Prince Jackson on the Court

We’re backstage,

Ready to walk Junior Class Courtwarming Attendant

Jackson Reed

Onto the court at the Courtwarming game!

He had about 15 different activities he was recognized for

From swimming to FBLA to Spanish AND French Honor Socity

To Robotics and YIG.

It was such a long list,

He had to speed up how fast he was reading.

So proud!

It’s reminiscent of 28 years ago

When Mom escorted Dad

When he was up for Courtwarming King

Pretty cool!

 

Another Friday Night at the Pool

We had another chance to shave some time off our strokes this week

At our 2nd winter swim meet.

Mom and Dad were escorting Jackson across town

And Tucker must have missed them.

It was a rough night for him.

His relay team came in first by over 6 seconds

But he was disqualified in back (and doesn’t know why)

And added time in the free when his goggles filled with water.

Mom and Dad arrived just in time to see Beckett swim.

His relay also crushed their race, coming in first by over 3 seconds.

Then he took nearly 5 seconds off his breaststroke seed time

Coming in 1st at 41.77 seconds.

He took 0.15 seconds off his freestyle,

Snagging 6th place at 35.15 seconds.

Guess Mom and Dad’s presence help everyone cut time!

They won’t miss Tuck again… ;)

Headed for the Super Bowl!

A night of food and friends

And Victory Potatoes

That rang true…

The Chiefs are headed for the Super Bowl!

Three-peat, here we come!

Aiming for State

Weston continues on his quest to make the archery state team.

Lucky blue tape in place

(Thanks, Coach Tiffany!) 

Let’s do this!

He got a 263, 

Just short of his PR 264.

Keeping our fingers crossed he makes top 24…

Prince Jackson

Can you read it?

Jackson was selected as the Junior Courtwarming attendant!

More to come!

Anyone up for some games?

It’s been a while since we’ve been to Main Event.

And a wide-open Sunday like this seemed like a good day to go

Mom insisted on pictures

We got one of her too

We squeezed in some games…

Which meant tickets and prizes

Sunday Funday!

 

Happy Birthday, Mema!

Pappo made reservations for us all to get together

And celebrate Mema’s birthday

And celebrate we did!

Happy 73, Mema!

 

Our King of the Court

Tucker had a pretty great week of basketball

Getting in a few good shots

Making one of his free throws

And earning King of the Court

For his speed and hard work

Keep it up, Big T!

Back in the pool

Tonight was our first winter swim league meet.

Beck is in it for the conditioning for middle school swim

(Coming up in March)

And ready to cut some time.

He swam on the free relay,

His team easily winning 1st.

He got 5th in back,

Coming in at 46.37s.

And 4th in free at 35.30s—

A new PR by over a second

Despite being his first time swimming 50s

(He was caught off guard and not pleased with that),

He got 5th in backstroke at 50.68s

And a huge FIRST PLACE

In freestyle a 36.80s, 

Nearly 1.5 seconds faster than 2nd place.

Sounds like it’s going to be a good season!

Jack’s BIG award

Jack applied for the Lee’s Summit Educational Foundation Grant

For the Broncobots…and WON…

For the SECOND YEAR IN A ROW!

The team will put all that money to good use!

 

Let him COOK!

For Beck’s gifted social studies class,

They are going a round the world

With each small group giving a presentation about a different country

Every few days.

For extra credit, you can bring in a food from the country—

And you better believe Beckett and team LOVE some extra credit.

His cooking skills clearing take after his dad

 

Bit of this, bit of that for Weston

We’re into the winter sports season with a bang—

Weston is on a mission to qualify for state again.

He has to be top 24 from North.

A 264 should be a good start…

And then off to a JV tournament

He won the first match

But then lost the second one

With a little insight from the coaches,

He’ll get ‘em next time

 

Minnesota Day 8: The coolest (and slickest) ice skating rink!

We were supposed to drive all the way home today

But a HUGE winter storm is headed for KC

So we decided to slow-play it home,

Stopping in Des Moines tonight

And hopefully head home on plowed roads on Monday.

Which means we have another day to play in Minneapolis!

Today we headed to Central Park Ice Loop,

This really cool ice skating loop just outside the city.

It was SO SLICK!

I mean, we’ve done quite a bit of skating

And this was impressive!

Most of us chickened out on the Minnesota-standard hockey skates

And went for figure skates.

But, after a hour or so,

Beck, Mom and Tucker

Were feeling pretty confident

And traded them in for the hockey skates.

Now,

Whether it was the Zamboni-fresh ice,

The hockey skates,

Or getting distracted by some people passing her,

Mom totally lost her balance

And wiped out

Landing flat on her back and whacking her head hard on the ice.

It bled a little and left a big lump

But thankfully it was mostly her pride (and nerves)

That were bruised.

BUT,

Not 20 minutes later,

Another person fell exactly the same way.

But this poor guy didn’t fair as well.

There was a lot of blood

And Mom stepped in to help

Before the EMTs showed up.

Thankfully he didn’t have to go to the hospital

But after that

We all decided we’d had all the fun we needed.

We grabbed some lunch and some Caribou coffee

(They are EVERYWHERE in MN—

We figured when in Rome!)

And hit the road to Des Moines

Duluth, Lutsen, Minneapolis…

Skiing, skiing, skiing, tubing, ice skating…

NYE, Mall of America, lots of food and board games…

Minnesota, you didn’t disappoint!

 

Minnesota Day 7: Tubes and Screens

Today we took it a bit easy—

I mean, we are on vacation!

We slept in, had a late brunch…

And then hit up Buck Hill for some tubing!

We thought the single digit temperatures

Would keep people away,

But Minnesotans are hearty stock—

It was packed!

We had our fill there

And then headed to Can Can Wonderland 

For some pre-dinner entertainment.

We thought it would be another Arcade Alley

But WHOA!

We underestimated it!

It was HUGE,

Filled with arcade games, basketball/football/shooting games,

pinball, 

And what we decided was our favorite:

These super old animatronic games

We spent most of our night on these

There were some photo ops

Tucker was really excited

But we had to take a selfie!

After that,

We headed to a place called Hazelwood,

Which we all agreed was one of the best restaurants 

we’ve been to in a while.

12 thumbs up!

It was a great finale to the day.

Minnesota Day 6: Afton Alps

We’re REALLY making this a ski trip—

Hello, day 3 of skiing!

Afton Alps is different from any other place we’ve skied—

There are about 20 lifts, 

Practically one per run.

The runs kind of run into each other

So we had to start coordinating by which lift we were at.

We all did a lot of blues…and even BLACKS!

WHAT?!?!

Yep, even Tucker and Mom!

There was a big terrain park

That Beck and Tuck were brave enough to try out.

Here’s Beck coming down a feature

He made it look good

Weston and Jack were really proud to have done

Every single run.

The rest of us think we did

But didn’t really keep track.

We all really liked the Highlands section of the park—

It had the best views,

Especially at sunset.

We all really got good on this trip.

Tucker was even able to maneuver and pick up a dropped stick

(From the lift)

Without slowing down.

And black runs???

Even if they are “Minnesota blacks,”

That’s still some serious improvement in our skills!

The best part about skiing?

Gathering at the lodge at the end of the day

It was a memorable day

Did we mention there was night skiing???

Wes, Tuck and Mom dabbled in it;

Jack really hit the slopes when the sun went down.

Wait,

There’s ANOTHER best thing after a day of skiing…

The HOT TUB!

Yep, we braved it.

With a temp of 0.

The water was lovely

But the walk back was…shocking.

When in Minnesota!

Minnesota Day 5: The ride to the Twin Cities

Since we missed them on the way up to Lutsen,

Mom plotted a few stops on the way back

To see the famed North Shore waterfalls.

Our big stop was Gooseberry Park…

And it was worth the stop!

We saw 4 of the 5 falls,

All of them nearly frozen through

They were really cool!

Well…everyone but Beck thought so.

He was cold.

And hangry.

Our next stop was Betty’s Pies for breakfast.

Yep, we had their famous caramel apple crunch pie for breakfast.

And may have bought a pie to take with us.

Never heard of them?

Click on the link above…

We made it, safe and sound to our next VRBO

And headed out for a night of wandering, shopping, and more eating

At the Mall of America.

Doing some city stuff,

Just what Jackson loves!