The Candy Barterers

Last night when we got home from the ward Trunk or Treat party, the children quickly shed their costumes and sat one the floor in their underwear, arranging every piece of candy they received by brand. Rows of Crunch bars, piles of suckers, stacks of Nerd boxes, etc. When all of the candy had been set out, the trading began. They traded and ate candy for at least an hour. This morning I stumbled down stairs to find a similar scene. Had anyone eaten a proper breakfast before diving into their stash? Of course not. (Although Calvin assured me that he was just about to pour himself a bowl of Fruit Loops. Whew!)


The proper pictures of Halloween 2010 are sitting one click away, over on "my other blog". Here are a couple more, just so that this post doesn't have to go pictureless.

Halloween! I love it!

Look Who's Blogging!

I know. Slacker. And I have no excuse. Or rather I have 5 excuses. Five intractable, insistent, insatiable excuses, cluttering up my house something fierce. They are loud and rarely put things away, but on the other hand they are mine and I can't help but love them (at least that is the take-away message I get from Jesus each Sunday).

I'm not even going to pretend to review the months since my last post. A lot of stuff happened. I'm sure some of it was good and some of it was bad but apparently it was all forgettable, so I'm not going to sweat it.

On to the NOW......

A few weeks ago Jon attended his first Cub Scout Day Camp. He loved it. I went too (for the first day) and I loved it. Have I mentioned the cool women who make up our ward's Cub Scout program? They even make hanging out in the sun for 4 hours fun. By far the best part about this camp was the time it was held--- 4 to 8 pm. Sweet. The days were hot but they only got cooler. I vote we ALWAYS have twilight camp instead of day camp.

Tanner's mom Holly went the second day and took these pictures. Isn't she something?

Some of our group (l-r) Gideon, Tanner, Jon, Trent and hmmm...not sure about the last boy.

Jon, Josh and Tanner. Notice how Jon is wearing his hat rolled up above his ears, in a manner that provides as little shade as possible. Awesome.
Soap carving. His hands smelled fantastic that day.

Tanner and Jon, walking off into the sunset. Thanks for the pictures, Holly. You are a much better mother than I am!

New topic: The Malos. Pete and Cheryl and their three cute teenage daughters had a time share up in Avon a few weeks ago and were kind enough to invite us up for an evening. We had fun going on a hike and then grilling by the pool. They haven't changed a bit!

Calvin had a shockingly good time.

Jon, showing off for the ladies.

And that is the end of that.

Jon's First Pinewood Derby

Yes, it's that time of year again. Time to check in with the Konchars to find out just how the Derby went. Well, I think our friend Ed said it best: "God often answers our prayers through those around us, and you guys are the answer to the prayers of many, many people here tonight".

As improbable as it would seem, Jon's car came in dead last in EVERY heat. For a total of 16 heats. Most times by several car lengths. Often it seemed the cars for the next heat were already being loaded at the top of the track before Jon's car crossed the finish line. Maybe the only thing more amazing than our yearly ability to consistently produce cars that exhibit the all the speed and aerodynamics of a sack of wet laundry was Jon's (thankfully) blissful unawareness of the situation. ALL I CAN SAY IS THANK GOODNESS JON DIDN'T SEEM TO CLUE IN. Repeatedly throughout the evening, my friends and fellow parents of racers would ask me with a simpering whisper "How's Jon doing?". By all indications during the race and afterwards, Jon seemed to be having a blast. Again, I am grateful that Jon isn't one of my more aware children.

Of course winning is the only thing. Thanks to our Cubmaster Jana, the Heritage Park Pinewood Derby is also about the spirit of the races. And Jana did not disappoint! After spending only the last 2 months visiting every car dealership and Grease Monkey in the greater Highlands Ranch area, Jana was able to amass all sorts of cool racing decor. The Ferrari dealership gave her sweet red bags which she filled with all sorts of swag, like coupons for Chick-Fil-A food and free tokens at Chuck E. Cheeses, not to mention candy and racing toys.

The evening was a huge sucess, especially for all those parents who no longer had to worry about their boy coming in last place in every race. But really, it was a super fun night and does anyone have a Pinewood Derby car that didn't come in last that they would like to sell me for next year?

Jon and Papa working on the car last week. Too cute.

The boys got photo ID that allowed them to get close to the track.

The boys had to pass an eye test and driving exam before receiving their passes.

Our super-sweet hot dogs and veggies and chips dinner spread.

Check-in.

They traded in their regular neckerchiefs for these jaunty race ones.

Jon in the "pit" area. The spectators were seated right behind the red cones and Tommy was in the front row. After every race Jon's car was in, Tommy would shoot his fists into the air and shout "Yeah! Jon WON!!!". It was like the cutest thing ever. As much as Jon enjoyed the evening, I think Tommy loved it even more.

My race car treats. Because when you tell me I need to bring two dozen sweet treats to the Pinewood Derby, my mind instantly goes to mini Oreos, mini Nutter Butters and mini ice cream sandwiches.

Jon with his swag bag and his participant medal. No flimsy certificates proclaiming "BEST USE OF PAINT" or "MOST CREATIVE CAR NAME" for this pack.

Oh, and just in case you've been wondering what Little Brother has been up to lately......Josie gave him a makeover on Saturday. I'm not sure that pink is Tommy's color, but he definitely has the legs for that skirt.

Our Little Furniture Models

Yesterday morning the twins and I headed out to Uncle Mark's work (American Furniture Warehouse) for a little photo shoot. Mark does the ads for AFW on line and in the paper and needed some kids to appear in the ads. Conveniently, both Josie and Jon are kids themselves and so it all worked out.

We got there an hour before the store opened and got right to work in Mark's studio--a huge loft-like space full of lights and cameras and exciting props like lap-tops, TV remotes and unopened cans of root beer. It was really fun!

The kids were pretty cooperative (rarely blinking at the wrong time) and they quickly adjusted to the schedule:

For the person who is being photographed:

Sit on chair, looking where you are told
Look pleasantly interested
Try to make your hands look natural (honestly, so much harder than it sounds!)

For the person who is waiting their turn outside the studio:

Hide in the panels of hanging rugs
Recline in all of the recliners
Take a ride on the furniture trolley

Even though our shoot only lasted an hour, the kids had a blast and managed to miss the first two hours of school. Sometime in the next few weeks the pictures will start showing up in the newspaper ads. I might even have to actually buy a paper!

A few of the highlights, for your viewing pleasure.......

The pink fluffy chair, so hard to maintain good posture in that thing!

That remote sadly didn't go to anything.

Ha! I couldn't get Jon to relax his shoulders in this one, but had to include it because he got to hold that can of root beer. After we left Jon sighed and said, "I really wish I could have had that root beer." I'm sure that will be the thing he remembers most about the day.

But he also loved this lap-top.

This is Jon's favorite show.

This bean bag thing had a real static electricity issue. Notice Josie's hair. Something tells me this one won't make it into the paper.

And now we're just being silly. I think it was right after this that Uncle Mark said we were all done and he had all the pictures he needed!

Thanks Uncle Mark! You are one patient guy.

Cheyenne Mountain Zoo

Friday morning we took a little day trip down to Colorado Springs to visit the very popular Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. It was expensive ($14.25 per adult, $7.25 per kid under 12) and it was a haul (about an hour from our house, whereas the closer but lamer Denver Zoo is only a 20 minute drive) but it was AMAZING! If you ever come to visit us here in Denver be prepared for us to drag you down to the zoo.

On our way:

Tommy picked out his loudest swim shirt and matching snow boots for our (68 degree) day out.

Our lil' Einstein: Tommy is fully capable of unscrewing the cap and drinking from the bottle like a normal human child but finds gnawing a tiny hole through the bottom and slurping out the contents much more satisfying.

Cheyenne Mountain Zoo is set into the foothills above Colorado Springs. A view of the Springs from the Zoo:

I don't know what this is, but it appears to be the ruins of some fort on the hillside above the zoo. (To be examined the next time we are in the Springs....)

The Zoo! After entering the gates the first stop is the giraffe exhibit. Lots and lots of giraffes--my hands-down favorite zoo animal.

The walkways around the giraffe exhibit are elevated so when the animals come close, you are literally face to face with them.

See what I mean? There is a zoo worker selling giraffe crackers ($1 for a stack of three) so we spent quite a while feeding the giraffes. They have incredibly long, black tongues. They were sweet and friendly (and didn't stink whatsoever, unlike the monkey house which actually caused my eyes to water.)

After we left the giraffes, we headed out onto the main path and found we were just behind a group of deer taking a short cut through the zoo. Here is the back end of the last one:

Near our lunch stop ($21 worth of hot dogs and french fries, plus two pumpernickel/rye rolls that Tommy picked up--sadly mistaking them for poofy brownies) is this cool climbing area.

Two pleasant-if-incapable-of-taking-a-hint children made sure they were front and center during my attempts to take a picture of Calvin, Josie, Jon and Tommy. With all the superfluous children in this picture you can't even tell Sid is not in the shot. He chose to hang out with a friend all day and totally missed out. Maybe next time he won't be so quick to say the zoo is for babies. What am I saying? Of course he will! (Don't tell anyone I told you this, but he really did wish he had come with us.)

More climby things to climb on.

Chasing after the free range chickens in the "Big Backyard" area of the zoo. Big Backyard also had a tree house, petting zoo,

oversized lawn furniture,

and a nest of dinosaur eggs just right for taking pictures.

This is what I get for asking my intellectually challenged children to share an egg for a "twinny" picture.

Grizzly bear

Napping Cougars. We didn't zoom in for this shot. So many of the exhibits were close up like this one. Thank goodness for industrial grade Plexiglas.

Ha! This porcupine up a tree was totally hilarious.

Figuring you aren't interested in this porcupine's lady parts, I have taking the liberty of censoring this photo. We saw lots of animal privates at this zoo (probably the only negative to such close-up exhibits). For the most part I don't think the kids really caught on, but Josie did at one point mention that she was tired of looking at the p e n i s of a particular Chinese Crested bear.

The wildest things we saw all day--including the warthogs and the screaming lemurs:

Unplanned anatomy lessons aside, this zoo is just really cool. The setting, the variety of animals (I know I only mentioned a few, but there were SO MANY) plus the inventive enclosures all made our trip down to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo really really fun. We are already planning a trip next May. Come with us!

Today Is Tommy's Birthday But I'd Prefer You Didn't Mention That To Him

Although today, November 2 is the actual day of Tommy's birth four years ago, we celebrated our selves sick yesterday. We took advantage of his youth and innocence, fudging the truth about his actual birthday just for our own convenience. Because that is the type of parents we are.

It was fun. I made a cake--even though after two trunk or treat parties, a regular Halloween party and of course Halloween night itself, we were in no mood for sweets. I wrapped the presents, we blew up a bunch of balloons and even had party hats! It was like a regular party. Of course the last thing any of us wanted yesterday was a party. But you can't let on to a four year old that you would rather nap off the sugar hangover from the previous night's festivities. So we soldiered on.

Earlier in the day, Tommy was modeling one of his newest looks. Last year's fat suit from his Patrick Halloween costume, plus snow boots. I bet you didn't know that snow boots can be worn backwards. (Tommy has a real knack for re-purposing items of clothing.)

This was fun. Tommy wearing his snow bibs, plus Halloween bucket skates. He scuffled around for quite a while.

The cake! If you have been near the magazine rack at the grocery at any point in the last month, you probably saw this cake on the cover of one of those holiday food magazines. It was easy. I like easy.

Off to Nana and Papa's house for the birthday fete (and dinner!)

Mid-soiree.

Ready to open presents.

Opening presents.

Glowering. (He didn't enjoy being the focus of the birthday song)