Legos! Legos! Legos!

Good evening everyone!  Just about complete with our wild April full of warm days, freezing ice storms and snow. Luckily, I think we are finally in the clear, so that's great :) This week was pretty normal. I photographed at a school on Tuesday, which went really well. Kids were great, most of the teachers were good. Overall, fun time.

Wednesday, Mia played with Noelle after school. Weather was good, just pretty chilly. Thursday was Spaghetti Night/Basket Night. I had drawn a BB-8 sketch and donated some time to draw with a class of whom won. The woman that built the basket really wanted to win the session and ended up the winner. Now I just have to figure out what as a class, we'll be drawing. I always look forward to working with kids so it'll be a great time.

Saturday, I watched Chelsea scrape 3 points from the Swansea vs CFC match. Good game, but need to win the rest of the games to possibly stay in the Champions League. If Spurs blow it, we can top them and finish in the top 4. Later, Jill and I went to a long time buddy of mine's wedding. It was really enjoyable catching up with old friends at the reception and after the wedding. Sunday, we got up early and drove down to Legoland in Schaumburg to meet up with some friends Jacqui, Rick, Leanne, Caleb and Leanne's little niece Lucy. The kids LOVED Legoland and had a blast running around exploring the exhibits. I was pretty impressed with the Chicago display and Star Wars. The kids really enjoyed the Lego jungle and the rides. 

Afterwards, we grabbed a bite at Rainforest Cafe, and walked around a bit before heading home. Really nice having a full weekend off after an intense week. 

Friday is the always intense High Interest Day. I'll be leading a rock painting session with classes of 10 kids each. Should be a great time. The Torrent start their NPSL season against Ann Arbor on Saturday. They've drawn, won and lost the three games so far in the pre-season with one more match to go before Saturdays match. It's a tough one so we hope they can pull of the massive win.

That's all for now, thanks for reading! 

So Long Snow

Good evening everyone. I'm pretty exhausted after a busy weekend, so I'll make this one quick. We had some weird weather this week with some lousy snow. Not a fan whatsoever, but luckily after just one more day of snow (which added up to be about 5 inches or so) the warmth and sun reunited  and we've had some more enjoyable temps. Mia and I walked home in some nasty sleet on Wednesday, which luckily, was the last of the snow we would see.

Saturday, She hung out with friends Cecilia and Hayden at the Princeton Club swimming for a few hours. Those girls love to swim and had a blast. After lunch at Subway (which Mia thought was really cool that it was in the massive gym) the girls wanted to go to PetCo to check out all the animals. Cecilia apparently is in the market for some lizards and planned out the next 4 Birthdays. That kid is all talk :P Mia and I went back home so I could walk Remi while Jill did some work and after a quick bite, I took Mia back to Cecilia's so that the girls could play some more. They played outside for a while while Jill and I made a pie. Super tasty. I talked to Cecilia's Dad about possibly helping me coach in the Fall and he seems stoked about the challenge.

Later I went to the 2018 Milwaukee Torrent Kickoff party in Milwaukee. Met my fellow Flood members as well as some of the new and returning players for the men's side. I met a bunch of the new players for the Women's team as well. All great people and excited for the season to start. Today was the first pre-season match that I sadly missed. They drew 2-2. When I got home from the event, I did some video-editing till it was time to crash for the night

This morning while working on the starting XL, I watched the semi final FA cup match between the saints and Chelsea. We won 2-0 and will face Man U in the final. Easily can defeat these guys on a "good day". Hopefully. Later, I went to work till 10.

This week, plenty of photo editing for the Torrent, photographing at a school Tuesday morning and have a plethora of work to do at the ol KT. That's all for now, thanks for reading!

Skate Party

Good evening everyone! What a lousy way to end the week. At least 3-4 inches of snow in New Berlin! Ugh. So the return to school this week was pretty good after a mostly chill Spring Break. Wednesday, I was supposed to photograph at Hillcrest Elementary but it got cancelled due to the staff not being "ready yet". Great. That's fine. After Mia got out of school, we had to head to a Journey to the Arts meeting. Jill and I got involved in running this massive project at Orchard Lane.  I'll get into that more later throughout the months as things develop.

Mia sat so incredibly quiet on my lap as I chatted with her art teacher, her gym teacher, Jill on the phone and another Journey board member. As soon as we left, she went back on talking about how her day was, etc etc Very typical. Later, Jill and I went to the NBSD  budget meeting. With the possible threat of Mia's school closing, which would dump about 400 kids into others schools that already are at capacity, there was a pretty good turnout. Plenty of concerned parents wondering where their kid(s) will end up. Felt weird for us to be at something so serious, but when it comes to Mia's upcoming future, we're invested. Plenty of her teachers and administration attended the first of 3 meetings. Jill's parents luckily watched Mia so we could go. Hopefully things work out and the NBSD can figure out the best way to fix their budget issues. I'd hate for anything to happen, Mia split up from her friends and stuck into a classroom packed to capacity with kids.

Saturday, I got up nice and early to watch the Chelsea vs Southampton match. Like they have blown games since January, they gave up two goals they really shouldn't have due to some lousy defending. Pathetic. Somehow after the 2nd goal, subs Giroud and Pedro jumped into the mix and things immediately turned around. Giroud picked up one goal (which was his first EPL goal of the season since he transferred to CFC from Arsenal) and shortly after that, Hazard EQUALIZED and we were back in this! Amazing. Two goals in 5 minutes! THEN, Giroud got another goal! 3 goals in 8 minutes! The Saints blew a much-needed win to keep them out of relegation giving us a even more important win. Spurs are only 6 points ( I believe) ahead of us. Not too bad. West Brom beat Man U today (shocking) to officially give the title to City. Back to Saturday. Jill had to work a dance academy, so it was primarily Mia and I throughout the day.

So later, Mia went to her friend Easton's birthday party at Skateland. She hasn't roller skated since she was maybe 3 or 4 on some Fischer Price wheels. I don't think I've rollerbladed since I was maybe 13 or 14. I had Noelle and Mia on each hand as we skated around the place. Noelle bailed a bit and I did my best to keep Mia from falling. She bailed a few times as well due to some kids running right into her. She claims ice skating is way easier. Roller skates are pretty heavy but she did pretty well. Easton held Mia's hand to help her from time to time move faster. Mia claims "Easton makes me a better skater" which is pretty cute. I wish she would have given him full trust and she could have skated with just him, so I could help Noelle a bit more. Ryan was also there, and it was her very first time on the wheels so it was a bit of a struggle. I'd find her grasping for my arm as well.  Her classmate Kostadinia struggled too, so I would try and help her as well. Throughout the party, I was lacing and re-lacing skates as, Noelle, Mia, Kostadinia and Ryan would remove them, put them back on, take them off again, put them back on again etc etc. They had a jump house, so of course all of them had to try it out. Overall, Mia had an absolute blast and looks forward to skating again. We took Noelle back to her house, and Mia hung out with her, her sister and adorable, yet insane cousins for a few hours.

She was supposed hang out with Cecilia later (actually it was originally planned to be a sleep over, but Mia wanted to just hang out instead) but unfortunately due to the crappy weather, Cecilia's house was out of power. Mia was devastated. Her familia was staying at their uncle's house so there was no way it was happening. We made the most of it and watched a movie till Mia crashed for the night.

Today, we got a bunch of snow, leaving me to snow blow for a few hours before I went to work.

This weekend is the Torrent kickoff party. Hopefully the snow melts because they have a friendly on Sunday :O That's all for now, thanks for reading!

Winter Break pt 2 (Or Spring Break 2018)

Good evening everyone. Spring break has come and gone in a blink so a few notable things to mention tonight before diving into my upcoming crazy week. Early in the week, we voted in hopes of changing the Justice and school board. We picked up a new Justice of the Supreme Court but didn't get the guy the district needed for the school board. Bummer. Mia desperately wanted to hang out with friends early in the week as well. but a lot where busy so she was pretty bummed. She knew however, she'd get to go hang out and swim with BFF Cecilia, Hayden and Harper at the Princeton Club. First of all, really nice gym that literally has something for everyone. We where got in as guests because Hayden's family are members. Mia swam with her friends for about 2 hours while Hayden's Mom and I chatted in the pool as well. Leading up to the hang out, Mia just couldn't contain her excitement. Mia and Cecilia gave each other the biggest hug and it turns out while Cecilia was on her vacation in Mexico, she missed Mia. Mia excitingly brought her new underwater camera, however, after a few attempts to get the kids, the lifeguard told us "NO PHOTOGRAPHY". Fine, ya punk.

All the fun and swimming wore out Mia and she passed out on the drive into Waukesha. She had the best time, so I'm glad she got to have at least one really fun part of her Spring Break. Later in the evening, we got MOD pizza for dinner. Always tasty. The rest of the week, we didn't get to do a whole lot. Thursday, Mia hung out with Arabella, our friend Christina's little 4 year old at the studio and they colored together while Jill took photos of Arabella's little pineapple sister Penelope. She's adorable, and even Mia enjoyed watching her dance. The kids played really nice and it wasn't long before I had to split and go to work.

Friday, Mia showed me her break dancing skills after painting a couple of canvases. One was to hang by my drum set of a penguin and a drum, the other was a nice family portrait.

Saturday, we cleaned some of the house before I had to split to paint part 2 of The Flood's tifo. Upon unrolling the tifo, myself and one of our Flood brothers discovered the unfortunate damage due to rolling it too early. It needed a couple days to breath before rolling it up. So, we had plenty to touch up and fix. Had to cut off a couple feet from the top and re-do the top of the letters. I put in the swords and I think overall, it's looking pretty good. One more session left. I honestly don't think I'll have a time to go back in and complete it. The rest of April is booked and May is filling up very fast.

Later, we completed cleaning our bedroom, had some late dinner and called it a night. Today, I watched Chelsea blow a win against a team we should have had any problems beating. This season is such disaster and I sincerely hope we can figure out how to adjust and improve over the Summer. Something needs to change big time. We have 6 matches left and I don't think we'll get above 5th place either.

This week, I've got a busy one. Mia's back in school tomorrow, Wed I have to photograph a Waukesha school, after Mia gets out of school, I have a Journey to the Arts meeting. Later, Jill and I are going to raise hell at a school district budget meeting. The district is rumored to be closing Mia's school because of budget issues. Throughout the week, I'm going to continue working on the Footy collection for Ian Bennett as well as an attempt to win $5,000 to design a new NPSL women's team logo.

That's all for now, thanks for reading!

Hoppy Birthday

Greetings everyone! Busy week to end April with much to discuss. Tuesday was Mia's 7th birthday! Can't believe she's already SEVEN. The things this kid can do and has done within a year is amazing. Her love for reading has soared, she's gained so many friends and has completed fantastic sleepovers. Her curiosity and creativity have continued to flourish and despite becoming more and more stubborn, she's still our Mia and our love for her fills our hearts. Yeah, I'm sappy. Anyways, so my Mom and I joined Mia for lunch. Earlier in the day, I had picked up a ham/cheese sub and when I arrived at the school, I had totally forgotten it so I sprinted back, grabbed it and ran back. We had lunch while Mia's friends talked my ear off. "You seem like a cool guy, we should hang out at recess" said Laiani (sp). Thanks kid. I had drawn Mia her very own My Little Pony character; Moonlight Mia for her special birthday note. She loved it so much that she plans to turn it into a book series.

So we did a large Duck Duck Goose game, followed by a jump rope competition followed by 22+ kids chasing me around the grounds. It got intense. Like that one scene in Pirates of the Caribbean where Jack is running from the islanders. I was mentally begging for the bell to ring so the chaos would end. They'd trap me with the hoola hoop. My guest sticker was long gone in the insanity. Mia gave me a hug goodbye before I split. A few of her other friends gave me hugs as well such as Ryan and Hayden. Sweet kids.

Later, we took Mia out to see Sherlock Gnomes followed by dinner at Noodles. I kept nodding off during the movie. From what I remember, it wasn't bad. It was a nice way to celebrate Mia's actual birthday, and she was stoked to open some gifts sent in. She got a Hermione wig/robe and some Play Dough sets from us as well. Wednesday, I was up early to photograph in Franksville, WI at Raymond Elementary. Longest drive to photograph at a school, but it was fun. It was a bit irritating not to have a map of the grades with classrooms but most of the teachers were pretty nice as well as the students to photograph.

Friday was Mia's first day of Spring Break so we hung out at the park for an hour with long time friend Olivia and her brother. The kids played tag and chased each other around. Wish it was a bit warmer, but what can ya do?

Saturday, I watched Chelsea fall apart to the dreaded Spurs at home. First defeat in 28 years. Such a terrible run they have had this season. Later, we cleaned the house and dyed eggs at Jill's parent's house. Sunday, was Mia's family birthday party as well as Easter. She hunted for eggs, baskets and enjoyed all of the little April Fools Day jokes before the rest of our family came over for more egg hunting and dinner. All in all, good weekend. Back to the grind this week. Mia's BFF Cecilia returned so Mia's hanging out with her this week. That's all for now, thanks for reading!