Utah Vacation - Day 1

We left Easter Sunday for sunny St. George, Utah, for a fast-paced (would we do it any other way) 3-day vacation with Gramma & Grampa. After breakfast, we grabbed the 4-wheeler and big wheel (sand motorcycle) and headed for the dunes at Sand Hollow park.

The boys were a little more than excited to ride around. The weather was absolutely perfect and the scenery even better. We had blue skies, orange sand, snow on the mountain, clear water, and 80°. The concept of public lands is good for the soul. JP & I rode up on top of sand mountain to take in the scenery.

Too bad St. George isn't a hotbed of engineering jobs.

Easter Sunrise

As usual, the boys were up before the dawn on Easter. The Grammas were here, so we had a real sit-down dinner and the Easter bunny came and went and left some goodies.

Springtime orienteering

Today we went orienteering with the cub scout pack for our March activity. Last year at this time, we enjoyed blue skies and warm weather. This year it was cloudy, cold, and breezy. JP gave up after CP took her neck gaiter. I think she enjoyed watching the snowflakes from inside the van.

The boys all had fun, as they were bundled up and more active than the adults.

The Grammas arrived Thursday on their way to OK City to see RK. He got home last week after serving in Iraq.

That's the way we've always done it.

Sorry, no pictures - I just need to vent a little.

The official Nebraska motto is "That's the way we've always done it."

This week the Lincoln city council voted to keep their tradition of allowing council members to have business contracts with the city. Their reasoning: "That's the way we've always done it." The news girl covering the story kept talking about it as if it was an issue of fairness, not ethics.

Our cub scout cubmaster has his own goofy way of choosing which dens do what during the monthly pack meetings. This entire year, the tiger cubs (1st graders) have done everything while the older, more capable boys have done nothing. The tiger cubs can barely read, much less do skits and group demonstrations. When I suggested that perhaps the older kids should be doing the more age-appropriate activities, I got "That's the way we've always done it."

This is the land of the eternal comfort zone. If change scares the pants off you, come to Nebraska where you can stay the same forever and ever.

CP's new Look

CP is growing up and has joined the 4-eyes club. He's fired up about his new glasses.

Paper V-2

This weekend we worked on GP's balsa Hawker Hurricane and finished up the paper V-2 that has been sitting around for months. One of the cool things from the 'net is the availability of card models. Just download and print and you now have several pages of small parts to cutout and glue together to make something big. Most of the V-2 was OK, but last night I worked for an hour assembling one of four steering vane assemblies (1/2" x 3/8" made of several pieces of paper). This morning I found it smashed, so I decided that the other three were not worth the effort. I found plans for a 36" paper model of the USS Arizona. It looks like it would require more work than I am willing to spend. Besides, within a month we will be starting on our deck, and then a MAME cabinet, and who knows what else. We have so much planned for summer already, I almost feel like it's over before it has started.

Last trip to the Zoo?

Last weekend was nice and we all had a bad case of spring fever, so we headed east and hit the Henry Doorly zoo in Omaha.

As we wandered around, I couldn't help to wonder if this would be our last visit to the zoo. Our annual membership is up in April and the boys are getting older and don't get into it like they used to.