Gamecock Sports Clinic for Cub Scouts

McIver and Will went to the USC Gamecock Sports Clinic this morning for Cub Scouts who participated in the annual popcorn sale.  McIver geared up in his USC t-shirt and was ready to go.

They met in the USC Field House and started with some stretching led by a student-athlete.

According to Will, the boys rotated through several stations set up throughout the field house.  Here's McIver in the starting blocks of the track-and-field station.

There were also several women soccer players there.  Apparently, Mac had just headed the ball in this shot.

After the clinic, those who were interested were treated to a tour of Williams-Brice Stadium.  We definitely have a Gamecock on our hands!

Winter Break 2012

Winter Break started last Thursday at exactly 3:05 PM.  The children were crazy-giddy when they got in the car after school.  Yikes!  I almost pulled my hair out on the ride home.  Olivia ended up spending the night with friends on Thursday and Friday nights.  McIver had a friend spend the night on Friday night.  He was SO excited to have company and they had a ball playing inside-outside-upstairs-downstairs.

We met Olivia at her basketball game on Saturday morning.  Her team played hard, especially considering they were missing several key players, but ended up losing the game.  They had a great season and enjoyed the taste of victory a few times.

Sunday morning, we packed our bags, loaded the car and headed to pick up the Harrisons.  We headed to the Great Wolf Lodge in Charlotte.  The kids could barely contain their excitement, especially the boys who had not been before.

Getting a picture of all four children was next to impossible... McIver was already off in the wave pool before I could this shot.

No one would stay still for the second flash!

Another one ... at the bottom of the Howling Tornado.  It was hysterical ... they really just didn't even have 45 seconds to stop for me to take a picture.

Silly boys enjoying the Kid Cabin (boy cave) in our room after dinner, but before our second trip to the water park.

I did manage to get a few more pictures with my phone (not of all four of them!), but I'll have to post those later.

Mexican Night

We had a few families over for Mexican food last Saturday night.  The kids had a ball running around with the balloons Aunt Kellie and Uncle Robert gave McIver for Christmas.  And, of course, everyone loved Will's fish tacos.

Tex and his Toys

Olivia and McIver were waiting for carpool in the front room the other morning with Tex.  They came running into the kitchen and were DYING laughing and telling me to bring my camera.  Apparently, they had discovered the black hole behind the sofa where Tex's toys had gone.

5 balls, a bone and an armadillo

"Which one do I choose?  Which one do I choose?"

Monster Truck Jam

Will took McIver and his buddy to the Monster Truck Jam last Friday night.  

Two excited little boys.

Olivia and I were equally excited to stay home and watch a chick flick on our own.

Olivia's Egg Drop Vehicle

Olivia's class has been looking forward to the Egg Drop project for months now.  Each student is asked to create an "Egg Drop Vehicle" that will be dropped from the second floor of a building at school.  Of course, the goal is that the egg inside remain intact.  Olivia stewed over it and brainstormed and finally started her project.  (She knows she's better off working on these projects with her dad!)

She started with an empty container of wet wipes and put a spring in the bottom of it.  She stuffed paper towels around the spring to keep it from wiggling around the bottom of the container.

After putting the egg in the spring, she poured popcorn around the egg to absorb the force of the landing.

McIver contributed a parachute from one of his toys to the project so she attached that to a pencil at the top of the container.

Voila!

Her test run out of McIver's second floor window onto the driveway.  It worked!  The egg was still in one piece without even the slightest crack.

The Egg Drop was today at 9am.  According to Olivia on the ride home from school today, her EDV was a success!

Money Maker

McIver is desperate to earn some money.  We haven't done a very good job of paying the children for their chores around the house because most of what they do (making beds, getting homework done, setting/clearing the table after dinner, getting themselves up and dressed for school) are things that have to be done anyway and that we expect them to do.  So, when I worked in the yard the other day, I left the pile of limbs, vines, etc. in the back with the promise to McIver that he could be paid for moving it all to the front of the house.  He jumped at the chance and didn't even slow down to change out of his school clothes to do it.  It was a BIG pile and he didn't complain once or stop until it was all done.

Zesto Day

The family who owns Zesto's also goes to our school.  They hold a Heathwood Day on the first Thursday of each month.  They give a portion of the proceeds back to Heathwood for each order that mentions our school.  After bribing the boys in our carpool all week long, we were finally able to go earlier this month ... there's nothing like soft serve ice cream in a cone!

Silly boy!

Sweet girl!

Legos

Is Lego a public company?  We need to buy stock in it, that's for sure.  Our latest morning routine has been to sit in the 'lego room' while we wait for carpool in the morning.  McIver plays with the Harry Potter legos while I read the 6th Harry Potter book.  

Some friends of ours just returned from a trip to Orlando.  They went to Disney and Universal.  It made me want to start planning a trip to Harry Potter immediately!

Valentine's Day

Olivia, McIver and I stopped by for a quick Valentine's visit with Mamoo. We took her a pretty potted plant to brighten up her den. She was in good spirits and happy to have seen her niece who was in town from Florida and had stopped by for lunch.

We have never really 'done' Valentines Day, but I decided to have a special Valentine's Dinner in the dining room last night.  It was fun to shake things up from our normal routine and the children enjoyed making the night special.

Vail 2012 - Days 7 & 8

Olivia, McIver and I stopped by Wildwood to buy t-shirts and Starburst on our last day of skiing.  We discovered that popping a Starburst in the kids' mouths as they skied past us to the lift at Nastar helped push back lunch a little bit.  For the most part, they were ready to call it a day after lunch, so the longer we could wait to eat lunch, the longer we could stay on the slopes.  (Note to self:  Bring Starburst from home next year so we don't pay out the wazoo for them on the mountain!)

Another day at Nastar - I left Will and the children to ski on my own a time or three... first time for everything, I guess!  Olivia has the 'pizza' move perfected.

McIver, a hunched down, after his 50th Nastar run.

Will started shedding layers to try to beat his best time of a silver medal.

Olivia ... still rocking her mustache.

On the way home, McIver finished up his homework in the airport.

Vail 2012 - Day 6

McIver started the day off with a little homework.  Nothing like a little Geronimo Stilton adventure to get your day going!

After saying our good-byes to Nanoo and Pop who had to head back to Macon on Thursday, we headed for the bus stop.  

McIver let us all borrow his mustaches (a gift from his Christmas stocking) to wear on the slopes that day.  We were all very well-received by our fellow skiers!  The children actually rode a chair lift a few chairs ahead of us.  By the time we got to the lift, we had kind of forgotten that the mustaches were there.  The lifties saw us and immediately knew who we belonged to  and called us the 'mustache moms.'

We signed the children up for the Nastar race course.  They were each given a number and raced against the clock to beat their own best times.  Times and medals were announced at the end of each run.  Olivia managed a bronze medal.

McIver pumped his arm every.single.time he reached the last set of gates.  We finally convinced him to stay hunched over and save the fist pump until he had gone under the finish line.  

We crack ourselves up!

This cracks me up, too!  McIver won for keeping his mustache on the longest of all of us.  He was the least 'into' wearing it, but kept it on until lunch.  I almost fell out when we sat down to eat and he realized he was the only one still wearing it.  Look how serious he is!

David had to leave a few days early.  We hate that he missed the Nastar day because it really was super fun.  Only problem was that we only had 6 mustaches, so that would have put us in a bit of a bind!

Olivia saved her mustache and rocked it again at the bus stop.

Another obligatory photo opp in front of the mountain ranger.

Vail 2012 - Day 5 - More Snowmobile

Mac trying to get his snowmobile started.  That's Andrew in the background.

The Pumpellys in front of Turquoise Lake.

Olivia would love to have taken off on the snowmobile.

Will and Mac

The Merritts with Turquoise Lake in the background.

More proof of these boys being buddies!

Vail 2012 - Day 5

SNOWMOBILING DAY!!!

We piled in the rental car (all nine of us!) to head to Copper Mountain for breakfast before going to the snow mobile tour.  We had a great breakfast at Jacks - it was cafeteria-style so everyone could get whatever they wanted, and every left happy.  We stopped by the giant red chair for some quick pictures.

More pics in front of Endo's Andrenaline Cafe where we ate the last time we went snowmobiling.

David found these hilarious sunglasses in the 'extras' bin at the house.  Olivia and Andrew had a good time being silly with them.

Mac rode on the back of Will's snow mobile.

Nanoo and I rode together.  She didn't want anything to do with driving that thing.  We had a good time ... even if she tried to be a back-seat driver, I couldn't have heard her over the engine. :) 

We stopped at a giant field so people could drive on the 'track' and go a little faster.  

This was also where the children had a chance to drive mini-snowmobiles.  We were a little disappointed that their 'track' wasn't bigger but they seemed to enjoy themselves.

Will and David