New Years Eve

We had a somewhat lo key New Years at our house. We had some neighbor kids over for a bit to burn some stuff. That included two Christmas trees. We had snacks and toasted in the New Year.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/16KWc34QDJ93eiP8A

Tommy Rock Tournament

Tommy wrestled in the Rock tournament today. This would be the home tournament we hold every year. He wasn't the lowest person in the bracket somehow. So he had a bye and then wrestled the 2 seat. This was a junior who pinned him in the first round. His next round was against a freshman. It didn't start the greatest. But he battled, and pulled off a comeback in the last 20 seconds to get a reversal and near fall for the win. He was pretty spent after this match. And he got a mat call for the next one not too long after. He had a tough time rally the energy to even warm up. But he got out there. After a tough start he managed to score 6 points on a senior before losing on points. He even gave that senior some stress. Tommy said he just kept saying "Oh shit". Not a bad day for his first rock. He keeps giving full effort and surprising some people. He will hopefully start moving up there and get better bracket rankings to where he doesn't have to start off with the top seats.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/uozsEgNSLoBsGMVJ8

Christmas Day

We had a small Christmas this year. The boys knew that so they weren't disappointed. They were lucky and got a lot of items at their holiday shop at school for each other. We opened presents, and then went over to my parents house for prime rib. We played some games and ate food and had a good time.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/FewCBRdT1BSmbSc38

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone. This is the 13th year the boys have made a singing ornament for their grandparents. I don't know if this will be their last year. It is getting harder and harder to convince them to do some of the holiday traditions. This year I was able to convince them by letting them turning the 12 days of Christmas into a silly joke. In case you can't understand through all the teenage voice breaking, here are their twelve days of Christmas. Turn up the volume.

On the first day of Christmas, my grandson sent to me 

Twelve batters batting,
Eleven noses bleeding,
Ten goats a milking,
Nine ballers playing,
Eight bikes a jumping,
Seven cheese a stringing,
Six Sevening,
Five golden gloves,
Four farting kids,
Three french baguettes,
Two cuddly cats,
And
a big bucket of swiss cheese

https://photos.app.goo.gl/aezwQdygGvoUXaQV7

Lucas' Birthday Party

Jake went to Lucas' 12th birthday party. It included an escape room, dinner at Red Robin, visiting the Lincoln Park troll and a sleepover. It looks like he had a pretty good time.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/3sR5W1sb9BpayKg2A

Cookie Making

We managed to get our cookie making done, squeezed in between wrestling. The boys did all of their own dough mixing. I just helped put some of them on the sheet and get them in and out of the oven. They are sort of pros at this point. That is except on frosting cookies. I think they actually like making them look ugly. That's fine as they are the ones who eat those cookies. They had a good time making them anyway.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/PfgwJV3y9fFh9Gt57

Hammerhead Tournament

Tommy went to his first bracketed tournament for the high school wrestling team. They were only taking varsity, so we weren't really expecting him to go. He is the only person in his weight class, but he was the youngest person there. Likely they decided to take him because he has done many tournaments before and knew he wouldn't get himself hurt or something. Because he had never had an official high school match on track wrestling his record was 0-0. So he was listed as the 28th seat out of 28 in the bracket. So he got to wrestle the hardest person first. He was pinned in a double arm bar fairly quickly. He had a bit better luck in the loser bracket. He didn't win his next match, but he scored points and didn't get pinned. He even came close to a comeback in the end. We also got to watch Lena wrestle in this tournament. She took second losing in the final to a 2 time state champ from Peninsula.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/hzEJNrokW3mCq2xB9

Kitty Presents

The cats have been steeling some of the Christmas stuff around the house. Including Santa hats, stockings, ornament stuffies. They even kept trying to play with the holiday train. It is mostly Finn's fault. So I made them an early present out of wrapping paper ribbon and some cat nip so they would have something of their own to play with. It lasted for a few minutes. Then went back to stealing my Christmas stuff.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/Rmnc3iu8g7xJikGv5

Decorating the House

We got our house decorating done. The boys helped a little. I can't say they did their best on their little tree on the porch. It looks like the shot the ornaments on there with a sling shot.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/EUZQmu7oV4UhTAkV6

Tommy Dual Tournament in Pt Townsend

Tommy is an 8th grader, but he is wrestling with the high school this year as there is not an official middle school team. He went to his first match Wednesday, but didn't make weight by .2 pounds... So today he got to try again. This was a dual tournament in Pt Townsend. After trying to purge his stomach a bit from all the midnight snacking he had done in the middle of the night, we got him back on track and he made weight. This was a dual meet tournament. So they would go head to head against each team with 1 person at each weight class. And then they did have a couple exhibition matches afterwards for essentially the JV. There was no one in Tommy's weight class for the first 2 rounds. So he took a forfeit. Finally in the third round he had an opponent. This wrestlers didn't see super experienced. Tommy took him down and pinned him pretty easily. The next round he had another match. This was a more experienced wrestler. Tommy was on the defensive the entire time. He fought really hard and didn't give up. But did get pinned in the second period. The last round Tommy had a bye again.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/yaAobNJrsRKfmTuf8

Big Boy and his Train

Even though Tommy is now a teenager, he was pretty excited to get his train out. His cats seem pretty interested in it as well.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/SbQts9QogLxxKw8JA

Rockbusters First Meet

Jake had his first meet yesterday, hosted by Tacoma Slam. We have been wrestling against Tacoma Slam for many years. A lot of these kids know each other fairly well at this point. Jake was in a group with Callum. He has wrestled him a lot of times. He has not beat him yet. But it is typically pretty close. He lost to him again today on points. Not sure how many exactly because the score keeping wasn't great. Not that it really mattered. But it was good tough wrestling. Jake won his second match with a pin. Good start to another season.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/vWoCLjvReWo1dK6Y8

Winterfest

Even though the boys are getting older, they were still fine with going to winterfest. They saw some friends, watched the parade. Got free coco and a cookie from the Church. And then we went to theatre to watch the Grinch. Of course we have soon it a ton, and we have it at home. But it is so fun to hear all the little kids giggle at the different funny parts.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/SQAjc8vFZ61vAXaDA

Finding a Christmas Tree

We went out to find a Christmas tree today. Eric thought for a minute he might let Tommy use the chain saw. Curious as he won't even let me use it. But after he saw him try to put the blade into the dirt, Eric took over.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/RrwHErHHwTVE3Daz7

Big Squash

Tommy was given a big squash by his soccer coach. I have never seen such a big squash. Eric had to take it outside and chop it with a machete. I filled up all the racks in my entire double oven with squash to roast them. Then I had to scoop it out of it's shell and puree it. After that I turned some into soup. Some into pumpkin pie and gave some away. I had still barely put a dent in it. So I froze a lot of it. The soup and the pie turned out pretty good with seasoning.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/uEczbRKtKNEVnMxw6

Wrestling Scrimmage

Wrestling season is getting underway. To get warmed up for the first matches they had a scrimmage tonight. They had both the Rockbusters and the High School team do an intersquad match. They had the littles warm up with the big buys. It was adorable.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/WsBmYyPwPoQiMbV29

Eric's 60th Birthday

Today is Eric's 60th birthday. He has also officially worked his last day as an ironworker. I asked him if he wanted to have a birthday party to celebrate. Like a typical grumpy old man, he said no. We just had a mellow night at home with chicken enchiladas and a tiny cake.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/rePz8PmUSbdH3Upv9

Thanksgiving

We had Thanksgiving at our house with the family. We had some yummy food and then played some board games. It was nice to spend time with family.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/LLVYMNzMjhaf3VJR8

Goodbye Jessi

 Today we said goodbye to our Jessi kitty. In 2009, I walked into the animal shelter looking for a female cat. I was a bit overwhelmed by how many were there. We had already picked out Jimmy the boy cat, so I asked them which was their favorite female cat. They handed me a little black cat who was about a year old. Instantly she began licking my face. I knew she was the one to take home. She loved people. She wanted to sit on you or next to you. Would follow you around the yard meowing for pets. She could snooze on the couch for hours at a time, but for some reason always wanted to go outside when it snowed. Jessi was the boys first pet. Jimmy didn't want to have much to do with the boys. Jessi would put up with them playing a bit rough and squeezing her a bit tight so she could get attention and pets. She was Jake's COVID buddy. She sat with him through all of his classes. He even wrote 2 comic books where she was the star. She caused a construction delay on day one of building our house. She saw new people in the yard. And like always, she had to go chase them down to make them say hello. She sat on the board they were trying to cut. She lived a long and full life and we knew the day was coming. This is the reason we wanted to let the boys get kittens. We knew this day was not far off and thought this may make it easier on them. Which it has been. Rest easy now Jessi. You and Jimmy are together again. 

https://photos.app.goo.gl/obwqetyNW4pFTFis9

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2009/11/jessi.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2009/12/cats.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2010/01/happy-cats.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2010/08/our-pets.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2011/03/jimmy-and-jessi.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2015/02/lazy-kitty.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2015/10/hello-kitty.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2016/01/my-kitty.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2017/12/kitty-presents.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2019/07/love-notes-for-jessi.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2019/12/my-kitty.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2020/01/our-jessi-kitty.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2020/08/weaving-with-your-kitty.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2020/12/covid-kitty.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2021/07/my-kitty.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2022/02/our-kitty-missed-us.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2023/01/kitty-cuddles-and-tablet-time.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2023/09/underfloor.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2024/02/jake-and-his-jessi.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2024/04/jessis-last-quiet-days.html

https://eric-dani.blogspot.com/2024/11/cuddle-time-with-all-kitties.html

Soccer Season

This years soccer season is a wrap. Jake's team really improved and learned how to play positions and work as a team.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/TJf8aLaHRb3BvtF76

Tommy's team really dominated this year. They won all but one game, which ended in a tie.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/15Q1YE14gCb2F5S9A