Happy New Year!

I haven't had much time to post over the holidays., but would like to wish everyone a Happy 2008 from the Klingsick family. We had a great Christmas. Blake's favorite gift was a Playstation 2. He's been asking for one for a year now so was very excited. His second favorite gift was a $10 T-shirt from Club Penguin. Club Penguin is an online site that using cartoon penguin, players can waddle around, chat, converse, play minigames, and participate in other activities with one another in a snow-covered virtual world. Disney recently bought the company making it more popular. It's designed for 6-14 year olds. He immediately wanted to wear the shirt that day and asked if he could wear it the first day of school.
Drew got an Optimus Prime helmet.


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But I think his favorite gift came from Uncle Tim. An R2D2 that walks and talks and is "supposed to" follow orders. He was jumping up and down as soon as he tore the top part of the package off, and then proceeded to dance like R2D2.


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Happy New Year to all! Keep checking out this site in 2008.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

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St. Louis got its first major snowfall of the season, and it was a big one for St. Louis. We got about six inches. The kids actually got to enjoy it because it came on the weekend. We woke up Saturday morning with about 2 inches on the ground, and it was still falling. Blake and Drew couldn't wait to get out. And the snow was perfect for building a snowman. The snowman was as tall as Scott and I. We got 4 more inches over the rest of the day on Saturday, and on Sunday we headed to Grandma and Grandpa Klingsick's for sledding. Drew enjoyed sledding a lot more this year. He was able to get up the hill on his own, and he rode by himself. The only part he wasn't to happy about is when he and I were going down and we got a spray of snow in the face.
Click on the pictures to see more.


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A mouse from outerspace

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Blake is in Drama Club at school, and they performed "The Mice From Outer space" this year. It was very cute, mainly singing. Here's a picture of Blake dressed up as a space mouse.

My children: The church's entertainment

Blake and Drew "sang" at our church on Sunday for Christmas to the great amusement of the rest of the parishioners. One woman told me she "was laughing so hard she was crying." Another told me "Blake is the one she watches now."
So what's so funny about "Away in the Manger" and "Go Tell It on the Mountain?" Blake sang as loud as he could which wasn't so bad (I could live with that). He wasn't shouting just singing louder than the rest. I was even amused by it slightly. Between the first and second song, Drew decided to move to the front near his brother. He was off to side relatively behaving himself before this. About midway through "Go Tell it on the Mountain," the "spirit" (or perhaps it was the sugary Happy Birthday Jesus cake before church) moved Drew to start dancing wildly. Blake proceeded to do the same.
They might be embarassing us now, but just wait until they're teenagers. Then it's our turn to repay the favors. Maybe when Blake gets his first girlfriend, I can pull out the tape of this "performance!"

Blake did redeem himself later during the children's sermon. They were talking about Advent Calendars. The one the lady who was conducting the sermon had was a stable scene, and the last piece you put on was the Baby Jesus. Blake told her we put Santa Claus at the top on Christmas Eve. (Scott and I hang our heads). Later in the sermon, she asked what Christmas was really all about. Blake raises his hand and she calls on him. (Me silently in my head: Please don't say Playstation 2; getting presents; or Santa coming!) Blake's answer: Giving thanks for Jesus. (Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!) See were not such bad parents :)

All I Want for Christmas ...

... is my 1 front tooth!

Blake lost his first tooth. He told me his tooth was loose in the morning, and wiggled and wiggled and wiggled and wiggled it some more ALL DAY LONG! And it finally fell out. He was very excited and couldn't wait to go to bed that night. The Tooth Fairy brought $2 and a note thanking him for taking such good care of his teeth. The note was on tooth-shaped stationary! We told him the Tooth Fairy gave less money for teeth with cavities because she had to fix them :)
How much does your "Tooth Fairy" give?

Blake's first performance

Blake had his first piano recital on Saturday. Just remember he's had only 7 lessons so far! He performed two short songs: 'Swinging Monkeys' and 'Elevators and Escalators.' He had no fear of performing at all and did an excellent job. We are very proud of him. I will post a picture of him later, so you can see how little he looked next to all the other players. But listen to him perform below.


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Fall fun

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Being the dooms-dayers that they are, the media was predicting a bad fall for colors. But the colors were bright and vibrant afterall. Above is the crimson maple in our front yard, and I think it is the prettiest it has ever been. Jennie, we used our "foliage" setting on our camera to shoot this one! We also raked some leaves and of course jumped in them in the backyard. Here are the boys hard at work and jumping and having fun. Click on the photos to see more.


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'I eat turkey!'

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Drew's class at the YMCA gave their Thanksgiving performance on Thursday. They sang a few songs, and we had Thanksgiving dinner. Here's a picture of him in his hat he made. Click on the photo below to see more pictures from the event.


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Happy Halloween!

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Take a ride on a mini-train

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

I stole this idea from my friend Jennie, so thanks Jennie for pointing me to this website. See posting on 10-14 for more information on this train.

Out of the mouths of babes

Drew was being really silly before bed tonight. He was up on Blake's top bunk and threw a pillow at Scott, and just thought it was hilarious. He really cracks himself up. He was still laughing about it as Scott was trying to put him to bed and reminiscing about his funny act, he said, "I laughed so hard, I lost my mind."
Not sure where he picked up that phrase.

My goofy family

Arrrrrgh!

We had a party at our house on Saturday, so the family "themed" that night. Here's a picture that Blake took of Scott and I. Not bad. Of course, our heads were cut off in the first one he took, but "you can see the rat really good," Dad told him (note rat by my knee in this one. Blake insisted it had to be in the photo).


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And of course, Blake and I had to mug for the camera. I think Drew took this one (with a little help from Dad). Hence, why it's a bit out of focuse.


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Online scrapbooking

Howdy, partner!

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Blake and Drew are Buzz and Woody from Toy Story this year. Here they are before a Cub Scout Halloween event.

Picture that makes me go ahhhhh

Drew's class took a field trip to the Watershed Nature Trail. This is him (in green jacket) with Zachary and Danny, two of his buddies from school.


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A ride on some tiny rails on a tiny train

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Glencoe, Missouri, has this great miniature train ride if you have kids. Drew really enjoyed this ... I think almost as much as Uncle Don. The trains are operated by the Wabash, Frisco and Pacific Association. They are 12-inch gauge steam trains. Volunteers keep the trains running and also help out with selling tickets and other things. The ride is a 30-minute round trip ride that's a little over a mile long. It travels through some woods along the Meramec River on the miniature train.
Here's Drew doing "his train" There's lot more pictures, so be sure to click on the top one and look at them all at Dropshots.

http://www.dropshots.com/sklingsick#


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What's a pine needle taste like?

Get ready for a flurry of posts.
We'll start with Blake's Cub Scout campout. We camped out at Silver Lake in Highland. It was fun though the campfire on Friday night started a little late for our two early-to-beds. Drew fell asleep on my lap at the fire, and Blake was ready to go -- right after he had a marshmallow. Only one other Tiger Scout came from Blake's den. Jop is from the Netherlands and is living in Edwardsville while his Dad works for a year in the states.
Here's Jop and Blake eating their Candy Cannon loot:


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The highlight for Scott and I was when Blake tried a pine needle. This man named Luther who is very involved with the Scouts conducted a nature tour on Saturday. This guy knows EVERYTHING about nature. Anyway, he was telling us this story of some pilot in Bosnia that survived on grass and leaves and other things. He also told us that if we had to survive, pine needles were edible. So Blake decided to try one.
Here's his reaction:


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The kid won't try carrots, green beans or broccoli (pretty much anything green), but he'll try pine needles! Go figure. Next time I serve him his chicken nuggets, he's getting a side of pine needles. Apparently, he likes the White Pine variety.

The highlight for the kids by far was the Candy Cannon. One of the scout leaders wrapped up gobs of candy in some newspaper, shoved it in a pipe with some gunpowder in it, and out blasted the candy. The kids loved it. Be sure to listen this video with the sound because the guy's pretty funny, dragging it out and getting the kids into a frenzy. "Did I tell you about the candy coming out of the cannon and going up ... oh, I did."
"Just fire it!" You have to watch it in two takes.


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One last game

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Scott and Blake got in one last Cardinal game before the season ended. And thanks to A-B and their Aunt Beth and Uncle Don, they had a fantastic game. Blake and Scott toured the dugouts and ran the bases. Plus, Beth's seats were upgraded to the box! Blake was excited because he finally got to buy a souvenir because they had Anheuser-Busch bucks to spend at the game.

Check out these cakes!

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We were at a wedding this past weekend that had the best cakes I'd ever seen at a wedding. The bride and groom like to travel, and each cake was dedicated to somewhere they had been together. Here's the Baha cake. It was my favorite. Blake and Drew loved the Antartica cake because it had penguins -- edible penguins! Click on one of the photos to link to the rest. There were 5 cakes.


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"Picking" apples

How bad did the April frost hurt the apple crop? On Drew's field trip, we went to the apple farm to pick apples. We "picked" apples out of a box under a tree. AND the apples were from northern Illinois. Heads up to Mills Apple Farm for keeping the orchard open for school tours and importing apples, so the kids could go home with a bag of them. You could also buy apple cidar -- from Peoria.

Corny fun

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We visited the Godfrey Maze about two weeks ago. This year it has a Western theme. There's two paths you can take and if you can answer quiz questions (we chose the pop culture ones), you can get clues about which way to go. They give you a flag to hold up if you get lost. One of the "wranglers" comes to help you out. We did both mazes in about an hour without getting lose. We played in the corn pit (think sand pit, only with corn) and the corn kernals get everywhere! We also road the cow train and shot the corn cannon. A great time if you have a chance to visit it this fall. Click on one of the pictures to see more.


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Drew starts school

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Interview with a 3-year-old:
Drew (running up to me when I picked him up): When we got to class, they handed out Guessing Buckets to some boys. You get to bring your guessing buckets home.
Me: What do you do when you get them home?
Drew: Nothing. You just have to guess what's inside.
Me: Okay. How was school today?
Drew: Good. We had snack goldfish and teddy grahams. And juice.
Me: What was your favorite part of school?
D: Playing in the gym.
Me: Who'd you eat lunch with?
D: Alan Busse sat across from me. I sat by Alexa when I colored. And Danny sat at the table, too.
Me: Did you make any new friends.
D: Well, I don't know there names yet. But there was another Mitchell (Blake also has a friend named Mitchell). But he wasn't the same as Mitchell. He had weak teeth (giggling).
Me: Weak teeth?
D: Yeah (giggling). He had weak teeth.
Me: What do you mean weak teeth?
D: He had weak teeth (still giggling).
Me: Weak teeth?
D: They were purple. (still giggling)
Me: OKayyyyy ...

Drive-in visit

I brilliantly didn't bring my camera, but the kids made their first visit to a Drive-In movie theater on Saturday. We saw Underdog. It was cute, the kids liked it. "There's no need to fear, Underdog is here!" or Drew's favorite: "There's no need to fear, Underwear is here!" That was in the "bloopers" during the credits. The kids went to sleep after that movie, and Scott and I saw Hot Rod. 2 hours of our lives we'll never get back. We went to the Litchfield Skyview Drive-In. We popped the hatch on our Honda Pilot and all piled in the back to watch the movies.
Only $2 a person to get in (under 5 was free so Drew got in for nothing) and the Snack Bar was reasonably price. We only spent $16.90 the whole night. That was for 2 movies, a tub of popcorn, a box of gummy bears, a bag of peanut M&Ms, a soda and 2 waters. Not bad!
Hopefully, it won't be their last visit to a Drive-In. The Skyview Drive-In in Belleville is up for sale. As far as I know, the Litchfield one plans to stay open. Next time, I'll bring a camera!

Soggy camping

We went camping out in the country at my parents house this weekend. The weekend started out a little wet. We hastily put up the camper in between rain showers. Also, my parents lost power the first night. So much for having AC in the camper though we didn't really need it because the storms had cooled it off.
The kids enjoyed tractor rides with grandpa, fishing and just visiting with Grandma and Grandpa Wilke.


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A visit from Mrs. Cruthis

Drew's teacher visited our house today. And Drew seemed to already like her. He was very social (no surprise there) and wanted to show her his cool flip flops with the Hot Wheels fire and his red car. He starts school after Labor Day.
Here he is with his binoculars on (couldn't you tell) and making a silly face. Believe it or not she thought he was "a sweet and polite little boy."


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Back to school

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Blake started 1st grade today. He was very excited. He loves school and could not wait to go back. There are 21 kids in his class, 7 of them from his kindergarten class and a few who he already knew, he says.
Here's some pics of him from when he visited his classroom last Thursday and from his first day. Click on the photo to see more at dropshots.


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Hello again

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So, I haven't posted since April. So much for your weekly Blake and Drew fix. Well, anyway, I wanted to post some pictures of our vacation in Oregon.
We spent the first part of our week in Portland for the Klingsick Family Reunion and second part in Bend, Oregon, for the Payne "Fathead" family reunion.
We enjoyed our week in Oregon. Blake couldn't decide if he wanted to stay or go home. His favorite part of the week was our trip to Mount St. Helen. He loved seeing a real volcano. Drew's favorite part was "the secret hideout at Aunt Diane's and playing with that other boy." That other boy would be Gibson.
Thanks to all of our relatives who played host in Oregon. We all enjoyed our trip there and had a great time visiting with all of our family, including all of the new additions.
I've posted all my pictures on dropshots. You used to be able to click on a picture on this blog and it would take you there. But dropshots changed their website, so I'm not sure if that works. If it doesn't, click on this link:
http://www.dropshots.com/nklingsick#

If anyone has pictures of the white-water rafting trip, please email them to me. We forgot about going to look at them the day after and don't have any. I'll post the pictures and any others you might want to shre on dropshots so everyone can enjoy.
Feel free to comment on here or at dropshots to share your favorite stops of the reunion.


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'I got my nailgun'

Drew has become Dad's little helper around the house. When Scott mows the lawn, Drew gets out his little mower and follows him around the yard. The other day I asked Scott to take a look at the dryer. It was making a clunking noise. Scott started looking at it, and Drew disappeared downstairs. He came up with his toolbox and his nailgun saying, "I can help. I got my nailgun!" Too cute!
Why is when they are 3, they are happy to help, but when they become teenagers, or for that matter 5-year-olds, it's "ahhh. you want me to do what!"

Springtime fun

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We went to Eckerts for the Easter Egg hunt and to visit the bunny. Believe it or not Blake loves that sweater vest. I think it's because it has matching socks. He wanted to wear it to school on Friday because they were having their Easter party. I of course did not want it to get filthy, so I told him, "No way!" Scott of course groaned because they matched. I think they look cute!
If you look closely at the picture, you will notice the rabbit is holding a carrot. When Drew found out we were visiting the Easter Bunny, he insisted on bringing him a carrot. Here he is on the way to Eckerts.


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They also rode ponies and got to hold bunnies among other fun things. Here's a picture of Blake with a bunny who really wants to get away!


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Saturday, March 31, 2007