Honor Roll and State Robotics

This year in 4th grade was the first opportunity for Landon and Emmy to earn Honor Roll for getting good grades.  We are so proud to say that both trimesters so far, Emerson has been on the Honor Roll and Landon has been on the High Honor Roll.  I can see their dedication and all the hard work Emmy puts into doing her best.  She asks her teacher, Mrs. Taylor for help when she doesn't understand.  

Congratulations!

The weekend of March 9th, we traveled to Indianapolis for the State Robotics Tournament.  We arrived Friday night for the Pizza and Pool party at the hotel.  Then spent all day Saturday at the Tournament.  It was a long day, but Nate and Sara came up from Evansville, so we got to spend the day with them.  It was neat being able to see all the robots from other schools and watch Woodview compete.

Landon in his Eaglebots gear.  The only thing you can't see are his red light up shoes!

The Red and Blue teams made it to the finals.  Neither won State, but they BOTH won the Excellence Award which is given to teams whose STEM research award, teamwork, interviews, notebook, and skills scores are the best.  This is a great honor (with a ginormous trophy!) and qualifies both teams to be entered to win the Excellence Award at World's too in April.

These kids and coaches work so hard and it shows!  Congrats on a great day!

We finished off the day with a yummy dinner with Nate and Sara, spent the night again and went shopping before heading home.  It was a busy, fun weekend!

Playa del Carmen Vacay

As I sit here on our 3rd snow/cold day off school and the coldest day of my entire life (no, really the wind chill was -38!), I realized I hadn't blogged about a much warmer time this winter...our trip to Mexico!  Matt and I went on a trip to an all inclusive resort in Playa del Carmen Mexico from Dec. 31-Jan. 5 in celebration of my 40th birthday last October.  It was heavenly.  We literally had NO responsibilities and could just relax and do whatever we wanted!

flying in

We got there on New Year's Eve, so we got to celebrate the new year outside in 80 degrees, a first!  It was a lot of fun, but we were so tired since we had to wake up at 4 am to be at the South Bend airport.

We spent time at the beach and pool.  It was a great time to go, not too crowded.

These little coati were EVERYWHERE!  They were rummaging around in the dirt and trashcans.

We spent an afternoon in town touring the shops and restaurants.

Our resort, Grand Sunset Princess!

We went ziplining at a really cool place in the jungle!

It was a lot of fun and even though it rained a bit, we had a great time!

waiting on the rest of our group to eat

We also got to go swimming in a cenote (natural sinkhole).

Our resort room was gorgeous!  It was spacious and the balcony overlooked the pool.

We went to dinner each night (usually around 9) and then just walked around the resort.  It was so nice being able to walk around even at night and not be cold or worry about bugs.

 Everyone was so willing to bring you drinks and help out.  Several employees were a little too insistent on us buying into the timeshare there and they kept asking us about it.  We eventually got smart and told them it was our last day, then they stopped asking!

It was a great week away, just the two of us!  We missed the kids (Emmy sent us messages about every day 😃), but it was nice to feel the sunshine and swim in the ocean.

Sunset on the way home

Purdue Kids Club Game and Tailgating

When I heard that the Purdue Kid's Club football game was November 3rd, I was NOT excited (remember the weather over Fall Break a few weeks earlier?).  Well, we ended up with a beautiful, sunny day to cheer on the Boilers vs Iowa.  We went down early to tailgate.  Todd and Cathy drove down with us and we met up with the Bergers and some of their friends.

The game was packed and the Boilers pulled out a last second field goal to win the game.

It was so exciting!  The crowd rushed onto the field.

Then we went back to spend the night at the Bergers.  The next day when they headed off to church, we went to campus to walk around, showing these future Boilermakers around! :)

We had a great weekend and although it was cold, we made some great memories!