Robotics Team

This year, the kids' elementary school started a robotics team for kids in grades three and up, which Olivia joined.  Olivia absolutely loved participating on this team and looked forward to her weekly practice.  During the first several meetings, the team worked on learning about robots, STEM, and the correct terminology that would be used to assemble the robots.  After a month or so of this, the students began working in small groups to assemble the robots.  Once the robots were assembled, the team met to practice the skills that would be needed for competition.  The sponsors had hoped to host an elementary competition, but there are no other elementary robotics teams in our area, so it was a no-go.  Instead, they decided to end the year by having a skills competition with all of the members of the team competing against each other.  The kids took turns driving the robot through an obstacle course.  They received points for completing each obstacle.  Olivia did well on her run (below).  She did hit one cone, but had a clean run other than that.  She and another kid ended up tied for first, and they had to defer to time to see who completed the course the fastest.  Wouldn't you know they had the exact same time.  So, they had to run the course a second time.  Olivia's had a perfect second run, and she ended up in first place.  She is really looking forward to participating in this activity again next year.

Region Tech Fair

 Back in December Olivia entered a project in her school system's tech fair and placed second in Multimedia for the 3rd-4th grade band.  The top two contestants from the county were able to advance to regionals, which took place last weekend.  Knowing that there would be tough competition at the region fair, Olivia went back and "spiced up" her project.  Her hard work payed off because she placed first and will attend the state competition in March. She also took an Online test (the "Technology Literacy Challenge") and ended up receiving a second place medal for that.  We are so proud of Liv's hard work and dedication to her project.

Paris Room

We have been talking about redecorating Olivia's room for over a year now.  She wanted to switch from a "princess" room to a "Paris" room.  The three-day Martin Luther King weekend day seemed like a great time to go ahead and complete our project.  We spent our time repainting (a slightly darker shade of pink), rearranging furniture, and hanging new decorations.  Olivia is very pleased with the finished product, and now Owen is putting in to have his room redecorated.

Wild Adventures

 Happy 2016!  After dealing with Olivia's illness for a week and a half, we had two full days of everyone being well before Owen got sick (hooray).  In those two days we managed to see the new Star Wars movie and make a visit to Wild Adventures to get our 2016 season passes.  We didn't have passes in 2015, so it has been a year since we've been. The kids loved revisiting their favorite rides and attractions.  We look forward to a year of rides, concerts, and waterpark fun.