Sports!

Handstand Hazel

So you've heard all about my run club and rock climbing class. While I've been busy with that, Hazel has been taking gymnastics and Turner has been taking a class at the gym called Sports Sampler, which is a class about a different sport each week.

Hazel really loves gymnastics and is great at it. She does all kinds of things; she jumps on giant trampolines, does hand stands, walks on a balance beam, climbs, and swings around on ropes and bars. She practices cartwheels at home all the time. She started taking it in the summer after we returned from our road trip and recently signed up to take it again in the spring. Special thanks to Bubbe for helping pay for her classes as Hazel's birthday present.

Gymnastics day at Sports Sampler

Turner is so excited about Sports Sampler too. Every day he asks what day it is so he can figure out whether he has his class. At the end of each class he tells Mom he wishes he could take it every day.

So far he has done soccer, basketball, gymnastics, tee ball and a bunch of other things. He is the only kid besides the teacher's two daughters. One of the girls is named Hazel, which he thinks is really funny. His teacher uses lots of songs in the class and tons of imagination. They do lots of funny, imaginative things with scarves, scooters, hula hoops and other PE class-type items. 

Fantastic Fall Weekend

We just had a really great weekend to start the fall (yeah, fall starts a little late in Austin).

Friday morning I went to school early for my run club. Run club is an activity sponsored by our PE coach at my school on Friday mornings to encourage kids to run. They play fun music while we run laps and get lots of encouragement. Then at the end we get to record how far we've  gone each week. Each week I've been increasing the number of laps I've run by one. I did six last week, so my goal was seven this week. To help encourage me, Dad came with me and we ran together. We beat our goal and did eight laps! That's two miles! I wasn't too tired when we were done, by Dad looked a little sweaty. He was happy to be able to get a workout in before going to work. Plus, we both had a great time spending time together in the morning.

Friday night, we watched Kentucky's first basketball game of the year.  It was fun to watch again, and we got to stay up late. Kentucky won. Yay!

Saturday morning was a really special occasion. It was Hazel's consecration ceremony, which marks the formal beginning of her Jewish education (even though she was in kindergarten Sunday school last year). Here's the post about mine last year. We all went to cheer her on. They called her up, mentioned her Hebrew name, Chasya Bina (protected and wise), and gave her her own little Torah. We were very proud of her.

After the consecration ceremony, we went to Fiesta Texas to celebrate. We had gotten free tickets from Dad's company picnic there last month. We were excited to go on all the rides again. When we first got there, Mom, Hazel, and Turner went on the kids' swings. Since there were three of them, Mom sat with Turner, and Hazel sat with a bigger girl. She talked the girl's ear off on the ride.

Then Dad took all us kids on the Ferris wheel where we got a great view of the whole park. Then Mom took Turner and Hazel on some dizzy rides - the Wave Runner and the Hustler. I got to pick the next ride, so I picked some rides in the kids section - the Kiddee Koaster, ZoomJets, and Buckarooz. After that, we split up for a bit. Hazel and Dad went on some more grown-up rides, like the 200 foot tall Sky Screamer and the 35mph Road Runner Express. Dad liked that. Mom, me, and Turner stuck with more kids rides. It was a long day, and we were all pretty tired heading home.

Sunday my Cub Scout Den went on a hike. Dad was leading the hike for the den, and Mom, Hazel, and Turner came along. All of us had a lot of fun, splashing through water and mud, finding fossils and little stone, and climbing up big rocks.

I can't wait to see what we do next weekend!

Rock climbing and videographer

Hazel is practicing film-making. She made this video of me in my rock climbing class:

Six Flags!

We got to a do a pretty fun thing this weekend. Dad's company rented out the Six Flags Fiesta Texas in San Antonio for a whole day, so we drove down there to spend the day in the amusement park.

All of us were very excited. This was Turner's first trip to Six Flags, and it had been several years since Hazel and I had been. We were excited about all of the rides.

When we first got to the park, we saw HUGE roller coasters that were loud and went really fast and upside down. We weren't so sure about that, but Mom assured us that those weren't the rides we were going on.

The first small ride we encountered was the Tea Cups. Dad rode with Hazel Turner rode with Mom, and I decided to watch. Turner, Mom, and Hazel had a great time. Dad didn't feel so great afterwards. I guess he doesn't like being dizzy.

After that, we headed further into the park and went on a few more rides. We went on some swings (see picture above) and a school bus that went into the air. Dad took us kids on the ferris wheel, which Mom skipped because it went up pretty high. Them Mom took Hazel and Turner on another dizzy ride while Dad and I watched. They laughed the whole time. Mom said that was her favorite ride of the day, and she was surprised Hazel and Turner liked such a wild ride.

We did a few more kids rides before going to a lunch picnic. The food was pretty good but we were ready to get back to the rides.

After lunch, we went on the Bugs Bunny water log ride. Hazel was a little scared but in the end she decided to ride with us. She really didn't like the drop at the end. I wasn't crazy about it either. Turner thought it was pretty fun, and he loved getting wet. Mom screamed her head off during the drop.

After that we all wanted to go on the bumper cars, but Turner wasn't tall enough to do it. He was really mad. Dad took me and Turner on a bunch more kids rides, including airplanes and a kid-size roller coaster, while Mom and Hazel rode on the bumper cars. Mom let Hazel drive, which apparently she wasn't allowed to do. They stopped the whole ride to tell Mom to cut it out. Way to go Hazel!

We did another water ride in which all of us boys got really wet, while Hazel and Mom stayed relatively dry. Dad pretended to be annoyed that he was wet, and Hazel was annoyed that she stayed dry.

Hazel got pretty excited to realize that she was tall enough to go on some of the adult rides. Dad was super excited to take her on the SkyScreamer and the Roadrunner Express. (Clicking on the links will let you see videos of what it feels like to be on the rides). Hazel loved them, and even rode on the RoadRunner Express twice, once with Dad, then with Mom. Mom wasn't so crazy about the roller coaster. She said she's never trusting Hazel about rides again, and roller coasters are Dad's job from now on.

We finished the day at the park by riding on the train around the park. Turner was practically asleep at that point, and all of us were pretty tired. It had been a really fun day.

We drove home, but on the way we stopped at Buc-ee's and picked up some dinner and a few treats. Mom really likes that place.

Splitting Up For the Weekend

A couple weeks ago, our family split up for the long Labor Day weekend. Dad took Hazel to Atlanta while Turner and I stayed in Austin with Mom.

In Atlanta, we went to a baby naming ceremony for my cousin Lizzie, Aunt Laurie and Uncle Jonathan's daughter. Dad didn't think we could all go to Atlanta for the weekend, so he just took Hazel to help represent us there.

Dad and Hazel had a good time. They got to ride on an airplane to Atlanta. Hazel did great on the plane, even after her unicorn got Coke spilled on it and the plane was stuck on the runway for almost an hour after landing. Hazel especially liked riding on the "plane train" that took them to get their luggage. Bubbe and Aunt Laurie greeted them at the airport and whisked them away to Bubbe's house.

Over the weekend, they had lots of fun at Bubbe's house. They went to lots of yummy restaurants, played games at Bubbe's house (Hazel taught Bubbe how to play Battleship), ran through sprinklers in Bubbe's yard, and watched lots of animals through the window of Bubbe's house. Hazel also tried teaching Bubbe to do cartwheels.

But the main event was the baby naming ceremony. Dad got to say a speech while Lizzie got her name. She was named after Papa and Grandmas Millie, Mary, and Frieda. After the ceremony, there was a party and Hazel met a friend and played with her a lot. Dad thought it was funny that Hazel was playing with the daughter of one of his old friends.

It was a pretty quick weekend, but Dad and Hazel weren't too sad to leave since Bubbe was coming to visit them in Austin later in the week.

Cones in a cave!

Meanwhile, back in Austin, we stayed pretty busy and had a lot of fun with Mom. After we took Dad and Hazel to the airport Friday, we came home and had dinner, then Turner and Mom had a sleepover in her room. I opted out of the party, thinking I'd get a better night's sleep in my own room.

Saturday we headed to the gym. Mom worked out while Turner and I played together in the child center. After a nice lunch together in the cafe, we headed outside for a swim. Later in the day, we met up with Eli's family for a concert and gelato at Central Market. Eli was so sad when he realized Hazel wasn't with us! Even without Hazel, we managed to have a good time. Turner enjoyed dancing to the band and we had a good time playing on the playground. It was a pretty late night, and Turner camped out with Mom again.

Turner really knows how to party

Sunday was another very fun day. We headed to Boerne, Texas, to the Cave Without a Name. Mom and I really liked it. I thought the best things we saw were little ponds in the cave. The tour guide asked us to guess how deep one of the ponds was. It looked very shallow, and we were surprised when she said it was four feet deep. She said it created an illusion because the water is so clear.

After the tour, we drove home, where we hung out for a few hours, then ate dinner at Phil's Ice House and played on their playground. It was such a fun day, we didn't even mind when Mom told us we were skipping Amy's Ice Cream, which is right next to Phil's, because it was another late night and she knew she had another sleepover with Turner coming her way.

Monday we took it easy at home until it was time to go to the airport to get Dad and Hazel. We were very excited to see them after the long weekend, and it was nice hearing about their trip when they got back.

S-E-C! S-E-C!

This weekend, Dad took all of us to a really fun picnic. It was a picnic for all of the Southeastern Conference (SEC) alumni groups in Austin.

While technically none of us are alums of an SEC school, Dad is on the board of the University of Kentucky Alumni Association in Austin, thanks to our fandom passed on through Papa. Plus, Bubbe is a University of Florida alumna, and Aunt Laurie and Uncle Jonathan are University of Georgia alumni. So we have a lot of SEC family connections.

Hi Bubbe!

We got to the picnic nice and early, which was great since it wasn't quite as hot. The Kentucky tent was the first one set up, and they had delicious breakfast tacos. We also had the bounce house all to ourselves. Before too long, the other schools starting showing up as well, which meant lots of other kids to play with. We saw our friend Allison, who we watch basketball games with, and Turner made a new friend, Reid.

We also ate lots of food from the other tents. At first, Turner was afraid to ask for anything, because he thought he would then "be on the other team." But in the end, we remained Kentucky fans even though we got cookies from Alabama, donuts from Tennessee, and even got some cheese popcorn. But the best thing was Kona Ice, a snow-cone place, which is owned by a Kentucky alumnus. They were giving out free snow-cones!

Besides eating, we played a few games while we were there. Dad taught us how to play cornhole. We also played a game with some of our friends where dad would yell out a school name, and we had to run around to find their tents. It was pretty fun.

After about 3 hours, it started to get a lot more hot and crowded, so we decided to head home. But we all agreed that it was really fun and we can't wait to go back again next year.

Welcome to the new school year!

Swimming at Deep Eddy on our last day of summer break

Since our road trip, we had a fun-filled summer at home. We went to lots of birthday parties, Mom took us to the Austin Zoo (where we saw lots of animals, watched a guy feed an alligator, and rode a train), swam a LOT, had many squirt gun battles, and ate lots of fun summer treats (frozen bananas, anyone?).

Also, Hazel found a new love -- gymnastics. She went to a three-week camp in August, and signed up to continue classes in the fall. She and Turner say what they both want for Hanukkah are gymnastics classes.

Handstand Hazel

It's hard to believe it, but summer has come to an end and we already finished our first week of the new school year.

I started second grade. We all got a bit of a surprise when we found out the my teacher changed a few days before classes started. Fortunately, the new teacher seems to be great. She came from a nearby school, where she had tons of experience, lives in the neighborhood, and has a couple of kids at our school. So far, I'm really enjoying second grade.

Hazel started first grade and has the same teacher I had last year. She has been having a good time at school as well, though she did cry a little bit on the first couple of days because she missed Mom so much.

Turner's first day of his last year of preschool

Speaking of Mom, while she misses having us around all day, she has been enjoying getting more quality time with just Turner. And he seems to be enjoying having a bit more time to himself.

Meanwhile, Turner is now in his very last year at Nicholson. He moved up to the Woodpeckers class and is really enjoying his new teacher and all of the new things in his classroom.

Mitch's first day of second grade, Hazel's first day of first grade

We are excited about the start of the new school year!