Family
- Italian Opera
- Love ❤️
- 7:30a Good morning! Coffee at Fairgrounds.
- 8:40a Breakfast at Wildberry. 30 min wait for table already.
- Walk all around “The Bean”, Millennium Park and surrounding area.
- 1:00p Pick up car.
- 1:22p First time at Home Run Inn pizza.
- 2:34p Enter Indiana.
- 3:04p Visit Albanese Candy Factory.
- Now in Eastern Time.
- 6:13p Pass Through Indianapolis.
- 7:45p Gas and snack stop in Columbus, IN.
- 8:54p Enter Kentucky, crossing the Ohio River.
- 9:18p Checked into the coolest Airbnb in Louisville, KY.
- Tyler picked one of the six starting numbers, 3!
- Jamie got to be part of the mentalist section, selecting three items at random from the audience: REI Member card, Tyler’s retainer box, and back scratcher. Watkins got them all!
- Tyler got to shake the dice in the shot glass. Rolled a 6!
- Mazie got to pick the order of the cards that went up his sleeve and into his pocket.
- Tyler identified one of the 10 cards, 10 of ♠️.
Mazie started her Christmas LEGO today too, the Roller Coaster! 🎢 She has already complete the Carousel 🎠 and Ferris Wheel 🎡 and this will complete that set. We may need to create a motorized display for these.
Land of Things Christmas Puzzle
Today Tammy put together this years custom Christmas Puzzle that we made for her and it came out really well. It was definitely the hardest puzzle we have created yet. We titled it “Land of Things”.
And here it is put together in 18x24" 500 piece jigsaw puzzle.
We took a unique approach this year. Tyler and I have been having fun with Townscaper so I asked Tyler to create the overall base of the puzzle using Townscaper. He used the iPad and spent a while creating various islands and buildings. We thematically tied each location to houses and neighborhoods we have lived in. We also included our cabin as an island that you had to get to by boat.
After we had the scene in Townscaper I loaded the city on the desktop version of Townscaper in Steam because it could render it larger and export a higher quality image. Using a screenshot on the iPad wasn’t high enough resolution.
I took that image and then we loaded it into Procreate and Mazie went to work drawing on top of it. We added grass, various scenes, decorated some things, a big sea dragon, etc. The details were really great.
Notice the GEM Tomatoes stand that was so awesome in our old neighborhood.
Our old neighborhood in Minnetonka with the Rock’s next door having rocks in their yard.
Lucky is hanging out in the back yard playing with a tennis ball.
I love the lighthouse with people hanging out on it, and the ice cream shop with people waiting in line.
We could have spent so much more time adding special details but we had to finish, we took well over our deadline as it is. It is incredible how much time a good jigsaw puzzle takes to design!
We are already thinking about 2022’s Christmas Puzzle! 🧩
Mazie is making steady progress learning to drive. This is not a view I’m used to.
We all enjoyed watching A Boy Called Christmas tonight. Mazie and Tyler had read the book. It was a great new Christmas movie for all. 🎅
Tyler and I played as a team and came in 2nd in Ticket to Ride Japan. It is a fun variant with the community bullet train encouraging some cooperative play.
The two most important ingredients when making lasagna are:
Mazie and I made this pan with plenty of love, and the Three Tenors accompanying us!
We all volunteered at Free Bikes 4 Kidz today. Tammy, Mazie, and Tyler did cleaning of donated bikes. I tried my hand at the mechanic station working on derailers, brakes, truing wheels and a lot of other stuff I didn’t know how to do. 😊
We stopped in at SI Hobby in downtown Faribault for their grand opening today! Tyler got a few Pokémon card packs. We arrived about 10 minutes after they opened the doors and there was already a good crowd of people there. 👍
Our first year with the garden was a good success. We learned a lot and had successes and misses. Tammy and Mazie reset everything so we are ready to plant in the spring. We are giving one box just to strawberries.
Tyler and I had an awesome time at the Dude Perfect 2021 Tour! We got tickets two years ago but it was moved due to COVID-19. The show was great. Funny skits, great tricks. Awesome Father-Son time! Shake Shack for dinner before. 🤩
Creativity on Shoes with Kicasso
On our final evening in Indianapolis we did a completely new thing — we painted shoes! Kicasso is a one of a kind experience where you take a plain, white pair of sneakers and express your creativity with them. We had a blast and it was a great experience for us all.
We all took very different paths. I made what may go down as the geekiest shoes ever commemorating the 200th issue of the Weekly Thing. Tammy hit on her favorite color, green, and kept it simple and awesome. Mazie tends to take a lot of time, she likes to be a perfectionist. She created a great multi-color pair with light touches of color and glitter. Tyler went all over with the color and was the only one that decided to paint the whitewall of the soles as well, which he sort of wanted to undo but its paint! 🎨
Overall it was a fabulous 2.5 hours and we had a great time expressing our creativity with our shoes! The folks behind Kicasso aren’t aware of anyone else doing this, so if you are in Indianapolis this should be on your must do list!
MEA 2021 Road Trip Day 2: Chicago to Louisville
Weather: Wonderful weather. Sunny in Chicago. Clear weather for entire drive.
Part of MEA 2021 collection.
Mazie and Tyler both love Home Run Inn frozen pizza. We made a point to try it “in real life” in Chicago, skipping the freezer aisle for the first time. Everyone loved it and thought the frozen option was amazingly close to the “real thing”.
Another amazing night of magic with Dennis Watkins at The Magic Parlour! My third time and it still blows my mind.
This is up close magic and we got to be part of things:
If you are in Chicago I highly recommend taking the whole family to this.
Related: Magic Parlour via Zoom.
Mazie did some parking lot driving for the first time tonight! We found an empty parking lot and did start / stop, figured out some basic turning, and a little backing up. She did really great!
Tyler introduced the family to Machi Koro tonight and we had a great time playing it. Easy to learn, fast to play, and fun strategy options.
Mazie doing homework.
Mazie: Dad, do you know what a polyatomic ion is?
Me: Ahhhh, no.
Me now reading Wikipedia.
Officially entered into that stage where your kids homework is too hard for me.
Tyler and I after our team won today’s Edina Soccer match. I’ve been having a great time coaching the boys. They’ve won all four of their first games. ⚽️🤩
We made some more Wicky Thing Candles this morning. 🕯
Mazie’s job was cutting down wax for the melting pots. She had some fun with the wax while doing it. 🤩
Mazie made a Peach Melba Pie today. “I’M A PIE” 🤤🥧
