Family Pic in Pleasant Grove

Here is the family picture as requested. I am really slow-freight getting all the pictures out to you guys.

Star Wars Rocks!

Aquarium of the Bay - SF

As promised, some more pictures from the Aquarium of the Bay at Pier 39. They have a cool tunnel through a big tank with all kinds of native sea creatures.

There is also a really great touch pool area where you can handle all sorts of stuff. Ella was a little squeamish about touching sea life but see did a little bit.

San Francisco

One of the days we rode BART into San Francisco and the Powell Street Station. From there we boarded a cable car for a ride over to the Fisherman's Wharf area.

Ella found this fun little bench with people just her size. That face of her's really cracks me up.

This is a shot I took of the Moon Jellyfish at the Aquarium of the Bay at Pier 39. I'll add some more pictures from there in a bit.

California Trip Part 1 - Bolinas

We started off our trip to California by travelling to Bolinas on the coast north of San Francisco to stay in the beach house of some friends of Katie and her family. I wanted to run an 18k trail run that took place up on top of the ridgeline behind Katie and Ella in the first picture so it worked out well for us to stay in Bolinas on Friday night.

Bolinas has a very strong hippie vibe to it. If you don't know how to get there you may never be able to find it because the hippies take down any and all road signs that point to Bolinas. Katie and I stayed in this beach house for our honeymoon so I've been there before. Katie has been there many times while growing up. And yet we got very turned around and had great difficulty finding it. We actually had to stop and ask for directions. And no... I'm not ashamed that I did. But thanks for asking.

Here are some pictures of us on the beach at Bolinas. Katie is instructing Ella in the finer points of Beachcombing. She was very enthusiastic but not very discerning. She would pick up every fragment of shell on the beach no matter how small. That an important first step though.

Katie and I have a picture of the two of us from our honeymoon where we wrote our names in the sand and posed next to it so we decided Ella needed one too.

This is the beach house we stayed in. It is a lovely, charming old place with a nice view of the ocean. It was originally owned by the parents of Katie's friends (the current owners). They recently purchased another home just up the road that is closer to the ocean and sports an amazing 180 degree view of the ocean. What a place!

Anableps

During Thanksgiving 2006 we went down to Corpus Christi to the beach. On Friday we went to the Texas State Acquarium and happened to see some of the famous Anableps. These are the crazy fish that can see above and below the water at the same time. You probably remember these from playing Balderdash with Uncle Bruce years ago. Anyway, I thought you'd like to see them too.

Pinewood Derby Extreme Edition II

Here are a few more pictures from the pinewood derby. On the left you see "Breaking Wind" the propeller powered car that was the overall speed winner. I was surprised by this one. Those propellers had enough power to drive the car on the gym floor.

"Breaking Wind" on the left and the RC car on the right. The RC car was a really good idea but he needed a faster motor to make it win.
This is a nice shot of the CO2 car blowing itself off the track. It needed more weight and a more consistent mechanism but it was fast when it worked!. We had a rule that you couldn't touch the car during the start so he had a mechanism attached to a string with a big fish hook on the other end. The fish hook went on the top of the track. The gravity start would get the car going fast enough that when the string pulled taut the nail would be shoved into the cartridge. However, sometimes the string wouldn't release and the car would be left dangling off the side of the track. Hilarious!
Elder Hallam's car did very well. It was a nice kit that he bought at the store. It came with a lead weight to mount on the bottom. Very nice. If you ever get to see the Church's new missionary training videos "The District" you will recognize Elder Hallam. Sitting on the table is Elder Bridegan's car "The Golden Convert". It was so slow that it only made it over the finish line after I lubed it up for him. There is a bit of a lesson there too. Even the "Golden Converts" need help from the members to get to the finish.

Pinewood Derby Extreme Edition

Friday night we had a Pinewood Derby Extreme Edition event and it was really great. The only rules for the competition was that you couldn't use fire or gunpowder since it was indoors. This ruled out the use of Estes model rocket engines. However, there were some really good cars. The winning car used twin propellers mounted on the back of the car. There was one built from a RC car motor, one with a pull-back type toy car and one with CO2 cartridges. There was a hands-off start rule too so the CO2 car had a string with a hook that would release the spring loaded nail to pierce the cartridge as it began rolling down the track. The release mechanism had a consistency problem though. When it all worked well the car killed everyone else. But it only worked well two or three times so it didn't win in the end. There were a total of 10 cars entered in the race.

Below are pictures of our car. Katie came up with the concept and bought the Acorn Squash and jewels. She made the decorative wheels out of wire and at the last minute remembered we had an old Cinderella to pu on it. I did the gold paint job on the car and squash and Katie did the decorative paint. I polished the axles by putting them in my drill and spinning them on extra fine sandpaper. I also removed the burrs from the inside of the plastic wheels and lubed it all up with oil.






Amazingly, this car came in 2nd place overall. The polished axles make a Huge difference. We lost out in the end to the propeller powered car aptly named "Breaking Wind". However, we deserved the Best Sportsmanship Award because I brought my oil can and shared it with everyone. If the propeller car hadn't applied the oil he would not have won. All in all it was a great activity. Next time we should do it outdoors with an asbestos covered track so we can use fire!

San Antonio Rodeo Stampede 4 Mile Run

Today was the San Antonio Rodeo Stampede 4 Mile Run and I finished 2nd in my age group and 7th overall. My time was 27:37 so I averaged 6:54 per mile. I'm really pleased with that because I've recently come back from some tendinitis in my left knee and I felt really strong today.