Singer Sewing Machine

Sheela is borrowing Her Grandma's sewing machine to make her Halloween costume this year. I'm glad that she wants to try this for a couple of reasons...I'm not wild about the store bought costumes though they are more elaborate and cheaper than what we will probably make and Sheela wants to compete in Destination Imagination this year. DI is a team based creative problem solving competition that usually involves making costumes from scratch (along with some math, science, research and playwriting). During the actual competition the kids have to do all of the work and research. I figure this will be good costuming experience. She wants to start simple, just a black cape with a hood (she will be a witch when its all said and done) she may or may not make a gown to wear too.

We bought an actual pattern instead of freehanding something. I wanted to show her how to choose a real pattern and the how to figure out what to buy. The pattern that she choose had a couple of extra frills like a tassel hanging from the hood that she chose to omit.

With the sewing machine we started with following lines on paper: straight, curves and corners. Before moving on to small pillows. She made a very cute pillow for Sunil. Tonight we will learn how to wind the bobbin and then layout and cut the fabric. The actual assembly may have to wait until next week.

Portraits

Fall school portraits are back.

Rec-n-Roll

The 3rd-6th graders have a Saturday Night out option up at our local recreation center. They call the program Rec-n-roll. From 7-11PM on Saturday nights the facility is closed to everyone except the registered kids (and a hefty number of chaperones). Sheela went last night with a group of her friends for the first time. There is a room for dancing, a room with bounce houses, some arts and crafts stations and pizza is brought in for a small fee.

Sheela and her friends had a blast until one of the boys attempted a more adventurous maneuver in the bounce house and landed wrong. In Sheela's words "he broke his back and was petrified." He had to be strapped to a back board and taken away in an ambulance. The girls didn't see the boy get hurt nor do they know him. All of the kids got herded together to keep them out of the way while the ambulance was there and the story got passed from kid to kid. Lisa was so upset that she decided not to spend the night with us. Sheela was still shaking when I got home (about an hour after it happened)and had trouble falling asleep.

Passports - Second Attempt

I managed to get the passports on order. Now we just have to hope that they get them back to us, with the birth certificates, before we leave in November. They should make it with at least a week to spare but I get nervous. The "unexpedited" cost was $82 a piece and they are good for five years.

New Camera

I must not have mentioned it but Sid bought me a new camera for our anniversary (along with a diamond necklace). The camera is as small as the old one it fits in the front pocket of my purse but it has a much faster action and a stronger zoom. Its a Nikon Coolpix S5. Here is the first picture that we took in the hotel...

Here is a picture from last night's soccer party at the coaches' house. Chris and Stacy (the coaches) have three black labs. Two of them spent the majority of the evening playing fetch in the swimming pool for the entertainment of the kids.

I also did find the cable for my other camera, so the kids will be able to use it when we go to Mexico.

Balloon Festival Weekend

Its time again in the Metroplex for the Plano Balloon Festival. We wont make it over there tonight (dinner party for the soccer team) and we wont make it over there in the morning (8am soccer game), but tomorrow evening looks like a winner. My favorite part is the "glow" after dark anyway. The kids aren't old enough to go up in the balloons, and the bounce house/face paining/midway games section is just too pricey to be worth it for me.

Celebrity homes

Sheela's soccer team has moved their practices to a new location. There is a very famous soccer player (from the 90s) that still lives here in McKinney. He is known as Tatu. He has a series of soccer fields at his house that he rents out. He coaches for the Sting Soccer Club (SuperBlue is Sting's Academy Program). Anyhow Sheela says the fields are nice but they are nothing compared to the house. I snapped a picture of the house last night when I picked her up. Its beautiful and slightly larger than your average Texas home, but not as ape sh** as Deion Sanders' house. We drove by it a few months back (I didn't think to take a picture). It was at least twice as big as this one.

Career Day

This is Sunil's class all dressed up for career day...

Officer Sharma

Today is Kindergarten Career Day.  Sunil has been planning all week long on dressing up as a Kindergarten teacher for school, but at the last minute he decided he just had to be a policeman.  This is why advance planning is a waste of time.  So he chose to wear navy blue shirt, shorts and socks.  He wore his hiking boots (no PE class today so they're allowed).  He accessorized with a junior ranger badge and Sid's navy cover (that would be a hat to us civilians). I still can't find the cord to transfer pictures off of my camera so you'll just have to imagine the overall effect.  Mighty cute and pretty easy. 

15 Years

Happy Anniversary to Us!  We've been married 15 years today.  That's pretty good if I do say so myself.... especially as I was talking through the preliminary custody arrangements for my friend's divorce first thing this morning.  I'm ignoring their situation for the rest of the day and focusing on us.  We aren't going to do anything special tonight, but tomorrow we are going to stay at the Marriott on the rail line and take the train downtown for dinner atop Reunion Tower.  We went there for our 5th and 10th anniversaries too.  It is easy for me to picture us married for 15 years but not easy for me to picture living in Dallas long enough to celebrate in the same place so many times.  I managed to pick up the first of Sid's presents at lunch today and I'm hoping to get the second on my way home tonight.

Birthday Wishes

Yesterday was Mommy's 70th birthday.  We didn't do too much but we did hit Macaroni Grill for dinner.  It's one of her favorite places and has been for years.  We did the big celebrations in Tennessee over the Summer.

Passports - First Attempt

I will be more comfortable taking the kids out of the country if they have passports than if I take them just with their birth certificates.  So I've gotten their pictures made, I've filed out the forms and gathered up all the extras.  I left work at 2:30 in order to pick them up from school and get all the way back to the Post Office here in McKinney (where I work) to file the forms.  I've done my reading and I'm prepared.  The US government prefers that both parents be present but with a notarized letter of acknowledgment I can get around that.  I have my notarized letter from Sid and I'm ready to go.  At the last minute I swing by the house and grab my passport and Sid's just in case.  The kids and  I wait in line and got to the counter with about 10 minutes to spare.  So far so good.  Unfortunately, I only have one notarized letter from Sid with both kids names on it.  I need to have one letter to put with each application.  We are rejected. 

Bringing the IDs was a good idea though, I need to have copies of both of our ID to send along with the applications too.  They don't tell you that on the website, but the clerk explained that sometimes, but not always,  the paperwork gets rejected if its not there.  Better safe than sorry.

If that wasn't enough fun, I found out from a friend that she has tried to travel with just the passport for her daughter and they wouldn't let her on the plane.  They had to go back home and get the birth certificate too.  She was born overseas and its something of a hassle for her to get additional birth certificates if this one gets lost, that was the whole reason she got the passport in the first place.  She wants the passport to stay safely at home.  Now she travels with both.

Mad Science

Both kids enjoyed their first "Mad Science" class yesterday after school.  The program is eight weeks long and the theme is "NASA".  The classes are held in the school science lab after classes are over.  Then they just walk back to Kids Club. 

Sheela is in the "old" kids section.  They made meteors out of superballs and streamers.  They are pretty and cute and they learned a lot. Sunil is in the "young" kids section.  He built a two-foot tall rocket, with fins and detachable nose cone and a parachute.  It seems like he got the better project.

Happy Ending

I screwed up.  I reserved flights for our trip to Florida a week or so ago but I completely forgot to confirm the tickets.  I figured it out about five o'clock this morning.  It was a real struggle to book the flights the first time since our return is so close to Thanksgiving.  I was pretty well panicked this morning.  We cut short our bike ride (our first in a week) so that I could begin piecing together a new itinerary.  It worked out to be okay.  We are now flying out on Sunday morning instead of at noon and its a connecting flight instead of direct.  This is a small price to pay for sleeping last weekend when I was supposed to be taking care of details.

The A Team

This is the logo for our new Internal Auditor shirts. We now have a trained crew of 14 auditors in a copmany of 300 employees. That's a pretty good ratio. Most of the auditor will only perform 1-2 audits each year. The lead auditor will do 3-6. I've already done three and have three more to go. I'm training to be a lead auditor, so I've doubled up this year. We all wore our shirts today and got to sit for a team picture for the next company newsletter. I really like the shirts and the team.

Let the season begin

Tomorrow is opening day for youth soccer in North Texas.  Sheela leads off with an eight AM appearance in the 3rd Grade Girls Select Division.  Luckily we only have two early games scheduled this season.  The early games used to interfer with getting to sleep in, now they interfer with getting to go for our morning ride.  The weekend rides are the fun ones.  We've seen toads, frogs, armadillos, swans, vultures, great blue herons, cattle egrets and now peacocks.  Technically they were peahens flying around wild or I guess ferrel downtown Allen.  Anyhow, I'm ready for the season to start.  Sheela has only played one game since June and I've missed it.

Cell Phone Woes

For the first time in nearly two years I'm having problems with my cell phone.  It's a fairly outdated Samsung flip-phone.  Today it doesn't want to flip.  I can still open it but it feels like I'm grinding up glass in the hinge.  This is not a good thing.  I was hoping to make the phone last until April.  We've been trying to get out from under the oppressive thumb that is Verizon for a year or longer and I'm only a few months shy.  I might be able to wrest Sid's old phone away from Sunil and use it for a few months.  Part of the reason that the phone belongs to Sunil and not Sid is that it lacks the battery power to last all day without charging.  Stay tuned...

Labor Day

The Labor Day holiday was very well timed this year.  Work has been rather frustrating the last couple of weeks.  I've come to accept that I'm not going to be promoted to the departmental manager... in fact it looks like they aren't intending to allow us to have a manager at all.  We've been without a Quality Director for six months and without a President for four months.  The big decisions that we keep putting off as not ours to make are all becoming critical.  We are finally being allowed to make them, but the delays have cost us.  The layers of indecision and the apparent corporate direction shifts are just beginning to surface just as next years budget cycle has begun.  We don't know what we will be doing next year but we have to set in stone how much its going to cost us to do whatever it is that they ask us to do and of course to justify our numbers.  Our third quarter audits have gotten underway.  I ended up on four audit teams instead of one so that I will have the experience to lead all of the fourth quarter audits.  Our independent lead auditor quit, he was the one tasked with auditing the audit system, the corrective and preventive action system and the complaint files.  These three systems are all under the direct control of our other lead auditors.  They are not allowed to audit themselves.  As an added bonus our most problematic product line of the year had another major incident.  We've been very lucky in that these issues have all been brought to light prior to patient involvement... which means that no ones been hurt.  But every issue makes us dislike working with this supplier just a little bit more.  We did not get to choose the supplier, he was part of the package deal when we bought the product line and it has been the biggest draw back.  We also had another labeling issue (internal only but that's about five too many this year).  I want to fall back and revamp the whole system but I am much too close to it to see it clearly.

The three day weekend was a glorious time of doing NOTHING.  I think I read three books this weekend, all of them so low on the intellectual scale that I may actually be dumber now than I was before.  Escapism is for lowering your stress level and it seems to have worked well.  I'm back at work today with a new and improved attitude.  I took all of the papers off of my desk pushed them in to an empty carboard box and I'm taking them out to the parking lot to use as a small fire for roasting marshmellows. 

Its still raining too much to start a fire so I guess I'll just organize the pile by priority and get back to work.  I'll go buy a s'more flavored candy bar out of the vending machine to keep me company.

Rainy days are here again

Last weekend we had a few hours of drizzle, it didn't do much for the lawns but it definitely cooled things off. Most of the week was dry again but in the low 90s. Its raining again this weekend, but longer and harder. Today its only in the low 70s. I love it! Of course Sheela was planning on spending the day swimming with Aneleise so she's not quite as happy about it as I am.

Sunil earned his bell

A few weeks ago we bought hand bells for the kids' bikes. Sheela earned hers for some rather dramatic room cleaning that was long over due but Sunil had to learn to ride his bike to earn his. Technically, he starts, rides and stops without assistance. In reality the stops are controlled falls but I think that the control is important. He is also better suited to riding in large open parking lots rather than to narrow trails. But he made great progress this week and we put the bell on yesterday.

I have some half decent pictures of both Sunil riding and of Sheela riding her new bike. However they are trapped on my camera. I can't find the cable to transfer the pictures. I've apparently either worn out or damaged the chip I usually use, so I switched back to using the camera's internal memory.

Picture Day

The kids are having pictures taken at school today. I learned a valuable lesson last year about putting too much effort in to picture day. This year I didn't try to influence the backgrounds choosen or the clothing worn. I just let 'em go. Sheela chose her favorite white blouse, a gray background and to leave her hair down. Sunil chose a green background, his new red t-shirt and I think his hair was down. It has recently been cut and so we've been spiking it for him.

If I get off work early enough (think three o'clock..... think three o'clock) then I'll take the kids to Wal-mart to have passport photos taken today too.

I just got back from Wal-mart where I picked up the portraits that we had taken a few weeks back. There are seven poses. I've selected my favorite seven to share.

Dress shirt, shoe box and paper bag....

What do these three items have in common?  These are the requests from school this week for Sheela to bring in.  The man's old white dress shirt is supposed to serve as a lab coat for the science lab.  The child's size shoe box is to become a diarama of ancient Greece.  The paper grocery bag's function is still a mystery.

 

Sunil surprisingly went a whole week without needing to scrounge up anything.  I'm sure he's teacher will get back in the swing of things next week.

3rd Grade Curriculum Night

I got the low down on the educational plan for Sheela and her cohorts tonight. It sounds like a fun program. They put their primary focus on critical thinking and reading skills and are working on algebra without telling them. I'm pleased with all of this.

They've started a school-wide bully-free school policy that I whole heartily endorse. They test drove it last semester with the 3rd grade class and have now rolled it out K-6th. They actually spend time with each child teaching them how to recognize the three types of bullies: physical, emotional and social and how not to give them power. This is also a love and logic concept and its impact is huge.

Sheela hasn't said much about her teacher this year. I like her but she isn't nearly as powerful a presence as Ms. DeWaters. Sheela still goes to Mrs DW's room every day after school to help her out.

How could I not be proud? (or not)

Sunil's teacher had to write to me today. Sunil attempted to smuggle a toy car out of her class room for his personal collection. One of his classmates turned him in.

He's pretty tired of talking about it by now. I had a go with him and then Sid got to do it again when he came home. Of course Ms. Barr got to go through him with it first.

Sunil made a card for Ms. Barr that says "I'm sorry" he decorated it with a shark.

I seem to recall stealing a rag rug when I was five years old. I just knew that it would look great in my room in Oklahoma on top of my little red bedside chest. I can't remember which of Mom's relatives I took it from.... I think it was cousin George Phares from Oklahoma City. I didn't do it again.

Jr Sprint

The Plano Pacer's race club holds monthly races at a nearby park. After the main race they hold a 1K sprint for the kids 12 and under. Since the fall soccer games haven't started yet Sheela's soccer team planned to go. However the Allen Eagle's Warm-up Soccer Tournament was also scheduled for this weekend. SuperBlue didn't do the tournament because our coach was out of town. But most of Sheela's teammates play on two teams and they ended up being double booked. Sheela was the only one that showed up to run. To see how she did you'll have to go see her blog. If you don't have the link drop me an email.

The nieces....

Seema and Sunita both came to town to compete in the Texas Tornado Tae Kwon Do tournament. It was held over at Southfork Ranch. I didn't get to go but I'm hoping that Sushama took some pictures that she will share when she gets a chance. Both girls placed first in their respective age categories and won medals. I'm pretty proud of them both! Sunil got to go and watch but it wasn't enough to rev him up on the tae kwon do thing. He's finished his three-week introductory special and we are going to let it drop for now. Its too late to get in to either soccer or football for the fall season. I'm hoping I can fill in with some more swim classes, but if not we'll just get to spend some time working on bike riding.

Another handy weekend

Farhana's AC condensate line backed up and did some damage to her kitchen ceiling. She caught it before it got to be too bad but it left an unsightly stain. Saturday afternoon we scraped, textured, sealed and repainted her ceiling. Here Sid is appraising the damage.
Here Sid is showing off our clean repair. We did tear up the edges of her wallpaper pulling down the painter's tape. She insists that its okay because her next project is to pull it all down and paint the kitchen instead. That's a good news-bad news sort of thing. The paper that we pulled down came down because its a nice stripable paper that will be easy to remove. The bad news is that it was put up over a more tightly adhered paper. I suspect that layer went up on the un-primed drywall. That will be at least a weekend project for us at a future date.

After we got back home we had to change out the guts in the downstairs toilet, pull down the lower two laundry room shelves, put up a low clothing rod (in place of the shelves) and replace the shower wand in the kid's bathroom. I managed to respackle but I still have to paint behind where the shelves were and I want Sid to put the shelves back up .... above the ones that are left. I can't reach that high even on the folding ladder and I'm two lazy to pull the big ladder out of the shed.

I love this place

This is the sign for the Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children. They do some phenomenal work here and I'm thrilled to have such wonderful access to their orthopedic department. I spent two days here this week preparing our new product line for shipment to our dock. In the first three hours that I was there they described two modifications that they have been waiting to make (as part of a joint design effort we hope to start this Fall) and thought of a third. I love creative people (it fascinates my overly analytical, engineering side).

One of the unique things about this hospital is that it doesn't smell like a hospital. They pop popcorn in the lobby to make it smell like a movie theater or a carnival.

Start the presses

The 2007 World Book Encyclopedia can now go to press.  The solar system has officially been redefined to include only eight planets.  Pluto is now a dwarf-planet.  I'm surprised to find that I do care.  I was always bugged by the discussions back and forth whether we had nine planets or ten, then Pluto and Neptune switched places and that made even less sense to me.  I may even sleep better tonight... well, that may be stretching it but I am happy with the new definitions.  I will leave Pluto on Sheela's mobile though, for old times sake.

Children's choices

One of the basic tenets of Love and Logic parenting is that you let your kids make their own mistakes so that they can learn from them. But when the temperature reaches 106 and Sunil comes downstairs dressed like this all I can see is CPS driving Sunil away in the back of a station wagon because we are so obviously negligent.

Lake Lavon

Lake Lavon is the source of all of the treated water in the North Texas Municipal Water District. As water reduction efforts across the district aren't showing the conservation that we are looking for we may have to go to more severe restrictions.

In the meantime we took a drive out to Princeton yesterday to look at some land that is for sale. Princeton is on a peninsula that sticks down in to Lake Lavon. I took this picture of the lake as we drove across the bridge. There is still water in the lake, but Princeton is no longer on a peninsula its just plain North of the lake.

Again

Its been another hard week at work. Judy's husband passed away Tuesday morning. He was in his 50's but he'd heart trouble for some time. Judy, and her husband's sister, Linda, both work on our manufacturing line. They've been here ten years or more. Yesterday we shutdown manufacturing allow everyone to attend the funeral. Last night Theo's husband passed away. He was in his early 30's. He was watching his oldest son practice football in the 106 degree heat when he started to feel ill. He went to a friend's houe and they called paramedics. They rehydrated him and said he was fine. He went home and was ill again before he got there. His wife took him to the ER where he died. The oldest son is two years younger than Sheela. Deanna's brother passed away yesterday too. We don't know anything about that situation. This has been a rough year for the Orthofix extended family.

Competition

The point of playing a competitive sport as a child is to be to learn a number of important life lessons. Some times you win. Sometimes you lose. Either way you should do it with grace. Either way the world continues to spin. You get better if you practice. You get even better if you practice a lot. You are expected to do your best no matter how good you are... or aren't. You always treat others with respect. If you are not following the rules you aren't really playing the game. I could go on and on. The gist of it is that I'm really glad that Sheela is playing Academy ball... but I'm feeling really petty for being so proud that Sheela made the team when most of her friend's got cut. I was thrilled to find that their were so many girls from her school on the team, but we ended up three players short of being able to field two teams so they had to cut ten girls from the team including ALL of the other girls from her school.

Reunion Pics

Here Sunil and Samantha spend some time together.

Sid and the kids after cooling each other off on the bumper boats.
Our whole River Rat crew after our first float down the river.


Sheela, Seema, Katie, Grandpa and Samantha are across the back. Sam, Grandma, Sunil and Sunitha are in front. Rachel was at home testing for her black belt in tae kwon do.
Renee, me, Daddy, Shashi, Ravi and Brian are in the back. Sudhir, Mommy, Sushama are in the front and Lee was at home taking care of her father (who came through his surgery easily).

A rainy day....

Saturday we enjoyed a wonderful, gray, overcast day with actual drizzle. We delayed our morning ride by two hours but the drizzle didn't let up so we went anyway. As it was a weekend we didn't have to stick to our normal path around the park. We ventured out to Northeast Allen to see what we could find. Mostly new construction for half-million dollar homes, but mixed in with the lot was an exotic bird breeder: White swans, Black swans, dozens of exotic ducks and at least one annoying rooster. The rooster reminded me of our house in Winston-Salem. We left the sidewalks for just a few feet but got nice and muddy in the process. As long as we were muddy anyway we walked up close to the enclosures. The swans were beautiful but they smelled suspiciously like the elephant cage at the zoo. There was also a flock of small white birds. I initially thought that they were white egret chicks, but by the time we found chick number six, I figured I was wrong. There could have been 200 of them all told. I forgot to look them up when I got home. They had long slender necks and long legs but weren't really very tall. The were in fields but looked like they should have been wading in shallow water.

There were actual storms up at the airport with rain delays and everything but the rain never really came down in Allen. Under the trees and bushed never got wet. It stayed damp out all day and at 90 degrees it actually felt cool for a change that should count for something.

Istanbul

Dad and Eileen should be enjoying themselves in Istanbul, Turkey today. They have two more days before they begin the trip back to Florida. I can't wait for the pictures!

Black Forest Cafe

We went to dinner last night with Sid's boss, Hudson and Hudson's girlfriend, Kim. They took us to a really nice German restaurant in Dallas. Their aren't too many German places around here. In addition to the good food and the accordian player we were entertained by a Bavarian Culture/Dance group celebrating a three year-old's birthday. The men in the group (and three year-old Ethan) were all wearing leiderhosen, most of the women were wearing Bavarian dresses. It was a very good time.

Nearly Complete

The upstairs renovation is nearly done. We are putting a stackable washer and dryer in the master bathroom (in the shower enclosure). So we put a shower in over the garden tub and enclosed it with glass blocks. Here are a couple of pictures.... The glass wall is my favorite part. The only major change left to be made is to replace the scuzzy-old window with glass blocks. The tile is a good match to what we already have on the floor. The other thing left to be done is to hide the new tile behind a glass door... and of course take delivery of the washer/dryer combo.

Puzzlehand

I made a puzzle just for you
At school on my very first day
It's made with love and my handprint
In a very special way.

Now you can sit down on the floor
With your favorite Kindergarten kid
We'll put it together while I tell you about
All the fun things we did!

Anderson Elementary School
August 7, 2006

Tae-kwon-do

Sunil's tae-kwon-do class started tonight. He's still in the three-week-cheapie-low-introduction-fee stage. After that it gets down right pricey. But I like the program and he seems to like it too. So we'll see how it goes.

M-I-L Update

I pleased to be able to tell that Sid's Mom's recovery is cranking on along.  She can stand up for a few minutes at a time (without holding on).  This allowed her to make pancakes for us (her pancakes are really good!)  She'a also been walking around outside and in the house (with her walker) --  this is more liberating than the wheelchair.  She has started to practice low steps.  Her goal is to be able to get around easily before she leaves for India in November.

A big day at the office

Orthofix Buys Blackstone Medical

This will put our annual revenue between $520 and $600 million a year. Our Spine business is expected to post revenues of $260 million, which would make us the sixth largest spine company in the world. We still aren't in the top 10 Orthopedic Companies, but we are working on it.

Now is they could just tell us who they've choosen to be our new president....

Kindergarten - Day 1

Here Sunil and Sahil are waiting in the cafetorium for their first day of school. You can tell that they are in the same class by the color of their spirit-wear. They made rather a point of not talking to each other during the 20 minuets that they sat side-by-side. The Kindergarteners, as a group, were noticably more subdued than the older kids. The chaos was made worse by us over-emotional parents. Not only do we all feel compelled to take those all important first day pictures but the set up a whole "cry breakfast" in the multipurpose room. The multipurpose room is the room where the kindergarteners are supposed to gather before the classroom doors are opened in the morning. This morning they all had to get redirected so that they wouldn't mess up the tableclothes and flower arrangements.

Mini-pies

Sheela and Lisa decided to make us a special treat for dessert tonight. They made us each a mini chocolate pie. They cut out circles of crust for each of the ramikins. After they cooked and cooled they poured chocolate pudding on top. Then we added whipped cream and orange sprinkles. Yummy!

Bike Riding - Lesson One

Sunil's training wheels have finally come off of his bike. He's only about halfway on board with learning to ride (and that half is because Travis just learned to ride without his). We've resorted to the age old tactic of bribery. When he learns to ride alone he gets a new shiny bell to attach to the handlebars. It would help if it weren't already 90 degrees when we wake up in the morning. Sid is trying to run along side him and they are both sweating into puddles.

Meet the Teacher Night 2006

Tonight's the night. Sheela, Lisa and Anelise have Ms. Morton (soon to be Mrs. Ponce) for their third grade teacher. Sunil begins with Mrs. Barr. Both are rumored to be the nicest teacher in their respective grades. I'm hoping Sunil will know at least one person in his class already, but his circle isn't too large yet. We get to go to meet the teachers (and read the names on the class lists) tonight before zipping Sheela back off to another soccer practice.

Town and Country

Roughly halfway through our 1800 mile roadtrip the new van gave out. We had to jump start the van to get out of Mom's driveway. Sure we could have left something turned on for the two days we left it in their garage or maybe Mom just tampered with it to keep us from taking the kids back away.... hmmmm. In either case, the van, once running, didn't give us anymore trouble at least not that day. Two days later we got to jump it again. We also got to jump it at a gas station in Arkansas, and thought we'd have to a few other times when the battery was weak but it pulled through at the last minute.

We stopped at Auto Zone on the way home for a free diagnostic check. According to their certified technician the battery, the alternator and the starter are fine. Monday morning the van starts up with no problem and I take it to the dealer. They called later to tell me that a wire was loose but its all fixed up now.

Tuesday night the car doesn't start again. Wednesday morning was another close call, but I did get it going and get it over to the dealer (again). It doesn't start when they try it (at least now they believe me) and they've decided that it's the battery. The car has 35,909 miles on it. The battery has a three year or 36,000 mile warranty on it. I don't actually think the problem is the battery, but I'll take the new battery anyway. I'm sure I'll be up there again in a few days. Luckily its walking distance from my office. I say luckily because there was a 45 minute wait for the courtesy shuttle today. I was at my desk in less than 10 minutes.

The Aquarium and our Junior Rangers

On our final day we went to Gatlinburg to visit the Aquarium. It was a very rainy Saturday and the place was packed. It was as good as I remember. We even went through the shark tunnel twice. Then we all went our separate ways. Sushama and Brian (Seema and Nitha) left for home. Shashi and Sam went back to the lodge with Grandma and Grandpa. Ravi, Renee, Katie and Samantha stayed another night too. We headed into the Great Smokey Mountain National Park to get the kids their Junior Ranger badges.
They now have earned them from three National Parks: The Great Smoky Mountains, Hot Springs and Big Bend.

River Rat - Year Two

We took the cousins to do some tubing with the River Rats again. The ambient temperature wasn't as stiffling this year and the water was almost cold. But the river was flowing well and the kids had a great time. I did not take my camera to the river but Ravi may send me his picture of us all after the first run down the river. I'll post it when I can.

The Track

We actually spent two afternoons at a place in Pigeon Forge called the Track. The first day we were there with cousin David et al. They are "regulars" there. Not really, but they do own a discount pass that let's them buy ride tickets for half price. The second day we went with all of the Sharma/Brimmer cousins. We drove the go-karts on a couple of different tracks (with kids along for the ride), played putt-putt golf drove the bumper boats and the bumper cars. Sunil was big enough to drive the kiddie go-karts (5 mph max speed). The first time he was the only child on the track (probably a good way to learn). But by the time we left he had the opportunity to drive against a couple of other boys and passed them all up in a cloud of slow moving dust.

Sheela, Seema and Nitha were all big enough to drive the rookie go-karts (10 mph max speed). All around a big hit with the drivers. In this shot Seema is preventing Nitha from passing her and receiving an illegal bump in return.
Here Sheela is attempting to sneak past Nitha. She didn't make it on this corner but managed before the end of the lap to get on by.

Charrit Creek Lodge Trip

While in Tennessee to retrieve our oldest kidling, we managed to make an overnight hike down to the Cherrit Creek lodge. The lodge is in the Obed River area on the TN/KT border. The hike down was less than 2 miles over what the map describes as Steep Stairs. Sunil was a little bit tentative at the first staircase but loosened up considerably by the end. We went down the Twin Arches trail across two limestone arches that are nearly 100 feet high. From underneath they were very impressive, from the top you can't tell that they are arches, they just seem like a narrow ridge. The view was well worth the effort.

Here Sid and Sheela are enjoying the view from the top of the South arch.
As was the opportunity to wade in the river at the end of our flatlander efforts.
In honor of Tracey's Year of the Snake.....If you look closely you can see the head of the watersnake coming out from under the rock in the river. He was in with us while we were wading but we didn't find him until we were getting out.
There were two cabins and a main lodge house in the valley. This was our cabin. It had bunk beds for 12, but we were the only guests in the valley that night. We had a camp fire, watched the stars, caught fireflies and just enjoyed being out of the city.

This is my little hiking buddy all set for the climb back out. He was an excellent sport about the whole trip and carried his own pack, water and food with minimal complaint. He even shared his hiking stick with me.

Vacation Countdown....

10 - Arrange for home renovations in our absence- Check
9 - Pack the obvious stuff -Check
8 - Pay all bills - Check
7 - take the cat to the vet - Check
6 - Buy car snacks (or not) -
5 - Tour Amy's Million Dollar Homes - not part of my normal vacation routine but this is the only day I can get down to Dallas

4 - Get directions (or not) - it's not like we haven't been there before
3 - Pack last minute stuff (from the list we've been making all day) - also known as fill up all remaining space in the car with anything that is not nailed down

2 - Load it in to the car (don't forget Sunil) - the real key to a good trip
1 - In the words of Bart Simpson, "So long, Stinktown!"

Hawaiian Falls

Sunil and I took a day to play yesterday and it was nearly perfect.  We went to a local waterpark called Hawaiian Falls.  Sunil is just over 40" tall and he would have needed an extra 1-2" to be able to ride the moderately thrilling rides, but he wasn't really interested in those anyway.  He was a little concerned that I might make him ride on the Hawaiian Half-pipe (a shear drop on an inner tube that eventually shoots you back up the other side of the canyon) -- no thanks.  We spent our gorgeous 105 degree day speed walking between Keiki Kove (the kids area), Splashwater Harbor (a swimming pool with waterfalls) and the Kona Kooler (a lazy river with inner tubes).  It was wonderful and we both came home in desperate need of naps (which we actually got).

I aquired a minor suburn on the backs of both of my arms and one bonus streak down the front of my left arm..... apparently, I didn't do a very good job applying the spray sun screen. At least Sunil didn't burn.

Handy people to know....

that's us. On Saturday Sid, Sunil and I went to Farhana's house to paint Jazmine's bedroom. The wallpaper had already been stripped but the walls needed some repair. That took Sid (and Robert) most of the morning. Then they put up a coat of bright blue primer. In the afternoon Jaz, Sunil and I put up the bright green primer (on the lower third of the walls) while Farhana painted the chair rails battleship grey. They were supposed to be silver but it didn't come out quite right. Sid has suggested that they use polyurethane and silver glitter to spruce them up. On Sunday Jaz and Farhana finished up with bright blue paint and bright green paint. I can't wait to see it all done. They've been in the house almost six years and this is the first decorating chore that they've tackled. I expect that all of the other cabbage rose wallpaper will disappear in relatively short order.

Sunday Sid and Sunil went to the zoo, but at 105 degrees they didn't stay as long as usual. When they got back Sid and I went to Alma's house to help them put up their built-in microwave. Its been sitting on their counter top since February. They mis-read something in the instructions about the mounting bracket and their attempts at installation didn't work out to well. I'm sure that was completely unrelated to using whipped cream to mark the screw holes. While Mark and Sid tackled that, Alma and I changed out the bathroom light switch. The one that we installed has turns on with a motion sensor and then turns off automatically. Their girls are apparently notorious for leaving the bathroom light on all night.

Sid also got another handrail up in his folks shower. Now his mom can get herself in and out of the shower without assistance. I know that she feels much better about not being so dependent.

Oohnorak...a Bionicle

When Sunil traded in his scooter for his new skates he also picked up a lego set to build the Bionicle Oohnorak. We haven't read any of the Bionicle stories yet, but Oohnorak appears to be a mechanical "bug" with (only four) articulating legs, a pair of pincers and the ability to launch flying disks off of his back. This is the second set that Sunil has, but select pieces of the first one disappeared before we managed to get it built. This one did pretty well but the set was missing one of his "thighs". Sunil managed to find the appropriate replacement piece from the old set.