Anyone wanna trade lives just for about the next 6-9 months? No takers?
Alright then. Today's topic will be Thing Two:
This kid has been busy.
He is in the Lego Robotics League this year at school. Really great program for the little mini-nerds engineers. He stays after school 2 days a week and has volunteer engineering type adults from the community to help along with his Math & Science Academy teacher and a few high school students that are also in the program and come to help the younger elementary students.
Loch and BFF Kenny, who clearly is awesome.
Every year there is a "challenge" that they have to design a project for. This year's challenge is to build something that will help senior citizens. Below is Loch working on the project.
These Legos are no joke, below is one of the robots, there are Lego bricks he uses that are $240 apiece! Needless to say, I am completely freaked out when he brings something home to work on or tweak a bit.
Here is Loch at a district competition.
Inside the competition. There are teams from all over the state and the Washington D.C. area set up. The competition goes all day with different events for presentation and judging. This Lego League is active all over the U.S. right up through college/university level. Geeks unite!
The school garden is looking good for winter this year:
Why can't my garden be this orderly looking?!
Last month Loch was selected as one of 30 students to compete in the National Geography Bee, and yesterday was the first competition. After surviving about 10 questions of increasing difficulty, he was out in Round Two. He did great and unfortunately the video I got of him was the one where he got the question wrong LOL! Ooops.
The Setup...
...and he's out. But to be fair, so was most of the 1st and 2nd row!
These are 4th and 5th grade students. They did great, Loch at least made the first 2 cuts. The winner was a 4th grade student from Loch's class, which isn't surprising because his teachers have been consistently amazing in his Math & Science program. The winner goes on to state level next.
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Add to this both kids are still in music lessons, Cub Scouts and now swim team which has practice twice a week and Saturday meets and you have one very tired mama!
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Finn wants grandma to know that he's been busy, too!
Finn showing his improved time ribbon in the Freestyle, and Loch finished 1st place in the 50m Backstroke. They are on the same team so there is a bit of brotherly competition!
Yes, I have completely lost my mind:
I am a stroke and turn judge at the meets. Go ahead and laugh... just don't swim in my lane or I'll get revenge in the form of two letters: D. Q. ! (insert evil laughter here)
I do get to be up on deck the whole time, but consequently can't really watch what my own kids are doing, and one day I am going to have one of my own kids in my lanes and face the possibility of DQ'ing my own kids :)
I did manage to get one video at last Saturday's meet. Loch is in Lane 2 (lane 1 is unoccupied so he's the swimmer on the left). When you watch just imagine how much faster he'd be if he didn't stop at the turn to do his hair and makeup... but I can't get on him too much, he was 1st place!
Sorry this post reads like a big brag book, but it's months worth of activity and I got to get rid of all the guilt I have been feeling for not posting the boys' stuff for the grandparents! I think we may be up to date now on their shenanigans.
Good Ness. When do you three get time to eat and sleep? And now, let's hope that all the DDs are over for the duration. That is really quite enough to go wrong. Congratulations to Loch! What a smarty-pants! You have every right in the world to be proud of your boys - and don't forget to give yourself a good pat on the back, too. You are a great mom!
ReplyDeleteI'm going to eat when the kids go to bed! It's 7:30 and we just got home, ugh.
DeleteStud. Muffin. That's what you are, my friend. Get 'em.
ReplyDeleteRibbit, HA!
DeleteYer nuts, NUTS I tell ya! My head swims every time you start talking about all the stuff you pack into a day/week/month/etc.
ReplyDeleteCarolyn see... I was afraid I would portray the wrong image and I did! I am barely keeping my head above water and just. want. it. to. stop! I would really like to be quilting, planning my spring garden, knitting... all I do is run around with my head cut off LOL
DeletePretty cool stuff the kids (and you) are up to. I had to laugh at your comment on Loch's backstroke turn. When I was on the swim team, I could never compete in backstroke because I would get to the end and bash my head. Could never figure out how to do that fancy backstroke turn where it looks like they flip over or something.
ReplyDeleteYou should suggest that next year's Leggo Robotics project be to create something that pulls weeds...
Chipmunk, haha! I have to keep telling the boys "swim until you hit that wall, don't turn over to look or you will get disqualified"! They can sort of do those flip turns but at this age they can just do wall touch. I had to DQ a kid last week, poor guy was so eager to show off his flip turn that he did it like 5 feet away from the wall and never actually touched the wall with his feet. It's hard for them they want to do it the "cool way" so badly but have to get it right first :)
DeleteYou have every reason to be proud of those boys. Your swim meet videos brought back memories of going to swim meets when my little brother was in swim club. At least you don't have to get up at 4am to get to hockey practice like my mom used to do to take my brother to hockey. LOL!
ReplyDeleteLooks like your boys are doing great.
Sparkless, thank goodness hockey isn't "a thing" in the South. Even though I LOVE hockey, its so darn expensive compared to swimming and you just gave me another reason to be thankful! I remember driving for hours to go to hockey games in high school, can't imagine at 4 am!
Deletegreat
ReplyDeletenice stuff
thanks for sharing