Medieval Times 5-6 Jan 2013

We have our annual tradition over the holidays of making graham cracker houses for Christmas, and then when New Years comes we stage a large battle scene with fire and soldiers to destroy them. This year we had a Medieval theme for which I built a castle that ended up pretty cool, and others gave it a more castle-type theme. Brittany & Matt were down for the holidays, and even my son-in-law  made a miniature Minas Tirith from LOTR. The fire that rains from the sky (napalm in our army scenarios) we determined was dragon fire and flamed ordinance from catapults. In reality we use a lengthy piece of plastic to drip the flame down from a ladder with a zipping sound - our whiffle bat worked quite well and we also mixed in a plastic sand shovel. An old set of Weapons and Warriors that we were going to throw out served well for our red & blue medieval soldiers, and the catapults and ballista added a nice touch along with some trees. We didn't use any fireworks this year, but Hannah, Jonathan, Caleb and Sarah all got to drip the fire to cool effect. The fire raged pretty quick and my castle was reduced to complete rubble and few soldiers survived. But with the glow of the flames I captured all the carnage with my camera.

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Sarah and Silent Phantom

My daughter Sarah and I had a rare treat this weekend, we had some time to ourselves and watched Phantom of the Opera together. This has always been a treat that we have shared, we both loved the movie adaptation of the musical and have often sung the songs together. But this occasion was different as I had recorded the original 1925 silent film version that starred Lon Chaney as the Phantom. I didn't know if Sarah would be able to sit through the whole thing with no dialogue except for occasional text slides to read that were shown intermittedly. But we were both enthralled with it! It was captivating and we found ourselves singing some of the musical dialogue at the appropriate times during the movie as part of the storyline. It is actually a pretty good movie, and I have always been an admirerer of Lon Chaney, the "Man of a Thousand Faces" who was in so many monster movies. Growing up as a young kid I would read about him and even create and put on my own monster movie make-up to be like him.

 When it got to the masquerade ball, the film had some color in it, rare in those days. It was striking as the Phantom appeared in a red costume and a skull mask. The coolest part was the rooftop scene with Christine and Raoul, with the Phantom on a statue and his red cape and costume billowing in the wind.
 

This Phantom story and the music have always been something that Sarah and I have shared over the years. When she was quite young (age 3) we would play the DVD with the subtitles on (I didn't know the words as well as she did) and we would sing and act out the scene on the roof between Christine and Raoul, singing "All I Ask of You." Sarah would always have a rose in hand, and would kiss me as Christine (Shell would also fill in as Phantom when needed!).

 

We performed it together at a family reunion in Southern Utah once, and even used it to try out for a stake musical together. It has kind of been "our" song. Of course it became a couple costume for us at Halloween time as well.



When the musical came locally to the Segerstrom Performing Arts center, I gave her tickets for her birthday for us to see it together. We got all dressed up as a formal daddy-daughter date, she felt so regal walking into the theater. It was an AMAZING musical that we will not forget, with the crashing chandelier and disappearance of the Phantom in the end. These will always be special memories that I have shared with Sarah.

Family Games - Get a Clue!

Sarah had been playing with our edition of Clue most of the afternoon so we played it as our activity for family night. Jonathan was not in a good mood so we had a hard time convincing him to play, but he grudgingly agreed finally. He loves Xbox and computer games, so of course a boardgame is much more tedious for him and he rarely has the patience though he does have good gaming skills. So we began and most of us were into it except for Jonathan but he made a few notes. We went around on the first turn and some got to make some accusations to narrow it down, but on my turn (going last) I only rolled enough to move but not enter a room to make a guess. Jonathan was still not into the game, but on his second turn he put in a guess for the room, suspect and weapon. And he nailed it! HE WON BEFORE I GOT MY SECOND TURN OR WAS EVEN ABLE TO ENTER A ROOM! Hannah was stunned with mouth open as Jonathan just got up and walked away. I think he gleefully enjoyed that, but was even more happy that he didn't havce to play that long.
(As a side note, that is probably a reason why I don't like that game as much, but will still play it. I prefer and recommend Mystery Express for a murder mystery deduction game.)

Family Games with Dolphins

My beautiful Sarah the gamer

Actually had some time at the end of Family night to play a game with Michelle and Sarah, and their game of choice was Aquaretto. We had always liked Zooloretto when it first came out, a great family game with a decent amount of strategy and a fun family theme of zoo animals. My daughters Brittany and Hannah always like it as they had played Zoo Tycoon for years on the computer. Aquaretto was a real step up as you had to create your own "pools" for aquatic animals instead of pre-defined exhibits. It made for more strategy, along with earning workers that could be used in a variety of ways for points. My favorite mechanic from these Michael Schacht games is the placement of tiles on different "trucks", then choosing the timing of when to take a truck. You can choose early and get a few of what you want but run low in animals, or wait and take a full truck but risk being forced to takes animals you don't want (and will score against you). In this game I went for trainers as my workers and was able to collect and place Orca, Dolphins & Seals that scored more off of trainers. My cute little Sarah (not so little at age 10) always seems up to playing a game and is pretty smart in figuring out strategy.

Brittany to the 10th Degree

Maybe its just because she is the oldest, but Brittany is amazing/shocking me in everything that she does. Living on her own, engaged, and now she completes her Associates Degree at BYUIdaho! We packed the car and did the road trip up to Utah and then Idaho to pick her up. Her college degree isn't the only think that is hot, as the thermometer is hitting triple digits in four states after Cali: Arizona, Nevada, Utah & Idaho! But it is way cool to see Brittany in her element at school and helping her move out of her apartment. We got to go to lunch with her at one of her hangouts, and just see how grown-up she is in checking out of school. She even got a college graduation tassle for 2012 that we are hanging from the mirror! I cannot believe what a mature woman she is, and I see how much her sisters Hannah & Sarah look up to her. So many changes going on for her right now, and this is going to be the last few weeks that we have her before I need to "give her away." She is so classy, and I am so proud of her. Here's to you Brippy!

My gorgeous girls . . .

. . . who can put away the food!

Shell's Idaho "moment"

Brit's last Idaho apartment

The boys came with us to Utah, but we didn't have room for them up to Idaho!

Happy endings leaving Idaho

Rockets Red Glare

Our family has always enjoyed doing our own fireworks show. It reminds me of when I was young and we did them in front of our house. We have made it a tradition since we moved back to California to do a family fireworks show in my work parking lot in Costa Mesa. We did it mainly because fireworks have been illegal in HB/FV, but even though they are legal in HB this year, we like our traditions. A few families join us for our small celebration, and as our kids get older they have taken the reigns from dad in lighting up the event. So I got to sit back and take a few pictures:

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Dizzyland

Good times at Disneyland with the family. We miss Brittany, but we can still have a good time with the rest of the family in Cali!

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