Cute Kid Pix November 2022

More pictures that didn't make their own post...

Our church had its annual Christmas Bazaar, which included a night of "ice skating." The skates were real ice skates but the "ice" was some sort of hard plastic flooring that sort-of worked to skate around. We had a fun time eating smores afterward at the nearby firepit. It was too dark for good pictures with the phone camera. Gotta remember the real camera next time! The next day, we went into the Kessler Center for food, silent auctions, and other fun.

The sales at the bazaar

A local board game store hosted a 24-hour gaming marathon to support Extra Life. I played the version of Clank that's on a pirate ship called Clank! Sunken Treasures. I never saw the box cover, but the game was fun.

Clank in water!

The store had a "pay what you can" table for used games, with the money going to the charity. My family bought me a tiny Jenga set that has seen much use by us. It went to Religious Education where I used it as a substitute for the gallows drawing in Hangman. It was also an icebreaker at a Cub Scout meeting.

Clearly an off-brand edition

Seemingly impossible yet still playable state of the tower

In other gaming news, I discovered that Rush Hour puzzles are solvable in ways other than the recommendation on the back of the card. In Rush Hour, the player tries to get the red car out of the traffic jam by moving all the other vehicles around to make a clear path. I made one solution that took a lot of moves and then tried out the solution on the back. I was pretty sure I had a different final state that got my car out, so on the next puzzle I took a picture of my solution. Then, I did the back-of-the-card solution and took another picture of a clearly different solution.

My solution

The card's solution

We made the kids rake leaves which might have been a mistake, because see what they did to me!

Looking for a dad in a leaf stack

Help!

My wife and I attended a Renaissance dance at our dance studio. It was a lot of fun, with some authentic dances and music, along with modern stuff that mimics the style from way back when.

Our Renaissance garb

We went to Savage Mill at the end of the month and saw all the Christmas decorations already in place!

But it's not even Advent yet (as of the picture taking)!

Santa's spot

We went for an epic bike ride from just outside of Baltimore to the Naval Academy in Annapolis. Most of the way is a bike/jogging path that formerly was the Baltimore and Annapolis train line. It was fun, with a challenging bridge at the end.

Meeting at a pickup point

Getting ready to go

This bridge is more challenging than it looks

View of the Severn River

At the grocery store, I saw another crime against breakfast.

You can guess the toy surprise inside

Fall Backyard Fun 2016

This fall we've had a lot of fun (and some work) in our back yard.

Leaf raking is still mostly a Daddy chore. We like to compost what we can, so I rake the leaves into the bottom corner of the yard. In order to mash them down, we enlist the aid of our children.



The falling part of Fall isn't just for leaves. We've had plenty of sticks and branches come down too. My kids were happy to use them, along with any other things they could find, to make some forts.

My son's fort is a collaboration between many neighborhood kids (including my son). They've had one or two collapses but are always glad to rebuild. The worst collapse was when the old shower curtain they were using for a roof accumulated too much rainwater and caved in! Building is half the fun anyway.

They even used the back yard gate, which means we can't close it!

Alternate view

My daughter was helped by Grandpa. They used some of the stumps left over from when we had to take down a couple of trees that were threatening the house. I'm not sure where the old railroad tie came from!

Another fort

The front view

The toddler did not build a fort. He had a fun time on our swing set instead.

Swinging!

Close up

At the top of the slide

Climbing up the rock-climbing side

Climbing up the ladder side

We have a wiffle-ball set (including bases and a pitcher's plate) that is used quite often for either a family game or when the neighborhood boys are over. It's big fun, except when we hit balls over the fence and then have to walk the long way around to retrieve them. We need a good old-fashioned English stile!

Ready to bat in the twilight hours of the day

The stile would be perfect for preventing other visitors from getting in.

That's right, eat the neighbor's grass