Lego Ninja Warrior - Stage 2

And Joseph has done it! Presenting...

American Ninja Warrior 2013, the National Finals Obstacle Course - STAGE 2

Let's take a look at what you've got there, Joseph...

The minifigure that will be attempting to beat stage 2 here is Joe Moravsky (Here's the video of him doing it in real life). First the Slider Drop then onto the Double Salmon Ladder -

(I liked how Joseph had the minifigure do it by hanging it on string - like a little marionette puppet...)

"I thought he couldn't do the salmon ladder? Boy, Weather man by day, Superman by night..."

(I thought Joseph's version of the Salmon ladder was really cool, you can make anything with Legos!)

"Across the Unstable Bridge..."

"No problem and on to the Balance Tank!"

"He's sizing up the Metal Spin..."

"He makes a big jump and a great grab on the chain...."

"And just 30 seconds to get through the Wall Lifts!"

"And he's done it! Joe Moravsky is our first Stage 2 finisher!"

"Man, I'm so happy for Joe, what a moment for this young man! Joe the weather man, skies looking bright for him!" And for our Joe here, Joseph Wride's next lego task is making Brian Arnold taking on Stage 3... coming soon to a playroom near us.

S'mores Pudding Dessert

I made this dessert for dinner last night. Super easy to make. Put the following ingredients in a cup in this order:

roughly broken graham crakers

marshmallows

chocolate pudding

whipped cream

sprinkle with chocolate chips

Having this visually tempting dessert sitting on the bar was highly effective in getting the kids to eat their dinner. Only Lily missed out. I got the goods to make this after finding it in my recipe book where it's been for 5+ years but never been made. (I think I've finally about got the plan-your-meals-for-dinner-before-going-grocery-shopping thing down to a system!!) The kids were super excited... (Can you tell?)

We've got another variety of this on the menu soon. I worked so well cause we played the "If you're naughty dad takes a bite of your dessert" game, so the kids all behaved very well. Sophi was the cutest, cause she repeatedly tried to drink hers pudding parfait.

 Hyrum showed her how it would work better with a spoon.

 "Thanks Hyrum, ol' buddy. I'll take it from here."

(And I was proud of myself cause I had such a big salad to work on that I didn't even get tempted with the treat, I didn't have even one chocolate chip! woo!)

Nap Time

Apparently the hard floor sounded better to Sophi then her bed and pillow. Perhaps cause it feels nice and cool. I love how her little toes are pointed in.

Princesses

Mel was holding Natalie on Sunday, then she wasn't, and I asked her where Natalie was ~ "She's asleep on your bed." I go to check on her...

Melodie seems to have felt that Natalie wanted to play dress up. Well, she is a Sleeping Beauty, so I guess it's appropriate.

Later that night, Lily was playing with the princess barbies and she tells me about her game ~ "They are having a birthday party..."

 

"...but she (below) can't come... cause she doesn't have any clothes..." 

 "...so she asked her mom if she could take a bath.... forever..."

I thought that was really funny. Yup. You don't have any clothes you say? Well, it's into a tub you go for the rest of your life until you can find some. I told the other kids what she said and then we all shared some "Lily said this" stories. Ethan said that he and Joseph were goofing off around Lily sometime last week and she was getting annoyed with them. When she'd had enough, she scolded them as she stomped out of the room saying "You guys are killing my life!!" We all thought that was cute. And here's one more. Lily and Abi were drawing pictures, Abi drew a picture of Lily's Zebra stuffed animal and didn't like how it turned out and so she crossed it out with an x afterwards. Lily was very upset, "Abi! You break-ted my heart AND you're breaking my feelings!!" Abi replied "But I will draw a better one..." Lily paused then quietly said "...better? (another pause) OK! Abi  now you fixed my heart!" Lily went back to her drawing and happily said to herself with a giggle "Hehe! All fixed!"

Baby Harness

When Natalie was born, they did all their little newborn exam things, and her hips didn't pass the test they did to see if they were in joint, both of her hips slid a little bit when they pushed on them, aka Hip Click or Hip Dysplasia. So she's gone in for 2 appointments with an Orthopedic and she's had an ultrasound, they said to come back in 4 weeks so they could see if it fixed itself on it's own. Well, she had her follow up ultrasound and doctor appointment today, and her right hips has corrected itself, but the left one is still over half out of the socket, so....

 Into the baby harness she goes.

Looks slightly uncomfortable. She has to wear this for 4 weeks (20 hours a day) and then after her follow-up hopefully everything will be normal and she'll be free to go. Now that the cool fall weather is here, I'll just have her wear some light sleeper pjs and that should keep her from getting scratched or irritated by any of the velcro. She's being a good sport. So hopefully the hip dyspasia should fix itself in another 4 weeks. Until then, the harness looks like a big deal and so I know she will be getting lots of extra sympathy and kisses and love from her siblings. I'm sure their hearts will break for her when the see her after school - "Oh! Poor Natalie!!!!" Pretty baby.

American Ninja Warrior Legos

Joseph's been busy this weekend making American Ninja Warrior legos - here we have Stage 1 from Season 5 - watch Stage 1 here if you want to see the real thing and see how Joseph's version compares. I was impressed, and am glad that there is still something that captures this teenager's childhood imagination. Have to take pictures of it for his posterity, so he can teach his children all about his awesome creations when he was a kid.

Joseph has a Brian Arnold minifigure doing Stage 1 here, it's Joe Moravsky in the Stage 1 video. Moravsky will make his appearance in Joseph's lego set for Stage 2. And Brain Arnold is ready for his run...

No problem going through the Timbers...

Quickly through the Giant Cycle, Brian is wasting no time...

Next down the Rope Glider... and Brian just flying through the first three obstacles!

Now for the Jumping Spider... nothing is certain with this obstacle, the Jumping Spider has taken out nearly half of our competitors during these Stage 1 finals...

 And he sticks it! The Jumping Spider no problem for Brian!

Next up the Half Pike Attack... Oooh, nice speed and excellent grab! Brian has all the right moves so far!

 Right up the Warped Wall... Amazing! Brian looking very comfortable

Now the Spinning Bridge, one mis-step and he could end up in that water... er, fall on those lego bumps. The key here is speed and balance... Look at that! I love his approach!

Up to the Tarzan Rope - Brian Arnold is just a climb away from advancing to Stage 2!

Look at this! Brian Arnold up the Final Climb, and he is on his way...

 And he's done it!!! 

Now all the other kids get to let their Minifigures compete. We'll see who makes it to Stage 2 when we come back on AMERICAN LEGO NINJA WARRIOR!

Ninja Boys

Last night on our date, I was rolling my eyes a bit as I told Corey how Joe can't just walk up stairs anymore, he has to do the "jumping spider" and land himself between the walls and then scoot up the stairs. He's training Ethan, and I'm slightly worried about a hole being smashed though the sheet rock and also see that there will be a lot of dirty smudge marks from dirty feet on the walls soon too. So as I laughingly complained, Corey said "Well, what did you expect!" Ya can't get the kids excited about Ninja Warrior and then try to stop them from training. It's cute. I'll just make them wash the walls every night. And they gotta move it outside if they break something.

Here's Joseph going up the warped wall... er, closet -

"And he's done it!"

Coming up the basement stairs..

 "...And now for the transition..."

(It's pretty funny, cause they are their own commentators during their competitions)
"This one's all about upper body strength..."

And they do a little leap frog thing with the barstools, pretty funny. Not exactly a Monkey Vault, but they're trying.

Ya gotta work with what you got.... Joe's making a 100 days goal to be able to do 25 pull ups. (He said 15, but I'm making him do 25, cause he can already so 10, I think in 3 months he could easily double that.) So we're all setting some "100 days" goals today, it's 100 days from today until the year is over. What's your goal?

Dad the Magician

Corey plays a little "slight of hand" trick with the little kids that they think is really fun. He'll take something small like a lego minifigure and appear to put it in one hand, but really he drops it through his almost clasped hand and into his other hand, then he blows his empty hand to reveal that the lego has disappeared.

Then he'll pull it out of Sophi's mouth/ear/belly button or something of the like.

There's Sophi opening her mouth for the great reveal.

As they played this game, we all got a good laugh at how cute Sophia was.

She's a cutie pants and a smartie pants.