The Lindenbergs

Man oh man, when things get busy, they really get busy. This my second week in Springfield, IL. My company won a contract to do a feasibility study for the Department of Education and off I went (the project started 3 weeks late). Additionally, my video editing business is picking up with the approaching holidays, so nights and weekends (when the kids are asleep) have been devoted to editing video. I love it (thank God Nora’s go the patience of a saint).

Highlights from the past couple of weeks:

Cooking
Pierce and I made a spaghetti dinner together complete with garlic toast. Pierce filled the pot, broke the spaghetti and put it in the pot and helped butter and put garlic on the bread. I don’t know who had more fun, him or me. A few days later Pierce helped Nora make cranberry bread for our Thanksgiving get together.

Movies
We introduced Pierce and Anna to the movie Back to the Future. I thought he’d like it because of the Dalorian. Turns out like was an understatement, I think he’s found a new love. We’ve watched two of the three movies –Pierce has to wait to see the third one until I get back home this weekend. He asked if he could take the video jacket with him when he goes to see Santa Claus so he can show him a picture of the toy car he wants (I’ve already got a bid out on eBay).

Nora and I went to see Walking the Line with some friends of ours (no kids). It was very good; not our normal movie fare but I highly recommend it. Nora and I also managed to catch a stage show at the local playhouse (American Theatre), the Buddy Holly Story. We really enjoyed it, the show got a standing ovation.

Weekend Activities
On Saturday Nora a spent a day at the spa (a very nice gift from a friend of hers). In her absence, I took Pierce and Anna to Union Station and Science City. Union Station sets up an enormous model train display over the holidays and, of course, Pierce goes nuts over it. We saw a movie at the Extreme Screen (5 story tall movie screen) called Pulse. Its about rhythmic music from all over the country and is pretty much straight music for 45 minutes. Anna loved it, Pierce tolerated it (I thought it was great). Science City is geared for slightly older kids and features magic and illusion, basic physics, police work, nature, and much more. Pierce is getting to the age where he really “gets it” and Nora seems to enjoy it too.

Thanksgiving
We had a low key Thanksgiving in town this year. Nora’s folks had us, and her brother’s family, over for dinner. Mmmmm. Of course Pierce and Anna played with their cousins all evening and pretty much ignored the food. Nora and I more than made up for their shortcomings.

-Eric (Dad)

It snowed today, mostly just flurries with very light accumulation as evening rolled around. In fact, it is still snowing now...

Anyway, My Dad picked up Pierce from school this afternoon because I had some errands to run. Pierce helped Dad put up their Christmas tree. Pierce is very excited about the ornaments, especially if they resemble a train or car in any way. He was a great help to me too, on Friday, when we put up our own Christmas tree. However, I guess decorating trees twice is plenty. Tonight, our Christmas tree was leaning a little and when I tried to straighten it, it went down! Eric is out of town, but thankfully my Dad was able to come over and help me get the tree upright again, and more stable. When we asked Pierce if he'd like to help put those ornaments that had fallen off, back on, he said sweetly, "No, I don't think so."

Oh, back to the snow...so I picked up the kids from my Mom and Dad's house and we went home. Both kids talked excitedly about the snow. I pulled into the garage, got out, opened Pierce's door, then I went in to put down my purse and a few other things before coming back to help Anna out of the car. As I came back into the garage, I saw Pierce picking snow off of my car and eating it! Mind you, there wasn't all that much accumulated on my car, but he'd found this little 'pocket'. I immediately said "Pierce, please don't eat that snow." To which he responds, "Daddy says it's OK to eat snow." My only response was "Yes, but I don't think he meant eating snow off of a dirty car..."

Anna is fighting a bit of a cold and our experience with her taking the PediaCare is just the opposite to what it was with Pierce. Pierce never wanted to take medicine and he could smell it if you tried to hide it in his apple juice. Anna, on the other hand, takes the PediaCare willingly and even sometimes tells me she needs cold medicine when she is congested and can't breathe.

OK, that's it for me tonight. Happy Holidays!

Nora

The other night we pulled out a game we haven’t played for awhile: Silly Six Pins. It’s six plastic bowling pins that sit on an electronic base. The base gives each the pins a silly voice, makes bowling sounds and keeps score. I thought Pierce and Anna would enjoy bowling while I would set up the pins for them. Silly me, they both wanted to set up the pins. After a couple rounds Anna completely tired of the bowling portion of the game and basically kidnapped all the pins. Game over.

We’ve all been building with blocks lately. My thing is making extremely tall, unstable towers. Pierce’s thing is knocking them down. Actually, to be honest, Pierce helps me build the towers, and then he knocks them down. Anna is usually the “thief of blocks” and inadvertent knocker-downer of the towers. We can engage in this activity for hours. Of course, the dog (Josie) usually helps knock down the buildings too.

I booked airfare for the holidays yesterday. The family and I will be out to see my Mom and brothers in late December. Of course we’re all excite. My sister-in-law, Erin, is pregnant with twins and due in February –so we’re all anxious to see her in a very pregnant state and coo over her.

Last night we went to the gym. Pierce and Anna love going –the kid’s center has lots of toys and movies. When we got to the front desk Pierce and Anna raced to the stairs. About half way there Anna successfully ran right out of her shoe –it flew across the room. Once at the Kid’s Center Anna was not able to watch her regularly requested show (The Wiggles) she had been preempted by Charlotte’s Web. While she wasn’t very interested in it, Pierce talked about the movie for the rest of the evening (sounds like he gave us an easy present idea for the holidays).

Everyone remains happy and healthy. Pierce and Anna keep doing new and interesting things on an almost hourly basis. How can life get better than this?

-Eric (Dad)

We had very nice, unseasonably warm weather over the weekend –so we tried make sure we took full advantage of it. On Friday, Nora took Pierce and Anna out to our neighborhood park and I arranged to meet them there on the way home from work. Pierce and Anna were having so much fun they did not want to leave for dinner at Dairy Queen. The slides were a big hit with both kids. Anna was wearing a pair of hose that gave her extra acceleration to the point where I had to catch her at the bottom of the slide to keep her from shooting out into space and landing on her rear end. There we a few other boys running around the park that Pierce immediately befriended. For some reason Pierce decided he needed to take his (recently completed) school workbook to the park with him, so he was playing tag and throwing leaves with these kids while clutching the workbook in his other hand.

After helping to put the kids to bed I headed out to KU to visit with the local undergraduate chapter of Pi Kappa Phi. I’m the recently appointed chapter advisor for them and went to go meet with a national consultant that was visiting as well as their newly elected President. A very nice visit, but of course it made for a late night. I’ll be working with the chapter over the next few months to help them put together a strategic plan for the coming year.

The big event on Saturday was Nora’s nephew’s birthday party. Jackson was having a sleep over with a number of his second-grade friends. We joined them for cake and ice cream and a little visit. Pierce was interested in hanging out with the guys and did very well. Two things were pretty striking about this group was: 1) Jackson is so much taller than any of his peers; 2) Pierce is roughly the same height as half of Jackson’s friends. Seems to me those Hundelt genes are pretty powerful.

Sunday was a pretty lazy day for all us. We slept in and had a late breakfast than hung around the house in our pajamas. Nora recently acquired a garage sale Legos table and for about an hour the entire family sat around the table and either built, or knocked down, Lego constructions. Probably the biggest surprise of the day was Pierce asking me to toss a football with him. Pierce is not particularly athletically inclined (much like me) but, after a couple of bobbled passes, started to throw very impressive spiraling bullets right to me. I can’t tell you how proud I was.

The last activity of the weekend was our new digital cable box. Nora figured out that it would actually be cheaper for us to move up from analog cable to digital. She swung by the cable office to pick up our digital cable box for me to install (I didn’t want the cable people messing with our home entertainment setup –nor did I want to pay for installation). The biggest challenge was to ensure that our ReplayTV and cable box played nicely together. Since I had to pull all the components out to make the connections anyway, I took the opportunity to re-hang the shelves and reorganize the components. I started this “little” project after we put Pierce and Anna to bed (about 9:30) and finished right around 1:00 in the morning. Groan.

-Eric (Dad)

When Pierce was born Nora and I made the decision that any time he (or subsequently Anna) received a momentary gift, half would be put into college savings and the other half used for more immediate concerns. We even had a caveat that if the money was not needed all 100% would be put towards savings. To date, all of those wonderful gifts have gone 100% into savings. Until now.

For their birthdays this year both Pierce and Anna received birthday checks. While Anna is still oblivious to their nature, Pierce now has a basic understanding of what they are. This weekend he asked when he could go to Toys R Us to spend his “credit”. Nora and I discussed how much of a budget this toy-rich, just-had-a-birthday-and-the-holidays-are-around-the-corner-kid could have for spending money and decided that both Pierce and Anna could have $10 each to spend.

Before heading off to the store last night, Nora and I explained to Pierce what a budget was and how this applied to the basic limits of his purchasing power. His question? What can I get for $10 –apparently he thought that for any given amount there was one, and only one thing, that could be purchased. Hopefully we got him straightened out.

I had other commitments last night, so Nora took both kids to Toys R Us. She gave Pierce the cash to hold (he was very excited). On entering the store Pierce immediately spotted what he wanted, an 8-pack of toy cars (for $9.99). Nora advised him that they should look around a bit, just in case he spotted something else he might like (Pierce good-naturedly agreed). But nothing else pushed his buttons. Nora helped Anna with toy selection (and held onto her money), with Anna ultimately picking a singing, plush Barney the Dinosaur.

When they got to the register Nora explained to Pierce how to buy his toy: give them the toy, wait for them to tell you how much, then give them the money. Pierce was so keyed up he put the money on the counter and held onto the toys.

-Eric (Dad)

This past weekend feels like it was full of activity, but I can’t really think of what kept us so busy. On Thursday evening we did a family trip to the gym. Those with longer memories may recall that Anna was not a fan of these trips. That’s no longer the case; she’s become quite the advocate. As soon as we walk through the gym’s door she demands “her movies” from the Kid’s Center staff person and makes a beeline for her favorite toys. After we left the gym, we swung by the Deaver’s house for a quick visit (I also needed to borrow some power tools). We ended up staying way too late, but the kids were having a blast and showed no signs of slowing down.

Continuing the visiting trend, on Friday evening we had some friends (and their children) over for dinner. Robert, Lori, their twin girls, and their youngest daughter came by for a combined play date and visit. The twins are just slightly older than Pierce and their younger daughter is a little older than Anna. They all get along quite well. If Thursday was a late night, then we were setting records on Friday. I don’t think we got Pierce and Anna into bed until 10:30 pm. The good news? We all slept in on Saturday morning.

Pierce has been disappointed that he is not able to comfortably wear his Herbie costume for more than short periods due to its weight. I asked him if he would like me to put functional wheels on it so the could roll it around. Of course the answer was a resounding “yes”. While Nora ran errands on Saturday, Pierce and Anna came with me to Home Depot to buy the necessary parts. Man, I love that place! 20 minutes after we got home Pierce was up and running with his new rolling car. He actually joined me in the garage as I put it together. Every 5 minutes he would ask how’s it coming Dad?

Anna has found a new love: tights. Last week Nora put her in an outfit that had stockings and now every morning she demands an outfit that requires them. I was always under the impression women didn’t like wearing hose. Apparently I was mistaken. She even plans out the next day’s color of tights while we’re putting her to bed. I wonder how long this phase will last…

Sunday was an outside day for me; lots of lawn work and landscaping. Anna helped me mow the backyard and Pierce got his toy lawnmower and mowed the patio. As I was spreading dirt and grass seed on some thin areas of the lawn, Anna followed me and kept up a running commentary (her feet were filthy from walking through the dirt). I also started working on the new control box for our arcade machine –this one will have a trackball controller for games like Centipede, as well a hidden keyboard drawer. I’m trying to get this done quickly so I can start putting my car in the garage now that the weather is turning cold.

Pierce is turning into quite the artist. His drawing skills seem to be improving exponentially. This weekend he drew a number of scenes with cars: traffic jams, cars on TV, cars having accidents, Pierce in a car, Anna in a car – do you see a trend here? All of the drawings are immediately recognizable. Saturday afternoon Pierce, Anna and I made paper airplanes then decorated them with magic markers. Pierce and I threw our airplanes from the second floor landing while Anna hugged her airplane to her chest.

We finished of the weekend by doing thank you notes. Nora worked with Pierce as he meticulously wrote notes to those who gave him birthday gifts. On each he wrote “Thank You” and “Love Pierce” while Nora addressed the letters and spoke to the actual gift(s) he had received. Pierce also decorated each note with a custom Herbie. I worked with Anna who provided the custom artwork for each letter while I wrote the text. I suggested that she draw a smiley face on one of the letters and it turns out she could draw a very passable face. I think she has the “gift”.

-Eric (Dad)

Trick or treating was a blast. On getting home from work, Nora and I carved the larger two pumpkins we’d picked up at Deana Rose. Nora did a clever ghost carving while I, of course, bit off more than I could chew and created a three dimensional Herbie carving. We got them finished just as the first trick-or-treaters started to show up. (See below for a picture of the pumpkins).

Pierce and Anna actually managed to eat a half-decent dinner despite their excitement. Nora stayed home this year to hand out candy while I took Pierce and Anna out. Both of their costumes got high praise, with Pierce’s drawing a lot of admiration. Sadly, the costume was a little heavy for him and he asked me to carry it for him after the first 6 or so houses. What made it funny is he continued to run up to each new house and yell “I’m Herbie” even though I was pretty much standing on the curb holding his costume.

Pierce’s enthusiasm for trick or treating waned pretty quickly, so I took him back to the house after about a dozen houses, but Anna is a trick or treating machine. She absolutely loved it and basked in the attention her costume brought. After visiting a “haunted house” (the neighbors had decorated their garage with spooky lights) Anna kept asking if we could go to more scary houses.

Once Anna and I got back, Pierce and Anna opened the presents Nora and I had gotten for them for their birthdays. Nora found a couple of die-cast metal, 1/16th scale Herbie models on eBay and they were absolutely the favorites of the evening. Pierce was so happy it defies description. Both kids played with their cars as we watched another of their gifts on TV, the new Herbie – Fully Loaded DVD. The only downside was that the models are not very robust. Pieces were falling off the cars almost as soon as we had gotten them out of the boxes. We’ve lost bumpers, doors, windows, and a glovebox handle. Neither Pierce nor Anna much care, but Nora was pretty disappointed. We have a number of similar types of cars and they’ve proven to be far more robust than these new additions.

Finishing off this post are some recent pictures. Enjoy.

-Eric (Dad)

A few pictures from the annual Halloween Party (see previous post)





Pictures from the Birthday Party at Dye Your Duds