Merry Christmas

 We had a very merry Christmas this year full of food, fun, and family.  The festivities began after the evening church service on Christmas Eve.  We went to my parents' house for our traditional Christmas Eve spaghetti dinner.  Everyone was there except for Sam who had to work.  After the meal, we opened gifts.  Everyone received many nice things.  My siblings and I all went in together to buy a new t.v. for mama and daddy.  Their old one was completely shot; you could barely see anything on the screen.  Needless to say they were surprised. 

Christmas morning brought gifts from Santa.  The kids each received clothes, shoes, a travel pillow, and a video game.   Later that morning, Granny Mel arrived and we opened our family gifts.  Brian and I gave the kids their own Vex robot, and they were really excited to receive those.

We went to Granny and Papa Buie's for lunch. I enjoyed catching up with all of my aunts, uncles, and cousins.  It was a great (and exhausting) day.

Christmas Lights

Christmas Day was on a Monday this year.  Because everyone arrived to town the weekend before Christmas, we were able to spend a few extra days with our family members.  On Saturday night several of us went to see the Lewis Lights in Hortense.  The Lewis family puts up a fantastic display of lights each year and invites the public to see them for free.  Not only this, but they also include a free hay ride and give out free hot chocolate.  We were amazed not only by the lights but also by the generosity of this family. The whole experience definitely put us in a festive mood for Christmas.

Church Christmas Performance

The kids Blast group put on a wonderful Christmas pageant this year in which they told the story of the first Christmas and sang a few songs.  It was so precious. 











Olivia's role was as one of the narrators.  She got to be on stage and interact with two of her buddies, and all three of these girls did a great job.

 Owen was Gabriel.  I always knew he was a little angel. 

 I cannot get over how seriously cute the performance was.  Each kid had a role, and their roles well suited their talents. 

 After one of the performances, the kids had a Christmas party and Santa showed up!  The kids weren't expecting this, and they all screamed with delight when he walked in.  Even the older kids were eager to sit in the lap of Ole' Saint Nick. 

I'm so thankful for the young kids in our church and all of the energy that they bring.

Snow Mountain

After the December robotics competition, the kids and I stayed overnight at Cassie and Nick's new house (which is super nice).  We got the grand tour of their new digs and played with the boys.  The next day Olivia, Owen, and I made a detour to "Snow Mountain" at Stone Mountain Park.  This is an annual event where the park sets up a snow tubing track on the large hill in front of the mountain.  The snow is manufactured, so it's really more like ice.  That doesn't matter, though.  The ice/snow may even help the tubes go faster (?).  We have never been tubing, but it was so much fun.  The tubes went down a lot faster than I thought that they would.  They had narrow tracks for single or double tubes, and then there was a larger track for family tubes that could hold up to eight people at a time.  We rode each several times.





We had a two-hour window in which we could enjoy the event, and we made the most of our time.  While we were waiting in line to get our tubing passes, we saw one of the kids' friends from school and robotics.  We ended up hanging out with their friend and his family.  The kids liked having someone other than each other to play with. 

 In addition to the tubing hill there was also a snow play area.  I think the kids liked this as much as the tubing.  They dug in the snow, threw snowballs, and made a snow (ice) man.

We had a great time at Snow Mountain.  We never get snow in our part of the state, and it was nice to be able to participate in a traditional cold-weather activity. 

Fall Robotics

The VEX IQ robotics season is in full swing.  We have already been to three competitions.  This year's game is called "ringmaster" and the students have to design robots that can pick up different colored rings and put them on poles.  Olivia and Owen's school has four competition robots this year, and both kids are on a team.

Olivia is on team A.  The A robot has finished well in every competition and has made it to the finals twice.  Olivia continues to be really interested in robotics.  At this point, she says that she wants to be an engineer when she grows up, and I think that her involvement on the robotics team has had a lot to do with this.

Owen was excited to learn that he had been selected for a robotics team this year.  He is with robot C, and his team has also done well- they even made it to the finals at the last competition.  This is Owen's first year working with the robots (whereas it is Olivia's third), so he's still finding his footing a bit.  He loves it, though.  He is really glad that he no longer has to go to the competitions and just watch.

 We continue to have the only VEX IQ robotics team south of the Atlanta area, so we have to travel four-five hours for every competition.  It's not so bad, though.  The sponsors always take the kids to a pizza place that has an arcade for lunch, and the kids love that.  Another bonus is that sometimes we can squeeze in a visit with Cassie, Nick, and the nephews.  Cassie even brought the boys to one of the competitions.  Olivia and Owen loved showing off their cousins to their friends.  We have at least one more competition in February, and then we'll cross our fingers and hope that we get a bid to the state finals.

Tech Fair

Both of the kids participated in the local technology fair this year, and they both chose to complete a project in the area of digital game design.  Olivia used the program "Scratch" to create a game called "Trash Sort".  The object of the game was to put paper, plastic, and aluminum waste items into the appropriate recycling bins.  She ended up getting a third place medal.

Owen used the program "Bloxels" to create a game called "Stayin' Alive".  It was a Mario-type game where a character is trying to complete a level without dying.  He did not place, but I am proud of his effort. 

The technology fair is a wonderful opportunity for students to showcase and present their work.  I am so glad that our school system encourages students to participate in this worthwhile venture.