Day 22

Make pine cone bird feeders.

Day 21

Camp out by the Christmas tree ( at least until 11 when no sleep forced them into their own beds)

Day 20

Make mini snowman - made out of marshmallows

Day 19

Take a picture with a reindeer. Unfortunately, the live reindeer didn't fly in to Minneapolis hollidazzle village until Saturday. So we saw this on the side of downtown Target and figured it would have to work.

Day 18

Make a holiday card

Day 17

Put on a holiday play

Day 16

Make edible Christmas trees (sugar cones covered with green frosting decorated with sprinkles and sitting on top of white snow (or in this case ice cream))

Day 15

Color pictures to send to kids in the hospital.

On an unrelated note, R&I decided they would have a sleep over last night.

Day 14

Look at holiday lights. Went to Lake Phalen again.

Day 13

Make a wreath

Day 12

See a holiday train

Day 11

See a Christmas show. Stages theater.

Day 10

Make feet reindeer

Day 9

Start a puzzle

17 days to go

Read your favorite Christmas story

18 to go

Bake cookies

19 to go

Day 19 - take a holiday trolley ride

Days 21 and 20

Day 21 - make strawberry Santas

Day 20 - ring a bell

Ho ho ho

Advent is in full swing at the Black house!

Day 22

Watch a Christmas show. R,I & E watched Pokey the puppy's Christmas early in the evening then we watched the tree lighting.

Advent activity countdown

I made another activity countdown for this year.

Day 24 was make snowflakes

Today, day 23 was decorate a tree

Thanksgiving

Watching the parade in gf with my Ro-man. Thankful for my entire crew!

Life in slow motion

 So I'm watching Casablanca. I don't remember seeing it all the way through before. Man, they smoked a lot back in those days. It doesn't matter though, because the story is so good and the actors and characters are so strong. I wish they made more movies like this, with no special effects or even a great deal of time passing, just a night, with a lot of back story and a lot of great jazz music playing in the background. Alex Trebek, who introduced the movie on the Turner Classic Movies APP where I'm watching, said that the movie studio Warner Bros. rushed this movie through filming so that they could get it done before a big Summit scheduled in Casablanca. Brilliant.

Now, for a story about my own timing and success. I finished the Twin Cities Marathon in 3:41.

It was less than 2 minutes slower than my PR for the Marathon which I had a year ago. I ran a much smarter race this time though, and didn't "hit the wall" like I did last year when I started out way too fast. I did get a little bit excited in the middle, and probably got ahead of my optimal pace, but still I had a good feeling when I finished.

I saw a few friends along the way, including my friend Mike Klevay who happened to have a nice camera. He took some great shots. I also saw our neighbors, the McCarthy's who were cheering for one of their sisters also running the race. I actually saw them 3 times on the route that goes from downtown Minneapolis, through the chain of Lakes and then along the Mississippi to St. Paul.

I also had a few pictures taken after the race. And I had a photo or two I took before the race I'll post. Oh, and I snapped a photo with my phone (before I handed it off to Christina at mile 21) of the best cheering section along the route.

My shirt. The front has the twitter handle for our church, @OKLutheran. Some along the way cheered for me.. "Let's go Lutheran."

Here's the message that I had on the back. I had one guy (as he was passing me at mile 24) that he really appreciated the message on my back. So that was nice.

The guy behind me decided to smile during my selfie before the race. 

Pretty sure this dude in strap on sandals passed me in mile 22.

My cheering section.  

One of the photos my friend mike took.

This is one of my favorites.

The finish line picture will have to wait. I don't have it now. I think its on Christina's phone. Instead, I'd really strongly encourage you to see what Pioneer Press photographer Ben Garvin made with about 4 minutes of video at the finish line.

If the video doesn't play, click here to see what he did by compiling 10-seconds of time captured with a high speed slow motion camera (720 frames-per-second). He's the best photographer I've ever seen, and its not even close.  

Moving on..

This is a photo I took of Roman and Ivy at one of Levi's recent soccer games.

Levi (sporting a cool headband) scored a goal in a recent game that team won.
Here's looking at you kid.

Waning days of Summer; a Black family photo album

Levi's birthday party with a few friends and family

At Lake Minnetonka in the last moments of summer vacation.

Levi and flowers

Ezra and flowers. He's really come a long way on his bike riding this year.

Ivy in her dance outfit. She's going to her first dance class Wednesday. It's a frozen theme.

Ivy and her doll. She's very photogenic when she's asleep.

Daddy and Roman at DQ. We cashed in a belated father's day "coupon" to go to DQ together.

Ivy changed her coupon from going to the beach with Daddy to DQ.

Christina's cousin Erik has a visit. He moved to Portland, Ore. to follow his dreams and find better weather.
We'll miss him dearly at family gatherings though - the kids will too, but they don't know it yet. 

In Savage, for Erik's going-away party.

Ezra's gotten into Legos this summer.

This was from early August. Just a funny photo during Neighbor's night out, which we hosted again.

Levi snapped this  cool photo of Roman holding a frog.

So this is Sam's sandwich with home grown cucumbers, basil and tomatoes. Yum.

Levi's friends and his cake, which was Snoopy this year.

Happy boy.

Would it be summer without a trip to the Cherry and Spoon sculpture?

A pink cat ring, oh boy what a ring.

Look closely and you'll see Ivy and her teddy "sprinkles" have the same PJ's. She's doing her pirate expression.

Our garden giveth. 

At Levi's birthday we played stickball - first time for a few of his buddies and they did well.

some photos at the Minnesota Great Get Together....

The start of the afternoon.

Record-setting attendance this year at the MN state fair. 

Giant slide fun.

Ivy in the sandbox exhibit.

On the farm at the fair.

Sweet Martha

Butterflies

And brothers

End of the day, when we were exhausted and watching the live WCCO 10 p.m. newscast

We returned a day later for date night at the Fair!  

The Tim McGraw concert was groovy.

Daddy brought the kids to the Minnesota Children's Museum in late August. 

Ezra shows Roman how to make big bubbles. 

Ivy wishes it was a hoverboard, but still has fun.

Levi shows Ezra a big bubble.

The kids play in the turtle shell. We have lots of photos similar to this - as do most Twin Cities' families. 

We also ended the summer with a trip to the Canterbury Park Racetrack.

Daddy lost about $20 total in bets, and spent about that much in food. But we had fun.
Levi is in this photo, wearing blue and near the track.

Ice Cream....

Free pony rides..

 For ...

Each ...

Kid.

And at the end of the last race they let the kids on the track to race about 200 yards. Ishy. 

Roman is running hard here. And laughing.

Ivy's getting into it here.

$2 on #6 to Win.