All dressed up...what?....what upside down baby?

I heard clicking from downstairs, i snuck down to grab the camera, snuck up to grab this scene. Her first foray into dress up shoes.  Alena had a funny line when we were watching the video,  "I showed her how to work her stroller...I did NOT show her how to put in the baby!"

5 Lil Elves--Kickin' It

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

OwieVechkin shoots and scooooorrrrrrreeeZ!

Hey, thought you all might like a "short story" of a 6yr old coming into his own on the ice

8th game of the season for the Blue Sharks. Owen had 7 goals in his first 7 games (the top two kids probably have 20+ goals each). but until last week (two weeks after we started power skating lessons again--learning literally to skate like the pro's skate) he wasn't really covering the entire ice like i thought he could. Today we played the best team (they have 4 kids who are on the Selects travel team, these kids play 30+ add'l games around DC, Philly, and Balitimore) and 3 of the kids i swear to gosh shave! (they also have a full-time goalie who plays travel--whereas most teams like ours rotate each kid each week) anyway, i told Owen w/o two of our best players this morning, he might need to step up and fill their spot. we had 9 skaters, they had 13. it's a shift every 2min for our two lines.

this Red team plays super aggressive which in Mites translates to out of control. on his first shift he raced down for a loose puck and a kid literally checked him up against the boards. this is suppose to be no "purposeful" contact until the age of 11yrs and up. he got up and skated after the puck to disrupt their offensive flow, shift ended. on his next shift, he was all over the ice w/ a couple of breaks out of our zone stick handling (side to side w the puck while his stick was being hit) and got a shot off twice. at this point Red has scored twice and it's 2-0 w/ 8min gone in the 1st 15min period. Owen has two shots on goal and a couple of good chase downs on defense. his line hasn't given up a goal yet.

before the game Owen tried to grab a sip of my coffee..i said "back off! coffee's for closers" (for you Glengary/Glenross fans). he said, "i am going to score our first goal today", i said, "if you score the first goal, i'll buy you a coffee." next shift the puck goes down by our goalie, one of our players gets it, Owen breaks toward the other team's net (as our Head Coach has practiced w/ our kids every week) but the pass goes wide, Owen races to the right of the goalie, grabs the puck w/ a guy on him, skates around the net, makes a stick move on a guy waiting for him on the other side, surprises the goalie and rips it in for our 1st flamin' goal. Starbucks it is! (don't worry, we all went to Saint IHOP's afterwards). the Red team scores 3 more goals to end the period to make it 5-1. they are bigger and more aggressive, we have to be relentless on the puck.

but before the period ended, Owen brimming w/ confidence now jetted for another puck in their end. he was suppose to stay on defense, but no one else moved. he beat the Red team to the puck, but the kid behind just clobbered him down. he was slow to get up, shift ended and he motored back to the bench. i asked him if he wanted to chase that kid down. he started to cry, apparently the kids skate had hit the back of his leg. i got him calm pretty quick and said, "hey, you are leading this team today, they need you to stay aggressive, keep after the puck." he wiped his tears and headed out for his next shift and kept his skating up.

he ended up scoring another goal in the 3rd where he stole the puck from the other team at center ice, dragged the puck in front of him, chased it down as it skittered ahead, faked left after he gained control w/ his stick and shot right about 10 ft from the goalie, a rising wrist shot while on the move. at this point we were down 7-3. we were only outscored 2-1 in the 2nd period. Owie did okay on the puck, but his line did give up the two goals in front of our net in the second, as they started to watch the Red team w/ the puck instead of going right at them.

the end of the third was the best, the other team had only scored twice on us, we again had scored once, but Owie's line really got a second wind and didn't give up any goals that period. OwieVechkin (as i will now refer to him) was all over, he had a bunch of good breaks, would get skated down, but he kept driving up and down the ice. if the puck went against the boards, he was after it to chip it out. if it shot across ice from the scrum he was the first Blue Shark after it. 

anyway w/ 5:30 left the puck went deep and left of their goalie. Owen went after it w/ one of his teammates who was quickly chopped aside by this giant kid from the Red team. anyone remember the movie "the Sandlot" where the dog on the other side of the fence had through imagination and myth become the equivalent of a canine T-Rex? well this kid was bigger! twice the size of our hero. but that little son of buck would not move, he kept kicking the puck against the boards w/ his skate as his stick was being pinned against the boards by Kidzilla. he finally chipped it toward the goal away from the direction the big kid was pushing, he grabbed the puck w/ his stick while his line mates closed on the goal. Owen cut out toward the front of the net and slammed the puck at the goalie. it hit his stick bounding out front and center of the net, where big Sam (as opposed to little Sam) was there to collect the rebound and he slapped it home.

an assist for Owen and 2 goals--a 3pt morning. the Blue Sharks lost 9-4, but that's 75% of our offense, a very proud assistant coach and our Head Coach who was really glad the "kid who can stick handle around 5 guys in a phone booth" stepped up!

Halloween and other updates

Another gorgeous Fall day in NoVa (more pics below the post)

Audrey survived her first year of trick or treating.  She wore a classic costume worn first by Emma and then Alena.  Grandma Kroeckel has been responsible for so many great costumes, this one she did when we were in Kansas City, Emma was 1.5yrs old at the time.  I remember her round little face sticking out of that flower and her walking around my HayGroup office (actually, she was still doing her one-foot drag crawl if anyone can remember Emma's unique scooting style).

Any way, can you say deja vu' all over again with the round, cherub like face of Miss Audrey. She didn't do much trick or treating, mainly rode in the wagon eating the first pack of Skittles she was given.

Quick update:  Emma is swimming year round now, for Snow Swimming or local USA swimming club.  She's doing well, has great form off the blocks and through most of her strokes, still needs to work on kick and getting some power on those long  limbs (i can relate since she has my body type--i still don't think i have forearm muscles!)   But she loves it and this was her decision to focus on swimming.

Alena is doing dance and gymnastics and really prospering in school and with friends.  And we just finished her 3rd session of skating and she is finally getting on her edges and moving out. We hope to have her back swimming in the spring.  

Hugh progressed in skating and made it to his first "stick and shoots" w/ owen and I, skating in full gear and shooting shots.  He is doing great in school and Spanish which he takes twice a week.  He is a rascal. But behaves at school like an angel and is smart as a whip.  He is learning to play video games on his own, so we now have another thing to take away from him when bad.

Owen is doing well in school, really liking all day, we just need to get a little neater on our printing--which seems to have deteriorated since kindergarten when he use to take forever to print.  Hockey is going well in his first season of Mites.  He's starting to get a little more aggressive for the puck, but also likes watching his teammates skate around and shoot while he skates side to side.  Oh well, it's 6 yr old hockey.  He also started Cub Scouts this year, is in an 8-boy troop.  We've hiked, done a corn maize, collected food for Thanksgiving food drive and sold the world famous Scout popcorn.  The kids love the outdoors and Owen more than anyone likes bugs and critters and knives and guns...so we thought Scouting would be perfect!

Kathie and I celebrated our birthdays and 11yr anniversary the past 3 weeks.  After her summer of Triathloning, Kathie is working at working out at Lifetime Fitness.  The only problem:  Audrey has major separation anxiety.  But when she can go they have workouts ranging from boot camp to aerobic yoga to pilates and weightlifting.  This winter she will start swimming and Tri training again.  Most of her day is running kids around.  I try to pitch in now that my office is only 10min a way, but the schedule is a challenge.  I know everyone claims their busy and we certainly aren't looking for any badges--but c'mon people, save your sob stories for another family, 5 kids under 10 and 3 labs--you can't compute!

BusinessElite is doing better, now that we hired our own local development team along w/ a really strong database architect and a designer.  The product itself is looking outstanding and it will launch Dec 1st w/ one of the best Beta interfaces of any job site ever launched.  We fired our team in India after 5mos of slow response and inadequate design and development work. Next time Glenn and I hire Indians, they will have feathers!  The timing couldn't be better for us, because going against conventional wisdom, hiring of professionals and executives usually goes up in an economic downturn, not down.  I started w/ a new hockey team this winter and moved up from C to B.  I am now Left Wing for the Chiefs (of Slapshot fame).  The summer team made it to the semi's before we were knocked out.  I won't give you my point totals as it embarrasses my bro-n-law Scott...well he gets embarrassed for me!

The best part of this year is we have 4 season tickets to the Capitals behind the Caps bench about 20 rows up in the lower bowl of the Verizon center.   Been great fun for our kids and our business associates.

We are looking forward to Holdiays here, even though these are leaner times than we have experienced before--no matter--by early next year I think any financial worries will be gone w/ the pending success of BusinessElite.com.

Cheers for now,

Tom and Kath

The wizards and the flower

The kids and neighbors

We get turned a way for going over the family/house quota, so we split up into two groups

The Knight and his maiden

Owen hasn't quite grasped the meaning of 40+ season ticket games.  One night he was really upset I was at the game w/o him, he called my cell and could barely talk.  After I explained that the game was a work thing and that he could look for me on TV, he calmed down, ran to his room and put on his "rooting gear."  I snapped this pic after I got home that night.  Hockey is all about passion!!!!

 

Dad's getting older birthday!

Hockey players don't need front teeth!

Kathie's friends from High School and earlier were in town for a visit (Lori--to Kath's left--and her husband Mark and fam just moved to Winchester, VA about 40min west of us).  It was nice to be around midwesterners for a change, I forget what it's like to have an ego-less, agenda-less conversation.

She fell asleep on her doll one morning while I was working, all of the sudden I heard what sounded like snoring.

Proving Caps fans are made not born! This one went to the owner of the Caps, Mr Ted Leonsis whom i know from AOL--I haven't seen it on his blog yet, but expect it on the Verizon center big board one game.