The New You

On Wednesday, Alyssa got contact lenses. This is her before heading off to school this morning, able to see without glasses on! Now you can see her beautiful face! My baby is so grown up.

The Family Dance

Every year around Valentines, Magrath Elementary School has a "Family Dance." Each grade performs a different dance while everyone watches, then they repeat all the songs and the families can try the dances along with their kids. They also sell milk and cookies after the initial run through. It was a packed house, a fire hazard, to be truthful, but a lot of fun. We took Mark because the kids in his class had practiced with him. I thought they were nice to include him like that. It did, however, make the evening a little stressful for me since Mark started getting agitated about 1/2 way through the first run through. But, with help from his iPod we made it through the whole first run through without an eruption. Then I took him home.

Mr. Metal Mouth

About a week ago, Austin got his phase 1 orthodontic appliance in, along with 4 braces. The appliance is an expander, just like his mom had when she was a kid. Everyday we turn it and it expands the roof of his mouth by 1/4 mm. In the end they want 6-7 mm of expansion. He will probably be wearing these braces and the expander until Fall. I hope you do notice, that the braces are going on teeth that are already straight. Apparently the whole exercise is to resolve a bite issue. On a side note, it may solve an even more important issue--getting a 10 year old boy to buy into dental hygiene. Since getting the braces, and in keeping with their very strict instructions, he has been brushing 4x/day for 2 minutes at a time with an electric toothbrush which they gave him, and also flossing. Maybe I'll ask if he can keep the braces on longer.....

Alyssa attains new heights

Alyssa has a science project due tomorrow. She chose to build a 3-D mountain scene, based on a 4x5 km section of Waterton Lakes National Park. She has done this pretty much to scale with 1 cm = 100 m, both on the horizontal and the vertical. The valley base is at 1300 m and the highest peaks are at 2400 m. She has put a tree line at 2000m, and the grass-rock border 200 m higher. Creeks from the mountains feed into rivers which flow east to the lake. She has scooped out basins because these are glacial mountains which are jagged because of glacial erosion. The Eastern side of the mountains which comes just before the foothills and plains is grassy because it gets less rain.

Meanwhile, Alyssa has been playing lots of basketball lately. Since we came back from Hawaii 13 days ago, she has played in 3 league games, and 2 tournaments, for a total of 9 games. Her team won both of their most recent tournaments, and have won 7 of the 9 games. Alyssa is a strong fundamental player and is really tough on defence. Her coach is really happy with her progress.

I have been impressed that despite Alyssa's busy schedule, lately, she has still been a stong positive influence in our family, is conscientious with school work, YW and other responsibilities.

Good work, Alyssa!

What we did this Christmas Holiday

If you've been to our house, you might know that Mark is in the master bedroom upstairs and Rob and I live downstairs in what was meant to be a kid bedroom with one 7' closet which with 2' of closet organizers, only had 5' of hanging room. In addition, the basement bedrooms do not have ceilings. Our bedroom is separated from our 11x13 laundry room only by the staircase which descends between the two rooms.
Before we even moved in, we had this idea, that you could create an opening between the laundry room and our bedroom, and build a walk in closet and a master bathroom and still have room for a small laundry room. But, this is a big project and we were not ready in terms of time or finances to undertake it before. So, when we moved in, we put the baseboards, etc. in the rest of the basement, but left our room without any. We also left the blue paint on the walls, even though it did not match our bedding.
Finally, just before Christmas, Rob decided to take the initiative and start this project while he had some holiday time. We decided to just do the ceiling and the closet for now, and build the bathroom later, maybe this summer. Rob started by framing the closet, and removing the old closet from our room, then opening up and framing a doorway between our room and the new closet. He then did some electrical work so that the new closet would have the proper lighting and hung drywall on the ceiling and on the walls of the closet. All of this happened right around Christmas, including Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.
Starting on the Monday after Christmas, Rob had to spend three long days at the school for their Christmas Classic Basketball Tournament. During this time, Becky applied three coats of mud, and started sanding. Later Rob did some more sanding and a few touchups, and just before our trip to Hawaii we managed to get the closet painted and one coat on the walls of our room. Since getting home, Rob put up the trim, lighting, and doors, and I have painted and caulked. Yesterday I moved our stuff in. Below you can see the finished product. Pretty awesome eh?

Some mud on the walls where the closet used to be. Opening to the under-the-stairs-area which is now connected to the laundry room.

The old closet is ripped out, now begin repairing the drywall. Note no ceiling.

This is the section in the laundry room that Rob walled off.

Our bedroom now. It is about 14 x 13' since it doesn't have the closet in it now.

The closet. Where the shelves are is under the stairs. Behind the 3 bottom shelves there is a door that opens to under the stair storage. I put all the Christmas decorations there. We have 5 shelves 41" across in that section, and 7' of hanging room, 5' of which is two level hanging. There is also a 7' shelf all along the top. Along the other wall, we will probably hang Rob's ties, maybe put a shoe rack or some hooks or something. At the end is a door into what is left of the laundry room. Picture that when we have finished the whole project, that door will lead to our bathroom which will be 5 1/2 X13'. Then we will have a 5 1/2 x7' laundry room which should work fine with the machines stacked and a counter top along the 7' wall with a space for laundry baskets below.

Hawaii, Part 2

Rob and I on the top of Diamond Head crater. It is actually the top of a volcano from which you can get a 360 degree view of Oahu and on a clear day even see the island of Maui. We are standing in front of the view of Waikiki. The tall buildings are mostly hotels, though some might be condos. The hike took about 30 min up, but was pretty steep, comparable in difficulty to hiking bear's hump, though different terrain.

Waikiki from Diamond Head.

Rob on a surf board at Waikiki beach.

Rob, surfing at Waikiki beach.

Hawaii, Part 1

This is me going to Hanauma Bay. I took my book, but didn't read there. This is the place where we went snorkelling. I really enjoyed it, and even saw a huge sea turtle. In the water behind me, you can see some places where the water is darker in color. That's where the coral is, and all around the coral there are tropical fish of every size and color.

This is the USS Arizona memorial at Pearl Harbor. When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, the Arizona took a direct hit to its munitions which caused a series of huge explosions which destroyed and sunk the ship, burning and drowning over 1,100 of its crew. The memorial is built over the Arizona which you can see just below the surface. The dead from the Arizona are still entombed in their ship. You get to the memorial by boat.

This picture was taken at the Polynesian Cultural Center. I am taking a Hula lesson. I have a washable tattoo on my ankle from one of the other activities there.

This is our group, Darryl and Alyson Christensen, Rusty and Jackie Rollingson and Rob and I. Darryl and Rusty are Rob's Vice-Principals. This is taken in front of the temple. Unfortunately, the temple is undergoing major renovations and is closed. In total it will be closed for a year and a half. I believe it reopens this summer.

We stopped for a look around at this spot. I believe it is called Turtle Bay because a mountain island out in the ocean (not the one behind us) is shaped like a turtle.