Portrait of the Artist

 The kids have art for half the year and music for half the year, so Matthew brought home his artwork the other week. He had some really cool pieces, including this excellent dog and both a two-dimensional and three-dimensional doughnut!

Gold Star Meet

 Last weekend was the Gold Star Invitational Meet in Niagara Falls. It was an improvement over previous years because we had the noon session rather than the 8 AM one, and because it was chilly but not freezing!  :)

James had a good meet -- he came in first on rings and third all around, with some other medals in there as well.  They combined some of the age groups this time since there were a smaller number of boys competing, so the boys who came in first and second were actually James's teammates who are not usually in his age group. His team won first place.

Videos here: https://photos.app.goo.gl/8P6b5tUUQKvxFJpb9

Matthew got to stay home with a babysitter this time, and they had fun going shopping and making pasta and shrimp with a cream sauce!  Very tasty!

Beagles and Bubbles

 Here are a few more pictures from the vacation -- a good time was had by people and dogs alike!  :)  James enjoyed the parks even though he bashed his shin on one of the Depot park domes and ended up with a very impressive bruise.  The Nerf guns are not pictured but the cousins had a great time playing with them. 

Winter Coding

 The boys were still off school last week (today was their first day back), but they enjoyed themselves at camp at the Coder School. Matthew did a Python camp, and James did one with a mix of different activities (3D printing, Scratch).

Matthew's coding teacher said he had really good reasoning abilities, and also a good temperament for coding -- he didn't get discouraged if things didn't go right the first time. Way to go, Matthew!

Chilly Swim

 As usual, the boys went swimming in Florida even though it was too cold for sensible people to swim. :)

Happy New Year!

We just did a quiet New Year's Eve at home this year. James came down with a bad cold, so he had to miss the gymnastics sleepover (to his great disappointment). And our other friends who we had planned to celebrate with were unfortunately in the hospital because their baby girl had breathing difficulties due to RSV.  (Update: She is better now and was able to come home over the weekend!)

Hope you all have a wonderful new year!