Our Webelos moved from their Cub Scout blue shirts to Boy Scout green tonight. They're growing up fast; only one more year as Cubs
Races Miwok diorama is done
I wish you could see the clay fish on the back of the drying rack behind the bear skin. I really like the shell necklace Race and Elizabeth made. -Dean
Race and Papa Mike went shooting today
And Race fired his 22 rifle for the first time. You can see he did really well.
How Tall is Race?
Yesterday we made our yearly pilgrimage to the pumpkin patch and got our 2011 picture of Race standing in front of the big measuring stick. He didn't grow as much this year as in some past years, but he is growing.
Fall Show: Go, Go Jonah
Without a doubt this was the wildest school production Race has ever taken part in. We actually lost track of him numerous times during the show as the kids relocated throughout the theater, next to us, behind us, in front of us, everywhere. It was non-stop energy. Race played a sailor on the boat taking Jonah to Nineveh, a citizen of Nineveh and even had a rap solo at one point. I wish we'd taken the video camera, but you will have to be satisfied with a couple of still photos.
Horse back
We went horseback riding in Sunol-Ohlone park. Race and Elizabeth enjoyed it so much they may take lessons.
Redwood Coast
Ok, this is a bit overdue, but we took a substantial detour when we picked Race up at Nana and Papa's house in Oregon. On the first day of our detour we went to Carter Lake, the Rogue River Gorge and then on to Crescent City where we played on the beach, took a walk on the breakwater and visited the lighthouse. We spent the night at a quaint little hotel on the highway called the Curly Redwood Lodge. The hotel is built primarily from redwood and all of the redwood came form the same tree. The next day we made our way down to Fort Bragg doing all of the tourist stuff on the way. We went to Big Trees, hiked a couple of miles through Redwood National Park, played on the beach, waded in a river and tried to catch frogs and tadpoles and taught Race to skip rocks. Crossing the Klamath River Elizabeth enthused, "there's a whale in the river, pull over." We stopped and walked out on to the highway bridge with all of the other looky-loo's and took some pictures of the whale. We were saddened to learn later that the whale died the next day. We spent the night in Fort Bragg and got an early start the next morning heading for Fort Ross. We had a great time wandering around the fort. The morning fog was just thick enough to hide the highway and nearby modern construction. It didn't take much imagination get an eery feeling of stepping back in time. We continued on down the coast and ended up in Petaluma for lunch and a tour of Mrs Grossman's Sticker Factory. It was actually pretty cool and we walked out with hundreds of sticker samples and scrapbooks to finish at home. We were surprised that Mrs Grossman had expanded her line and now, in addition to craft stickers, printed wine bottle labels for Ironstone, Coppola, etc. We arrived home in the early evening exhausted after our 3-day whirlwind trip through Oregon and down the Oregon Coast.
Lemons at Thunderhill August 7th and 8th
We managed to finish 61st and 114th at Thunderhill. In the process of this pitiful accomplishment we managed to blow the 14 cars engine and wreck the 11 car so well that we bought a replacement car from another race team. Yeah, we sucked! Here's an entirely unflattering picture of me in our Deff Lepoard costumes that we wore to tech the cars. Yep, scary, but the live guitar solo by teammate Ian during tech was a big hit.
Landscaping Progress
The backyard is close to looking like, well, a backyard. The irrigation, lawn, and paths are in. The traffic light and all the outside lights are now operated by wireless remote control and, today, we put Race's gas station back together.
Lake Tahoe
We spent Friday and Saturday at a Camp Concord work weekend. Lake Tahoe on an 85 degree day is a wonderful place to be. While we worked on cleanup and deck building, Race went off with the other kids and camp counselors for a visit with Smokey the Bear, pedal boating on the lake and building sand castles on Pope Beach.
Amtrack
Race and Dean are on there way to Sacramento for the day on Amtrack. Why? Why just for the fun of it.
Some June Pictures
These are some pictures of Race degreasing the bottom of Elizabeth's '65 Mustang. Note the responsible use of safety gear.
Not so fun
We're spending the afternoon at the emergency room. Race smashed his finger, tore his finger nail loose, we'r waiting on the xrays to see if it's broken. He is his mothers child.
Update: it's broken, the tip if his finger is broken free. He also lost the nail and has damage to his nail band. It took three stitches, one internal, to pull his finger tip back together. We won't be leaving for Oregon to stay with Nana today, after all. Maybe Sunday.
Big fun on the street
There a new girl Race's age on the block and she has an electric scooter. It might be love! Well at least he's in love with her scooter.
KKDV Ultimate Coffee Break
Elizabeth won a KKDV Ultimate Coffee Break. KKDV is the Diablo Valley's local radio station. She was able to take Race to work with her last Friday for the party. Coffee and pastry's in the morning. Race didn't drink the coffee, but he ate his fair share of cookies and other pastry treats. Check out the pictures on the KKDV website. Picture 1 Picture 2
Its a hit
Race found the courage to try the 410 shotgun. Only 1 hit out of 15, but we're really proud of him.
Birds Landing Gun Club
Clays for Kids day. The gun club puts this event on every year. Its all free for the kids. They get to shoot pellet guns, bows, and shotguns. Race got his face camlouflaged by the face painter. It looks cool but its hard to see him now. ;)
Staying overnight
Race's best bud, Rockwell, is here for a sleep over. It's not even lunchtime and we've been to Home Depot to build Drink Coaster Sets and the airport to watch the busy weekend activity. What's next? Not even they know...
Remembering Matteo
Elizabeth and Dean attended a Celebration of Life for Matteo at Matteo's Dream Park this afternoon. Race went to a birthday party at Sky High and then Mountain Mike's Pizza.All 3 of us returned later in the evening for a candlelight vigil for Matteo. Amazingly, when we went to light the candles the sun finally came out for a bright dusk display and the rain stopped. Unfortunately the breeze continued. The breeze was wonderful for the bubbles being blown, but terrible for the candles. There are more pictures of the event here CLICK HERE FOR MATTEO CELEBRATION PICTURES
Flags
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NBC in the morning
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Blackhawk 500
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The Dramatic Finish
We survived 24 hours without any major issues and came in third out of seventy-eight cars. This puts us in a 2-way tie for second place in the championship points.
Series 24 hours of LeMons
Race: Goin' For Broken
24 hour race at Fernley Racetrack in beautiful (if you like windblown desert in the middle of nowhere) Fernley, Nevada
Team Cajun Coonasses (it's a stupid name, we're going to change it, in fact we're going to change our whole theme)
Car #11, 1991 "Deaf Leopard" Nissan Sentra
Drivers: Gary Sheehan, Tony Partida, Kert Miller, Dean Cofer, Eric O'Brien, Billy Brooks
The race started at 10AM on Saturday. There were six team drivers present at this event and I was fourth in the driver line up and was on track from about 2:30 to 4:30 pm. I managed to post a fast lap of 2:43.372. Our, ahem, pro driver managed a 2:34.773. I can live with that differential.
After my driving stint Kert and I rushed into Sparks, 30 miles away, to get more tires. It had already become apparent that the 8 used and 4 new tires we had brought to the track were not going to be enough. Fernley Racetrack is extremely abrasive. Thank goodness Summit Racing stays open until 9 on Saturday nights. We returned and I made dinner for the team and then served as crew for a few hours.
I managed to take a short nap before going back on the track from 3:00 to 4:30 Sunday morning. Let me tell you, driving at speed on a highly technical track like Fernley in the dark with a low budget, ill handling, POS race car, racing wheel to wheel with a bunch of other amateur drivers is the most entertaining, most terrifying, stupidest, and, by far, the most fun thing I've ever done in a race car. It's a near religious experience when you actually find the apex of a corner on a pitch black track; unfortunately, you'll probably miss the next one so the rapture is short lived.
We did something a little different for this race; we put a horn on the race car. Let me tell you, when you're passing in the dark and you blow your horn at an opposing driver, well, its hilarious how often they move quickly out of the way and leave a clear track ahead. We thought a horn was a nice touch, to warn drivers that you were coming around; now we're wondering how long before horns are banned in the rules.
The drive home was awful. It was snowing and Donner Pass kept being opened and closed. We hung out in Fernley waiting for the pass to open. We hit the road when we received the good news that it was open and ended up stopping at Boomtown and waiting again. We finally made it through even though it was snowing pretty hard. It took us over 8 hours to make the 4.5 hour drive. Thank goodness I scheduled Monday as vacation to recover and unpack.
Lessons learned: 1) black flags will cost you a win; we spent over 40 minutes in the penalty area being punished for violations. One driver passed under a yellow flag and the other hit the Killer Bee (see picture of Kert signing his paint marks on the Killer Bee). Kert didn't actually get penalized, but he did have to come in for us to pull the fender away from the tire. When we asked him what he hit he said, "Nothing." He finally admitted he'd hit the Bee. Gary swears he didn't pass under yellow, but he got black flagged for it (the video will tell the truth, but won't change the results). He spent 20 minutes in the penalty box listening to Judge Phil explain all the financial problems being suffered by the State of California. 40 minutes equates to a 16 1/2 penalty. 16 1/2 laps would have made us the race winners; we only lost by 9 laps. We will focus on running clean in the future.
2) Febreeze works to deodorize people who don't have time to shower. Gary got in late Thursday night and went straight to bed in the back of the car trailer. He smelled pretty ripe, so he tried Febreeze. It worked. We do not recommend trying this yourself, but Gary is a convert.
3) Racing in the snow is even scarier than racing in the rain. Yep, it snowed on Eric when he was out from 4:30 to 6:00 Sunday morning.
4) don't throw away the headlights and cut out the wiring for them on the next car we make into the race car. Also, lights that work great on the highway don't reach out nearly far enough on a race track.
Here are a few pictures from the event. You can see even more pictures by clicking here. CLICK HERE
Living the dream
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Larkey Park with Race and Daria
I went to work this morning and they didn't really need me there, so I left. Now I'm enjoying a vacation day with Race and Daria. We went to breakfast at Min's Kitchen with my buddy Dave; then we went geo-caching at Markham Park; we just finished a tour of the Lindsay Wildlife Museum and now they're rolling down hills at Larkey Park. It's definitely better than being at work or school!
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Pack 316 Pinewood Derby April 21st
It was the pack Pinewood Derby today. Race's red pickup took second place and Andrew's car took third. Both cars were built in the Cofer shop, so Dean is claiming that he won the manufacturer's championship. Here are a couple of pictures of the cars and the action.
Mustangs Plus April Car Show April 23rd
It was a big day for Race. Elizabeth drove her '65 convertible to the show and Race and Dean loaded the '66 coupe that Race inherited from Grandma Donna, the Mustang Jr and Race's flamed Mustang pedal car into the trailer and we all headed to Stockton. The promised rain never appeared and we all ended up with sunburns. It was great to see all of our Mustang friends. The featured cars this show were unfinished project cars. Race;s '66 Coupe fit the bill perfectly and he managed to take home an engraved plaque and a trophy. He's pretty happy about it as you can see in the pictures.
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