Adam's Thanksgiving Feast

Adam's class took part in the annual Kindergarten Thanksgiving Feast. The kids made an Indian headdress, a macaroni necklace, and painted Indian designs on a tshirt. Adam brought 6 bags of popcorn that Helen pre-popped the night before. Helen asked if I thought it would be ok to send the popcorn in a Victoria's Secret bag and I said, "That's fine with me - that's probably where his teacher's shop for their underwear anyway."

The pictures above are from when Adam got off the bus and his macaroni necklace broke. Derek tried to console him, but it was going to take some time for Adam to recover.

Xmas Crafts

Helen bought some little Christmas crafts for the boys. They love those kind of things.

Leaf Party

Derek and Adam had fun raking leaves into a big pile to play with. They've made forts, buried each other, and jumped into them from the tire swing, their bikes, and their scooters.

School Art

Every year the school does a fundraiser where the kids do some artwork and then the parents can buy the artwork on magnets, coffee cups, etc. These pictures are this year's artwork. Derek's looks nice. Adam's looks a little scary.

Birthday Pictures

Derek and Adam decorate the cake

Blowing out the candles

Talking with Adam about his attitude

The Police

On the night after we saw "The Blue Man Group", my friend, Jeff, invited me to see "The Police" at Philips Arena. We had some time before the concert and walked around Centennial Park near the Aquarium and The World of Coke. The park was all decked out for Christmas and there were lots of people out walking. The area felt very vibrant. We have not been down there in a long time, but now that I've seen how nice it is we'll definitely have to take the kids down there. After some sightseeing we went to Ruth's Chris for dinner. We had to wait a while since we didn't have reservations and there was not a lot of turnover at the bar as people were engrossed in the football games.

Jeff and I went to the same high school and were roommates as freshman at Georgia Tech when The Police came to Atlanta. Jeff went to the show then, but for some reason I didn't. He said that he remembered it being a great show and really wanted to see this concert.

I like The Police and have a few of their dvd's, but I wasn't sure they would be that great in concert. I don't want to see a band just play their songs just like they're done on the album. I want to see them break it down and jam. There's nothing in my Police music that made me think that they would "jam", but...I was very pleasantly surprised. The amount of sound created by the 3 musicians was incredible and they did plenty of "jamming". There were a number of blended songs where they went right from one song into another and there were a number of their hits like, "Don't Stand So Close To Me" and "Message In a Bottle", that they re-arranged very nicely for the show.

I liked "Synchronicity", but my favorite Police dvd is "Outlandous D'Amour", which has a very raw minimally produced sound. I thought the band did a great job playing their raw heavy hitting stuff as well as their pop hits. We knew the concert was over as soon as they played "Every Breath You Take".

It was definitely a "world class" show and I really enjoyed it. The band seemed to be into it, rather than just going through the motions. Sting tried and he almost got the audience into that magical "transcendent" state, but it didn't quite make it. I think maybe there were just too many people there because the concert was an event, not quite as bad as the crowd at Chastain, but not truly into it. In fact, I've never seen so many people walking up and down the aisles in the middle of a show. They didn't even have the courtesy to wait for a break between songs. If my knees weren't so stiff and I didn't need to stand up to stretch them, I would have refused to let people pass on my aisle while a song was playing.

Blue Man Group

For my birthday, on Saturday the 17th, I took the family to see the Blue Man Group at the Gwinnett Arena. We had seen a PBS special on their tour and really enjoyed it, so I thought the show would be a great family birthday present.

We knew Derek would get himself too worked up, so we didn't tell him about it for a while. But we decided to let him know a few days before the event to let the anticipation build.

We met my cousin Tom and his son for breakfast in the morning. They were in from Arkansas to do some sightseeing and take in the Falcon-Buccaneer game on Sunday. Tom is a big Buc fan and our Falcons did not disappoint.

I had tennis and the boys had basketball in the morning, but were able to get naps in the afternoon. For dinner, our favorite mexican restaurant was too crowded and we were a little pushed for time anyway, so we settled for a pre-show meal at Wendy's - always a kid pleaser.

The crowd was diverse. There were lots of kids with their families. The opening act was Mike Relm, a mix-master extraordinaire who did lots of cool\funny visual and sound mixes. The Blue Man Group came on afterwards and didn't disappoint. The show is basically about the Blue Man Group ordering a "How to be a Rock Star" kit from an infomercial. The kit includes a dvd that the group plays on the big screens for the audience to see. The dvd shows shows numbered rock concert moves:

"Rock concert movement #1: the basic head-bob, rock concert movement #2: the one armed fist pump. In a moment it will be time to execute rock concert movement #3: the up and down jumping motion: Here are your instructions: step 1: bend your knees step and then jump into the air, step 2: let gravity bring you down and upon landing rock your head forward, step 3: repeat. Ready go..."

The whole encore thing has always been a uncomfortable for me. We all know the band is coming back out, but how long do we stand here and cheer? With the Blue Man Group, as soon as they left the stage, the big screens displayed "Rock concert movement #48: The fake ending" and the group came back out for their encore.

It was a very entertaining show with lots of visual effects and all the rock concert movements kept everyone into it. The kids loved holding up our cell phones with the crowd to illuminate the arena. All in all we had a great time. Here are a couple other You Tube links of their songs we really liked in concert (I Feel Love and Baba O'Riley).

Oostanaula River Paddle Trip

Getting ready

Derek leads the way

Adam enjoys the ride with Aunt Agatha and Uncle Paul

We scrambled up the embankment, on one of our breaks, to see this beautiful farm

Adam shows off some of the mussels he found

The head guide found this stick for Adam along the river bank and informed Adam that the bark had been chewed off by a beaver

Me, Helen, and Derek

You can't see this very well, but Adam loved riding in Uncle Paul's big truck down to the river to load up Paul's canoe after the trip

Adam and Derek show off some nice mussels that one of the other paddlers gave them

Helen's brother, Paul, and his wife, Agatha, invited us to join them on a paddling trip down the Oostanaula River. The trip was sponsored by the Coose River Basin Iniative. Paul and Agatha have their own canoe and have done a number of trips, but this is the first one we've done with them. We don't have our own canoe, but the group provided one for us.

We met Paul and Agatha for lunch at Wendy's in Calhoun before heading to the river, which was a few miles away. It was quite a haul for us eastern suburban residents. The weather was beautiful and we all enjoyed learning about the river, especially the role that mussels play in keeping the river clean. We stopped at various places along the way to look for mussels. Usually, we stopped at these partial dam like structures that were built during the Civil War era in order to divert water and make normally shallow areas deep enough for steamboats to traverse.

After the trip, it took a while to straighten out our backs and then we all went to Pizza Hut for dinner. The boys must not have heard us planning with Paul and Agatha to meet them at the Pizza Hut, because when we pulled into parking lot and Paul and Agatha were there, the boys got so excited that Paul and Agatha had also stopped at Pizza Hut. They rushed out of our van to inform Paul and Agatha of the serendipitous situation.

All in all it was a fun day and I was only mildly disappointed that I missed the big showdown between the Colts and the Patriots.

Halloween

Derek unveils his costume to Nini

Aunt Laine and Derek have some snacks before the parade

Uncle Mike, Lindsay, and Aunt Chris

Aunt Helen gets a kiss

Another cute shot of Lindsay

Adam and Derek incognito

And now...unmasked

Adam and Ryan discuss some pre-parade logistics

Nini dressed for the occassion

Laine, Derek, and Jason head up for the start of the parade

Mike, Chris, and Lindsay on their way to the parade

Our neighbors, Sandra and Pete. Pete's costume is probably not politically correct these days, but I thought it was pretty funny given that we actually have a multifamily Mexican household in our neighborhood.

Meeting up with some others on the way to the parade

Adam and Ryan man the pirate ship float

Derek's friend, Becca

Our neighbors - Mr Scott, Carlton, Madeline, and Margaret Ann

Derek and his teacher this year, Ms Sutton, who happens to live in our neigborhood. Derek just adores her.

Me hamming it up behind Chris and Lindsay

The fire trucks arrive to lead the parade

Becca's tail

The parade winds through the neighborhood

Helen helps out with the post parade refreshments

Derek and his crew

Ryan and Adam are off to trick-or-treat

Adam is captivated by the graveyard display at one of the houses

The last glimpse of Derek before he took off. He loved that we allowed him to run off with his friends this year.

The pirate ship at night

Visting while waiting for trick-or-treaters. Lindsay did a great job handing out candy.

Derek checks out his haul

Halloween is a big deal in our neighborhood. There's a parade with fire trucks leading the way, followed by a pizza party before the kids head out for trick-or-treating. What great memories for the kids!