Partying with Violet

 One of the kids' classmates, Violet, invited all of the kids in their class to her party.  Since all three of our kids are in the same class (it's a multi-age class), I took them to the party, which was at Black Hoof Park.  We have been to the park many times, but usually to the north side, where there is more playground equipment.  The south side has a picnic area and a smaller playground area, but it's really pretty.
After the main part of the party, the attendees were free to play and explore the park, which our kids were excited to do.  And by the way, the picture by the water isn't nearly as dangerous as it looks, as that water has almost no depth to it at all.

Shatto Tour

Today we had plans to go to the Shatto farm to take a tour with Alaina and Halie. This didn't exactly work out because when we got in the car, I realized Clara's car seat was so loose that I could take it half way out of the car, which is definitely not safe. Jason fixed it, but by the time we got there, we were about 30 min late. I thought we'd be okay because they said to allow two hours for the tour, but I found out that the tour lasted 30 min and the other 1.5 hours was to allow time in the gift shop. So I started out feeling really disappointed, but it actually ended up being pretty great. We started out tasting many milk flavors. They were all pretty great, though I wasn't a huge fan of French Vanilla.

We also tasted some cheese and butters. Hannah wasn't sure about this blue Royals cheese, but she ended up approving. She likes cheese far more than my other kids who are a bit iffy on it, so that was no surprise. We also bought milk shakes. For the kids I got it made with cotton candy milk and for me I chose root beer milk (that and coffee milk are my favorites). They were delish. I generally don't drink milk and don't like it. However, this milk tastes so good and fresh, I actually do really like it.

After tasting, we went out to the parking lot and had a tailgate picnic since the picnic area was super muddy from all the rain. 

Then we went back to the gift shop to buy some milk to bring home, including some Royals milk that we brought home to Jason. We had a super fun time even though we didn't get to see the cows. I think we'll try to go back some time to actually experience the full tour.

Hangin' with the Big Girls

Although Joshua tends to be the most outwardly social of our children when we are around our house, wanting to yell "Hi!" to anyone he can see, even if they're down they street out of earshot, Clara still finds the other kids to be good potential friends.  Specifically, she's really interested on Lauren, a newer girl who moved to our cul-de-sac.  This picture was from September when Lauren and another girl on our street (I can't remember her name), were near our house, and Clara wanted to play with them.  She offered them some of our bubbles, and they had fun playing together.  It was a hot day, and Clara probably should have come in to take a break, as you can see how sweaty she is in the picture, but she was having so much fun.  Click the pictures to zoom in and see how happy she is to be hanging out with her new big girl friends.

Finding Dinosaurs at Home

This week we have been learning about dinosaurs. Today we excavated a dinosaur and talked about how when people find dinosaur bones, they have to figure out how to put them back together again, just like we did.

Our excavated dinosaur ended up being a stegosaurus (I think. My only complaint is you get no documentation at all, but it looks like a stegosaurus to me). We also had a 3D puzzle that was a T-Rex. Though Hannah doesn't look particularly thrilled in this picture, she loved this guy and named him "Dino", which is pronounced like a dinosaur, not like dino from the Flinstones. We talked about how T-Rexes are meat-eaters and eat other dinosaurs, but the stegosaurus is a plant eater. We also talked about how their plates keep them safe from meat-eaters and also probably helped cool them off.

I also remembered there is a Dinosaur Train episode that talks about the plates on a stegosaurus, so we watched that. Buddy, one of the main characters, is also a T-Rex so we got to see him too. Clara watched with her dinosaur and of course had to tell him all about it, because she really likes talking and explaining, even to inanimate objects. We had a fun time learning about dinosaurs. Some things we do I am personally not that interested in, but I actually really like dinosaurs and my "Biology of Dinosaurs" class was one of my favorites I took in college, so I enjoyed this week as well.

Working on Gratitude

One thing that we really work hard (though it's quite a battle and I'm not sure we're winning) to instill in our kids is that it isn't all about us. This pretty much goes against everything that small children believe, but at the least we want to show, at an age-appropriate level, that there are so many people who don't have what we have, that we have so much to be thankful for, and it is our job to sacrifice to help others. We try to focus on this all year, but definitely in the month of November. For the last few years, we have done a gratitude tree and a prayer each day of something we are thankful for. This year, I thought the kids were old enough to do more and wanted activities and something sort of like an advent calendar. I was so excited to order this one from pottery barn. It's so professional looking and attractive and so easy. I didn't have to sew anything or design anything. But then it came and was missing a 22 and instead had two 26s and most of the squares seemed to be glued shut. So I returned it. And was extremely disappointed. And had one day to find something else.

So coming down in the attractiveness and professional scale several levels, I ended up with this. I hope to make (now that I have a bad attitude about store-bought options) something more permanent in January. But for this year, we will give this a try and see how it goes. Each day has something to focus on to be thankful for and also a related activity.

Yesterday  we thanked God for the beautiful world he made for us and went on a nature walk around our neighborhood to collect some "cool" things. After we were done, Clara and Joshua relaxed on the driveway and literally howled at the moon. I am going to call that being joyful in God's creation.

Today we are thankful for our home and we made a centerpiece to decorate our home with the items we collected yesterday. I am a little concerned about our leaves lasting. I ironed them in wax paper and then removed the paper and mod podged them. I am hoping for them to be okay until the end of the month. We'll see how it goes. I hope that we will have both enjoy the various activities and get value and meaning out of them. The good thing about not getting my super professional calendar for this year is we now have time to test the concept before I settle on a delivery format.

Champions!

Amazing.  Just amazing.  I’m on Cloud 9 right now, as I just experienced one of the most exciting moments of my life.  I’m probably going to write a lot of words, and I don’t even care!  In my sports fan lifetime (1988 and beyond), my favorite pro football team (the Broncos) has won two Super Bowls, my favorite hockey team (the Penguins) has won three Stanley Cups, my favorite pro basketball team (the Bulls) has won six NBA championships, and my favorite pro soccer team (Sporting KC) has won an MLS Cup (they also won one when they were the Wizards). So I’ve been lucky, as that’s more than most fans would get from whatever their mix of favorite teams is.  But I have have had two favorite baseball teams over that time (originally the Cubs but later eclipsed by the Royals) and the closest thing I’ve had to even a World Series appearance was the Steve Bartman experience for the Cubs a decade ago, until last year when the Royals went to the World Series but got Madison Bumgarnered.  K-State winning an NCAA championship in either football or basketball would be the ultimate, but it’s unlikely, though far from impossible, that I’ll ever see that.

I don’t watch as much baseball as I used to, partially because I’m a parent and a husband and I travel for work, which means my free time for watching TV is almost non-existent.  Also, our Dish Network package doesn’t include Fox Sports Kansas City, which has all the Royals games.  But I’m no less of a baseball fan than before.  I’m passionate about the Cubs and the Royals.  The Cubs for years were my favorite team, but since I’ve been in Kansas City, the Royals were my second favorite for a long time and eventually overtook the Cubs as my favorite team.  At the start of every baseball season, it’s convenient for me, because as a fan of those two teams, I’ve been able to have zero expectations of success, and when they didn’t achieve anything for, well, decades, I didn’t have to be too disappointed.  But this year was different.  I knew the Cubs were on the right path (I fully trust Theo, but I thought they were a year away from contending), but this was the first year in my life that I’ve had expectations for the Royals.  Because of the close call last year, I went into this year thinking the following: Anything less than an ALCS appearance would be big disappointment.  Anything less than a World Series appearance would be a slight disappointment but understandable, and anything less than a World Series win would of course be a little disappointing, but it would be very understandable, giving how hard it is to do and how much luck is involved.

The Royals had a great start to the season at 7-0 and pretty much cruised to the Central Division title, at times having a bigger division lead than all other division leaders combined.  By late summer, we realized that barring a huge collapse, the Royals were going back to the playoffs.  They easily clinched the division, and the only thing in doubt was home field advantage throughout the playoffs.  Thanks to the American League’s performance in the All-Star Game, the Royals were guaranteed home field advantage in the World Series if they got that far.  But they were very close with Toronto at the end of the regular season, and for a couple days trailed Toronto for the best record, but in the end (thanks, Tampa Bay!) had the best record in the AL, meaning they would have home field advantage in every series.

They started with a five-game series (it’s surely a matter of time until the revenue opportunities make this round a seven-game series) against the Astros.  They were down 2-1 in the series before facing a must-win game in Game 4.  Playing in Houston, in a win-or-go-home game, they were down 6-2 in the 8th inning, and the Astros seemed in control.  Some fans had declared the season over, and even I, ever the eternal sports optimist, realized things were looking grim.  I was working in our garage that day, listening to the game on the radio, and I remember thinking, “If any team could come back, it’s this year’s Royals.  That’s what they do.”  Baseball Reference indicated that statistically they had a 1% chance of winning that game at that point, meaning it was VERY improbable.  But this Royals team scoffs in the face of improbability.  They can’t be killed.  They were two innings from going home for the offseason, and most teams would’ve packed it in as a lost cause.  But not these guys.  In the 8th they hit FIVE consecutive singles (“Keep the line moving!”) and ended up taking the lead and held on to win. And then they went on to win a winner-take-all Game 5 in KC with Johnny Cueto finally proving he wasn’t a worthless trade deadline acquisition, and the Royals beat the Astros to move to the ALCS against the Blue Jays.

In the ALCS, it was essentially the Royals pitching against the best offense in baseball: the Blue Jays.  With Josh Donaldson, Jose Bautista, Troy Tulowitzki, and Edwin Encarnacion, the Blue Jays had a formidable line-up.  The Royals got rocked in a couple games, but held strong to win the series in 6 games, sending Bautista and his bad attitude home for the winter.  That meant, for the second straight year, the Royals would play in the World Series!

In the World Series, they faced off against the New York Mets, who had a very strong second half fueled by the trade deadline acquisition of Yoenis Cespedes, and Daniel Murphy’s historically great NLCS against the Cubs.  It would have been crazy to have the Royals and the Cubs in the same World Series, and I would’ve rooted for the Royals, even though it would have been a little painful to root against the Cubs.  The Mets’ core strength was starting pitching.  With Matt Harvey, Jacob deGrom, and Noah Syndergaard, the Mets were loaded with flame-throwing arms.  But, the Royals were the best team in baseball at hitting fastballs, and were even better on the fastest of fastballs.  Game 1 started with an Esky inside-the-park home run, but the Royals were down by one in the 9th against one of the best closers in baseball in Jeurys Familia, when Alex Gordon tied the game with a homer, and then the Royals won it in the 14th inning on a Hosmer sacrifice fly.  In Game 2, the Royals trailed in the bottom of the 5th 1-0, but came back to win again.  The Mets took Game 3, and then in Game 4 the Royals again found themselves trailing in the 8th inning, before they came back yet again to win, setting up Game 5 tonight.  As has happened in every World Series game this year, the Royals fell behind and were losing 2-0 going into the top of the 9th with a statistical 3% chance of winning the game.  But Matt Harvey talked Terry Collins into letting him stay in the game, and the Royals pounced, scoring two runs to tie the game and send it to extra innings.  In the 12th inning, the Royals broke the tie with a barrage of five runs, and of course Wade Davis then finished off the Mets in the bottom of the 12th.  And just like that, the Royals had won the World Series!!!  I really didn’t expect I would be this happy, but I really am.  It’s glorious!  People who aren’t sports fans can’t really relate to deriving such joy from a bunch of professional athletes accomplishing something, but anyone who has ever loved a team and has seen them win it all knows the feeling.  Because it’s wonderful.  I tend to overly invest myself emotionally in my teams, and when they lose, that makes it worse.  But when they win, that makes it so much better.

This Royals team has been so fun to watch.  They play historically good defense, they run the bases well, they make contact better than any team in baseball, and they’re a fun group guys that are easy to root for.  But their calling card is their never-give-up attitude, and their ability to make comebacks.  They did it somewhat last year, but they did it so much this year in the playoffs.  In different postseason games, they had the following chances of winning the game: 18%, 1%, 25%, 8%, 10%, 16%, and 5%, and they won every one of those games.  Of the 11 postseason games they won, they trailed in eight of them, and in seven of those they were losing by multiple runs.  And in the World Series specifically, they trailed in every single game, including in the 8th inning or later in three of them, and they still won four out of five.  And out of the many hundreds of times a team has been down by four runs or more in the 8th inning or later of a playoff game, there have only been two times in history where that team ended up winning the game: The Royals in last year’s Wild Card game, and the Royals in Game 4 of the ALDS this year.

Ned Yost has done an outstanding job, and Escobar, Zobrist, Cain, Gordon, Morales, Moustakas, Perez, Gordon, and Rios, and even Colon all played big parts.  And Cueto pitched well at home, including two gems, and the rest of the pitchers including, of course, Wade Davis, but also Herrera, Madson, Young, Medlen, Ventura, and Volquez all played key roles.  They came together and somehow did what has since 1985 almost seemed impossible: they made it possible to truthfully say the sentence: The Kansas City Royals are World Series Champions!

A Toy Story Halloween

Last year for Halloween, we decided to do a family theme for our costumes, so we were all superheroes.  This year, we went with Toy Story.  Joshua was Buzz Lightyear, Clara was Jessie thw cowgirl, and Hannah was Bo Peep.  But it was a family theme, not just a kids theme, so I was Sheriff Woody and Meghan was one of the aliens from the claw game.  Meghan made Hannah's Bo Peep costume from scratch, which was very impressive, and she made much of Clara's costume and her costume.  I put together my costume from a combination of different sources, including constructing a pull-ring for my back, like Woody has.  Woody is a cowboy, which means he needs cowboy boots, which meant I had to find a way to acquire some.  After failing to find super cheap ones (or any ones at all, actually) at Walmart and Kohl's, I opted to buy some used ones off Craigslist, which I will eventually re-sell back on Craiglist later.  I am pretty proud of our costumes.

In past years, we have stayed at home for the first half of trick-or-treating to hand out candy before we headed out for the second half of the evening.  This year, things were a little different.  Game 4 of the World Series was tonight, starting at 7:07, so we headed out earlier than normal in an effort to be home by the time the game started.  Pretty much all of Kansas City seemed to operate under that same plan, as there was a flurry of early activity and then a pretty big drop-off by the time the game started.  We got home in time to see the game, which the Royals won, putting them up 3-1 in the series. We had a really fun Halloween (and an extra happy one thanks to the Royals), and it'll be interesting to see if we end up doing another family theme next year.  Meghan and I hope to, but at some point the kids will probably want to branch out on their own, so we'll see.