Christmas Day

This is the first year that I told my kids not to wake me up, I think I have turned into the scrooge :) They woke me up anyway :)

Emma got a robe and some littlest pet shops, a travel size Mad Gab, and cooking mama for the wii.

Tayler got a robe and an erector set and Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam for the wii.

Jackie got a robe, my sim for her DS and Harry potter and the order of the phoenix for the wii.

Hope got a robe, some yummy smelling perfume and some make up and Donkey Kong Barrel blast for the wii.

For the family we got some more remotes and nunchucks so that everyone can play.

I was also pleasantly surprised that my kids wore their robes the whole day and the day after and some of them are wearing them today, just goes to show that you never know what they will like.

These last pictures are to show you what our house has looked like for the last two and a half days, I don't think their bottoms have left the couch longer than they had to. They love the new games, and have played and played.

I am going to tell you our rating system for these games, each of us will rate them for you .

Tony Hawk Downhill Jam: 12 Thumbs up (6 two thumbs up)
Cooking Mama: 13 Thumbs up (Tayler gives it 4 thumbs up and George gives it one, the rest of us give it two thumbs up)
Harry Potter: 4 Thumbs up (Emma gives it two, Hope and Jackie give it one)
Donkey Kong: -3 (Tayler two thumbs down, Emma one thumb up, Hope no thumbs, Jackie two thumbs down, and George no thumbs, I don't count I haven't played it)

So for all of you new wii owners out there, you now know what we think about these games. I need to run, I have to beat George one more time at the skateboarding (Downhill Jam), just so I can say I did it!!

Christmas Eve

For Christmas Eve we went to Sid and Chan Heis house.

Last year when we were there Sid had bought a new game that we all played, and this year he didn't disappoint us :) This years new game was named SET and we were sucked into it. It is a card game with different designs and different colors and different shadings, and we had to find a set. So we did a lot of yelling "Set". It was a lot of fun.

Chan Hei fed us a wonderful meal, as always. We had Ham, rolls, broccoli salad, green salad, Uncle Sids famous sparkling Jello, and mashed potatoes. They had invited a lady in their ward to come to dinner also, so it was nice to meet her. We had a very good time.

After hours of playing and talking and Uncle Sid trying to talk us into doing a Hispanic Christmas(opening our gifts at midnight) we drug ourselves home and went to bed.

Yummy challah bread

Take a deep deep breath, can you smell it? Jackie is baking again!!! YAHOO, she is the kitchen whiz and I love it!!

The recipe is yummy and looks awesome too.

Challah bread

1 tbsp. Dry yeast

1/2 cup milk

2 tbsp. Butter

2 tbsp. sugar

1 tsp. salt

2 1/4 to 2 1/2 cup flour ( flour is an estimate)

1 egg

Topping:You will need to do this on day two:

1 egg yolk mixed with a little water

1 tsp. Poppy seed (optional)

Soften yeast in 1/4 cup warm water. Combine milk, butter, sugar, and salt until the sugar dissolves. Stir in 1 cup flour. Beat well. Add egg beat well. Stir in enough of the remaining flour to make soft dough. Knead on a floured surface until smooth and elastic. Bag in a zip lock and put in fridge.

Day two:

Divide dough into thirds. Roll each third into a rope: braid strands and secure ends. Place on a greased cookie sheet and let rise until doubled in size. Brush with egg yolk and sprinkle with poppy seeds. Bake ate 375 degrees for 15-20 minutes.

Robotics competition

I guess I should give a little info on the competition.

The teams start with a lego kit, that has wheels and wires, sensors, the usb cord, a central computer system, the mat and all the things needed to program and build a robot that will complete as many tasks as possible within a two minute time range.

The theme this year was alternative energy sources, so every task has something to do with that. The robot is programed to go out from the home base and complete a task. Taylers team sent it out to do one or two tasks at a time and then come back to base, some teams completed two or three tasks at a time and then came back, each team can decide what they want to do. Each time the robot does not make it back to base, and they have to pick it up they lose points.

The robot goes out and hopefully gets a task done and comes back, Tayler's group pushed the windmills over a line, tripped a switch that sent a coal car down a track, pushed a dam into place, pushed a car to a house, picked up some uranium and corn, hit a switch that activates a solar panel, after they collected the corn and uranium and power poles they have to have the robot take them to different areas on the mat. This isn't the order they did it in, I am just trying to remember them, and I am not sure which ones I am forgetting. They have ten tasks to complete in a two minute time frame. The robot has to leave the base and make it back to the base to get the points, so they try to get as many points as they can.

In addition to all of the programming and stuff they had to do an energy audit of a local business, and then present to that business all of the ways they could conserve energy by using alternative energy sources. What the cost and savings would be and how long it would take to pay off the improvements. They went to our local swimming pool and filmed the video and then the day of competition they showed the video to some judges.

The team gets judged on how well they work as a team, how well a robot is built, how well it performs, they judge on if they think the kids built and programmed mostly by themselves, and lots of areas, so it is a full day

They also did a alternative energy fair at their school, all of the kids researched a different energy source and made a display.

And just recently they went to our City council meeting to present their ideas of how they could save money using alternative energy sources.

I am sure I am forgetting something, but in a nut shell that is what they did, it only took them every single friday and saturday evening since August to do all of this and I am sure Uncle Sid put in more hours than that. It is amazing to see, and I only have a small idea of all that they did. It's a lot of work but Tayler just loves it.

Another Video

This is the first of the three rounds in the competition. Tayler and Erin ran the first two rounds, then our cousin Sydney and Onaka ran the third round.

Banks Bots Video's

This is their cheer. These kids are amazing, they got together every friday and saturday night since August. Uncle Sid and Aunt Chan Hei are amazing also, tons of work has gone into this so far and now more work is needed before January 19th, but Tayler loves it and comes home excited every week with all of the things they are getting accomplished. This experience has been very good for Tayler, he has learned alot. Go Banks Bots!!!!!

We're Going To State!!

Today was an exciting day!! Tayler has a robotics team and they had a competition today. They did very well, and they are going to state. They have been practicing since August and it has payed off. On the spread sheet below, his team is number 940. It shows the scores of each of the runs they did. I will post some videos of the competition later.

It's raining, it's pouring.....

I got a call today from Judy, wondering if we are floating away or not, so I thought I better let you all know what's going on.

Friday we got snow, I already told you that,well friday night it started raining, then it started pouring, then some old man started snoring :) (sorry couldn't stop myself :)) It rained hard all day saturday and on sunday so that monday lots of places started flooding. So Stacey if you were still here you wouldn't have been able to leave your house at all and if Dave was at work he wouldn't have made it home with out trying to drive through a river. They sent kids home from Dilley early and those that didn't leave with the buses had to be transported out by I think National Guard? So lots of water everywhere, by far the most water we have seen since we moved here.

The important news is that we are all ok and that the flood hasn't hurt us at all, the kids didn't have school today, and we didn't work yesterday, other than that life goes on for us. Lots of people did get flooded and I have heard they are getting help, that is good and hopefully they can get things cleaned up. Hopefully this is the only really bad weather for the winter.