Rockets and Princesses

Greetings friends and family,

I'm back home safe from a three-day work trip to Sacramento.  My days were full of meetings, presentations, and project work, but completely absent of good-night songs, hugs, and child-like laughter.  Since I have no new material, here are the pics and the video of what I mentioned in the previous blog post.

Easton and Zander were very patient to learn how to launch and prepare the rocket each time.  They were excited, but self-controlled enough to get the rocket ready.

Easton experienced some sad endings to our rocket launching days of the past because sometimes the rockets end up in trees or back yards.  Not today though!  we recovered every launch and are ready for next time.

Easton asked me for a Hubble Space Telescope to interact with his space shuttles. I searched briefly online for a toy, but couldn't find a sufficient one with the size and detail I wanted.  I had this random thought of "maybe we can build one together?"  I went online and found this awesome website with directions and a pattern sheet. I printed off the materials list and we went to the hobby store.  I expected the build to be more kid-friendly, but it was not.  tedious is the most appropriate word I can think of.  Easton and I and even Dad, before he left, contributed over the course of 9 days!  Our kitchen table was a wreck.  Waiting for glue was biggest time delay.  Each tiny piece was cut with scissors from the stock paper and glued together.  Each day we would tackle a little bit and then wait for it to dry.

The results were worth it.  Easton was content to have it and I was proud to have built it.

Check out the level of detail and proportional size of the pieces! and the boys in the background lifted off from the launch pad with a destination of Hubble.

The Lego men worked on replacing the primary mirror (Easton's words, not mine) and Zander knew enough about space walks to carefully bounce along the edge of the shroud.  The model is sturdy and hangs from his fan light, but I'm not sure how many days it will survive before turning into a pinata.

Kendra took a couple of pictures of the girl's experience at the Disney on Ice performance.  Special princess cups were exorbitantly priced, but worth it to see their smiles and give the full experience.

Their seats were close and somewhat inexpensive.  I don't think the experience would have been twice as awesome if they were 10 rows closer where the tickets were twice as expensive.  There is a fine line between spoiling and treating a child to a good experience while keeping costs in mind.  The prince and princess left happily ever after.

Joya and Layla were both grateful for the special treat.  That makes it more likely to do something similar again in the future.  Gratitude goes a long way with kids and adults alike.

I'm going to sleep in my OWN bed! (hooray) and will be bright eyed and bushy tailed tomorrow morning for work.

See you soon.