Friday, May 4th

On Friday after waking up, at 5:30 a.m. local time, we very much had hoped they would sleep in but David woke everyone up) we had breakfast with my grandmother and my Uncle Bud. We got to talk about the up coming wedding and how the boys were doing. I took the boys for a ride around the retirement home on their skateboards. Along the way I stop to go look at the Greek Orthodox Church right next door to the home. It was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. I will give more on that in a later posting. My Grandmother then took the boys to see the birds up on the 2nd floor of her retirement home. Rodney was in love He really like a little blue bird who was at the bottom of the cadge he couldn’t fly. Before lunch we took my grandmother to my Aunt Pats so she could be there as people arrived for the wedding. The boys spent time toughing their new spider-man frisbees from the upper deck of the my aunts condo, wile we worked out what to do about lunch and entertain the boys. We had a lot of time to kill until the rehearsal dinner that nigh.

After Bud and I took the boys to the park he dropped me off at Patties so he could go get his kids from the Airport and I could take Amy and the boys out for lunch and Custard. You just can’t go to Milwaukee and not get custard. After that we all went to the hotel were every one was staying for the wedding. This was to give the boys a chance to meet my Cousin Shannon’s kids and to go swimming. I got a chance to geek out with My Cousin James (he is the one who was getting married). We played Carcassonne and he won (only because I was a little sleepy fro the trip).

That night after feeding the boys and letting them play Star Wars with their Cousins, we went to the rehearsal and the dinner. On the way there David fell asleep from all the activity. At the Church the boys got to find out what their job was in the wedding and how important they were. They both were very good. My mother took the boys back to my Grandmother’s so they could go to sleep and Amy and I could go to the Dinner. Both boys fell asleep faster that any other time. The dinner was at a Mexican restaurant in honor of Sango de Mayo. Amy and I only stayed long enough for drinks and dinner. We were very tired.

Hmmmmmmmm Custard


Me and James Geeking out playing Carcassonne

Carcassonne

Many of you may already know I love to play board games. I meet up with a group of guys every Monday to play our board games. I did a blog on Settlers of Catan Back in August of last year; witch was my obsession at the time. Later I stared playing Dreamblade witch is a Miniature based game that has some of the same mechanics as chess. Now the new came I like to play is Carcassonne.

Carcassonne is a heavily fortified French medieval town in the south of France. Carcassonne the board game is a tile-based German-style board game for two to six players. The game board is a medieval landscape built by the players as the game progresses. The game starts with a single terrain tile face up and 71 others shuffled face down for the players to draw from. On each turn a player draws a new terrain tile and places it adjacent to tiles that are already facing up. The new tile must be placed in a way that extends features on the tiles it, (roads must connect to roads, fields to fields, and city walls to city walls.)

After placing the new tile, the placing player may opt to station a follower piece on that tile. The follower can only be placed on the just-placed tile, and must be placed in a specific feature. A follower claims ownership of one terrain feature—road, field, city, or cloister—and may not be placed on a feature already claimed by another player's follower. However, it is possible for terrain features to become shared after the further placement of tiles. For example, two field tiles which each have a follower can become connected into a single field by another terrain tile.

The game ends when the last tile has been placed. At that time all features (including fields) score points for the players with the most followers in them. The player with the most points wins the game.

The game has a few expansions that change the way the came is played in subtle ways. I bought the Carcassonne Big Box; witch combines the base set, The River, Inns and Cathedrals, Traders and Builders, The Princess and the Dragon and The Tower.

The best part of the game is that it is simple enough from Rodney and David (who are both 6) to play yet complex enough for adults to enjoy as well.

Our trip Up to Travers City

This week we went to Travers City, Michigan to see Amy’s parents and grandfather. We were up there from Thursday to Saturday. We could have stayed there until Sunday but we needed a day at home after a long trip. We all had a good trip and really enjoyed our selves. We stayed at Amy’s grandfather’s farm house in Empire just 30 minutes out side of Travers City. The boys really looked forward to going there and love playing out side. The only problem was in was a little cold and there was 6 inches of snow.

Wile there I started to teach Rodney and David how to play pool and we played my new board game, Carcassonne. We went to a great restaurant in Empire for lunch on Friday with Amy’s Grandpa, and it was really good. They had some vegetarian meals for us witch were very good. That night we went to the city to eat dinner with Amy’s parents. Wile we were there the boys got to play video games and I played Carcassonne and Dreamblade with Shane, Amy’s 11 year old brother. We slept one more night at the farm house and the boys got to spend time talking to great grandpa.

On Saturday we went to have lunch again at Amy’s parents then we came home. The new van made the trip quite nice, and the boy’s colored and read comics most of the trip. We all enjoyed our selves.

Also I did not put back on any of the weight I lost wile on the trip. I’m now at 285lbs! the diet is working

Playing Pool with mom

Amy, David, And Amy's Mom
We're Watching Sponge bob with great Grandpa!!


Amy and her Dad
Someone took this wile I was taking a nap
This is a good one of the boys
Rodney reading Calvin and Hobbs
David Coloring