at the United Center, as well as ‘bamming’ on his Dad in our living room with the Nerf hoop hanging from the front door or the little Fisher Price hoop propped on a chair.

(The Fisher Price hoop was a gift for his first birthday. It’s been well loved!)

This morning, Miles started his first season in a 4-6 year old Bitty Basketball league at a nearby gym.  He was excited to lace up his new basketball shoes and show his peers that practice has already made perfect!

Nate and I were surprised at how well Miles actually played today!

They started out with some stretching, running, and fundamentals/drills.

Dribbling with the non-dominant hand, defensive shuffling, bounce passing, and layups were the skills of the day. Lots more practice is needed by all!

Of course, the best part of the morning was the scrimmage play at the end.  They played 6 on 6 – kids wearing blue vs. kids not wearing blue. Please enjoy the video below!

Isn’t he scrappy?!?! This is going to be a really fun season :)

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Posted in: Basketball,Miles,Video