A personality

If you quickly scroll through this post to view the photos, you may think it's about having some fun on a climbing wall...but it's not.

It's really about
a p e r s o n a l i t y

Here you see Mike a good way up the wall, a really tough wall that many experienced climbers give up on. Don't see much to hold on to, do you?

Well, Mike was in this position for about 15 minutes. Every new hold he tried just wouldn't get him any higher.

Sometimes he'd move down a bit to see if he could find alternative holds, then go back up again...only to be stymied--over and over.


If you really try to imagine just how long 15 minutes is while hanging from a couple of toes and fingertips, you can now realize that the idea of "fun" has now left the imagination.

It's now mind over matter...over physical discomfort, over mental strain...over the fact that our hour in the gym was WAY overdue!

I kept thinking he'd see the situation as futile and come back down and find a different wall to try.

Even his taller, lighter, flexible, determined twin sister had tried this wall and had to scrap the mission.

But no.
He's very persistent when he sets his mind to something.

Around the 20-25 minute mark, he finally made it to the top and rang the bell.

His sibs and a group of experienced climbers in the area heard the bell and came over to see him up there--one of the toughest walls.

The older experienced climbers (handicapped with added weight) showed their admiration by clapping.

Mikey grinned and came down.

A personality...

Satisfied.

In the mind of Mikey

Along with Kathleen's pile of drawings and other papery projects covering a table in our school room, Mikey made his contribution to the heap.

He's steady in his work and not one to disappoint.
So, as you can imagine, his creations are of...vehicles.

Some *wearing* exciting things

I was informed that this is a monster truck with
a front slider, coil overs, and reservoir shocks.

Some *doing* exciting things

A mudder with a supercharger--making a muddy projectile mess.

For the record, this next one is Mike's favorite drawing.

A rock-crawling Jeep Comanche using its winch.

My only concern with this drawing is that there is no longer a driver in the vehicle.

What happened to him?

Does his mother know that he was driving precariously over boulders near the tundra line among snow-capped mountains?

Did he leave a trail plan with a park ranger before he started his off-road journey?

Did he bring a sweater?


A go kart
I can handle peddle go karts.
I think.

Diagramming vehicles from various perspectives is also a trend with Mike's drawings.

He started doing this when he was around 7 years old. After we took a ride on Uncle Bob's houseboat down the Mississippi, Mikey came back and started drawing the whole boat from different angles--some of which he had never actually seen.

Channeling his inner da Vinci:

Okay, I was caught a little off guard with the next one. NOT a vehicle?

Besides Mike thinking about vehicles, I'm usually not sure what else goes through his mind. So I must ask:

"What's this flow chart?"

"Is this a diagram of your mind showing how you file and retrieve information?"

He says, "Oh, that's a diagram of a bunch of slide outs. I imagined all of the little boxes sliding into each other and all fitting into the largest box."

"I drew that a LONG time ago when I was little."

(Interpretation: "A long time ago" = sometime last school year)


* * * * * * *
Now that he's not so "little," what does he make?

Drawing in 2-D > Building in 3-D

He's kind of big on this Erector Set right now.


This week's creations:

A dragster

X Plane (his high performance "test model")
with forward-swept wings and twin tail fins

In progress: an off-road pick-up truck chasis
with independent front suspension and live axel in back

(He did have to tell me all the specifics because I know nuh-singk about zees vehicles.)

So there you have it.

Glimpses of Mikey's mind on the inside...from the outside.

School Planning Thwarted :: Part 1

Supercars

The only people I know who may want to read this post are the only other true car fans in our lives, Grampy and Uncle Joe.

Sorry to the rest of you. Consider yourselves warned.

* * * * *
The day started when Mikey made a request to use the computer while I was checking email. After patiently waiting, he got his chance to look up a list of Supercars.


He would have been totally satisfied to find a mere list of the cars. But, thanks to the many wonders of cyberspace, he not only found a list but an internet-linked list of every single one of the cars...with lots of information and oodles of photos for each one.

The first car he searched for was the Bugatti Veyron. I really have no idea how he even knows about this car. After seeing this link, I'm just wondering WHY a $1,700,000 "street" car would need to go 253 mph with an acceleration of 0-60 in 2.6 seconds.

Bugatti Veyron
Unless you live in rural Montana, wouldn't you need your own road to drive on? You KNOW that owners of these types of vehicles aren't just looking to putter down the road to pick up a few groceries. And...wouldn't the driver pass out from lack of blood flow to the brain with that kind of acceleration?


Oh...NOW I remember why Mikey likes this type of car so much.

When asked what he'd like to be when he grows up, he once said he wasn't quite sure, but would like to do "something that requires wearing a G-suit."

Mikey is kind of scaring me. He says things like, "You can tell the Koenigsegg by the two domes in back."

Koenigsegg
and "I knew that was a Zonda by its exhaust pipes."

Pagani Zonda C12 F
What's even scarier is that after I asked him where, exactly, the exhaust pipes were on the Zonda, I thought to myself--"Yeah, that is a good identifying feature. Now I can point one out too." Like I'll ever actually see one.

If you haven't found the four exhaust pipes yet, they're in the cute little circle above where the license plate is supposed to be. But, as you can imagine, none of the Zonda drivers would want to actually mount their plates. They might get caught speeding.

I'm afraid this may be as close as we'll get to seeing any of these Supercars.

Mikey's Matchbox Supercars
Front to Back: Dodge Viper SRT10 ARC, Ford GT LM, Saleen S7, Bugatti Veyron
(per Mikey: these cars are in order of speed--slowest in front, fastest in back)
Figures he'd have them organized in some way.
As I sat with Mikey supervising his search, he dashed off to see what the girls wanted in the other room. But first he said, "Can you look up what the EB stands for? It's on all the Bugatti steering wheels." Off he trotted.

So.
I find myself--mySELF--looking up this stuff on the internet. (Okay, the EB stands for Ettore Bugatti, the company's founder.)

Enough.
I set up Mikey's own bookmarked folder, CARS TRUCKS SUPERCARS, on the internet. You should have seen how fired up he was about finding this Supercar website. It was like the dawning of a new age. Doors just burst wide open for him.

Good thing he's still not bigger than I am, because I know I'll have to start fighting him off the computer.

Now, I MUST get back to some more school planning. The kids would like the living room floor back.

Official Supercar photos filched off: www.thesupercars.org

Drawings :: by Da Mikey

Just looked through Mike's art folder for this school year.

Hmmm...I'm seeing a theme here.

As you may have gathered by now...

he really likes cars, trucks...vehicles, in general.

Crawler...or is this a Baja?

Sure--RVs

A little monster action

Slight departure, but yeah, boats too.

Bird's eye view of a very dusty race

Speaking of "bird's eye view"...can't forget the flying vehicles.

Above all though, he is really *rEaLlY* REALLY into suspension and articulation.

He even draws Da Vinci-esque diagrams of shock systems he dreams up in his head.


So, is "slightly obsessed" too strong a descriptive phrase for Da Mikey?

Ringing in 11 years

a.k.a. The alarmingly long, nostalgic birthday post


Our 1999 model turbo-charged twin engines.
On the right: our subdued first born, who had to be "invited" out by my doctor and first appeared with a knob on the side of his head since he had attempted an innovative lateral birth position that didn't agree with my unimaginative framework. Just like him to be so inventive.


On the left: our enthusiastic second born (by a minute), who included her twin brother with her in utero calisthenics by giving him swift blows to the head with her feet. (This claim is backed up with ultrasound footage. She was caught on tape even before she was born. I can hear her now, "Is nothing sacred?")

Showing early adaptability, she was also thoughtful enough to incorporate her parents in her eternal extra utero workouts by urging them to bounce her around in her everlasting free time. In so many ways, she let us know that it was our obvious oversight in not teaching her how to walk immediately upon birth.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Celebrating their 11 years by taking a step back in time.

Day before delivery

Profile of 11.5 lbs of baby

Days old

One week: Mikey...calmly meditating, I think

One week: Kathleen...live wire


One week: a frequent site.

Gramma helped us from the start...until Grammy & Grampy relieved her.

Mike, we didn't call you "drunken sailor" for nothing.


3 weeks: Baptism
Grammy & Grampy and Aunt Weezy & Uncle Kevin traveled from MN for the occasion.

Scandalous photo shoot

2 months: a visit from Grandpa Terry & Grandma Doogie

2 months


Gramma came back for more...as did Grammy!


. . . : : Have milk, will travel : : . . .

As long as the babes had their milkshakes on tap, they didn't seem to care how long or where we traveled. So, we started their roadtrips early.

2 months old: Gulf Coast trip (400 mile RT)

3 months old: to Dubuque to meet Great Grandpa Hardie

We headed up to MN to Grammy & Grampy's and as far as Duluth on this trip (2400 mile RT).


5 months--Colorado Reunion in July (1640 mile RT)

The two K.M.R.s met at the lodge in Colorado.

After this trip, Joe started grad school.
Mysteriously, we were never seen again--until Christmas...


...when we flew to California to be with Gramma again and meet Uncle Chris and more family (3000 mile RT).

In the above photo, I was keeping a very new inside secret (literally)...until the end of August, that is. But that's a whole different story.


Well-traveled one-year-old twins
~ Roadtrip veterans ~
~ Sky miles under their diaper tabs ~
~ From Lake Superior to the Gulf Coast ~
~ From the Great Mississippi to the Pacific Ocean ~
~ 10 states visited ~
~ Traveled over 7400 miles ~


* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Now, back to our regularly-scheduled 2010
wherein the twins have since
~ rid themselves of diapers ~
~ lost scads of teeth ~
~ and started learning algebra ~


11th Birthday -- March 9, 2010
The Birthday Dinner Contention


There was no question that Mikey and Kathleen wanted to have barbecue for dinner. So, after all the debate they had earlier in the day about which barbecue joint they wanted to go to for dinner (guess which one got her way), they must have also decided that they didn't want to be embarrassingly predictable. So, instead of the obvious, they ordered breakfast plates of eggs, waffles, and pancakes.

Back at the ranch...
Loving Gramma's photo book creations


Off they went on their gift-finding treasure hunt with clues written in verse with help from Jimmer.

New reads

Bike jump Fly Box

RipStik

Eleven tricky candles


One quadruple chocolate mousse cake
(Guess who talked her brother into this one.)

Mikey was certainly all over this mousse cake idea Kathleen mentioned to him, but I suspect somewhere in the discussion they had a communication breakdown that led him to believe the cake would actually look like a moose...or maybe even four moose (mooses, meese). How would I know such a thing? Because after he blew out the candles he said to me, "Oh, I thought the cake might be shaped like a moose. That would have been really cool."

Mousse. Moose. Those darned homophones.

11 beautifully fun years
with our turbo-charged twins

Dear Mikey & Kathleen,
You were such enjoyable, precious little babes.
Now, the fun continues as you grow into such interesting young people.
Thanks for being such good traveling buddies. And thank you for teaching me all there is to know about being young again and learning afresh...all the important things in life.

Love,
Mom