The Manlius Formation

… just very busy. Here are a few tidbits of what’s been happening with the Sokolovics lately:

Went to see the Harlem Globetrotters and the Syracuse Crunch at the War Memorial arena. No big surprises - the Globetrotters beat the Washington Generals, and the Crunch lost their matchup. These two outings marked our first visits to the War Memorial, and I anticipate more visits in our future. It’s a very family-friendly environment and the tickets are reasonably affordable.

Had a great Valentine’s weekend. Nanny and Poppy came up for the weekend so Kath and I could go out to eat with some friends. Nanny and Poppy got to see Daniel play basketball at the YMCA. Kath and I got to play Guitar Hero for four hours after dinner - the verdict: I totally rock.

Bought a refrigerator. Our existing fridge was about 20 years old and was running pretty much all the time. We decided to take advantage of a sale at Sears and do our part to stimulate the economy. Pretty exciting.

Went skiing on the big hill at Toggenburg. It was the first time Daniel and I were up on the real slopes. Daniel’s buddy, Parker, and his dad joined us for the day. Daniel, possessing absolutely no sense of his own mortality, crouched into his snowplow position and hit every bump and jump he could. Much snow was consumed.

Daniel spelled a curse word (correctly) in a school assignment. He had to spell words that use the letters in HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY. You can imagine which 4-letter word he spelled using “S” as the first letter. His reason: “I was so busy thinking of words to spell that I didn’t realize it was a bad word.” Since I am the presumed source of his knowledge of such words, I got in more trouble than he did.

The kids had another ski lesson today - Daniel’s third and Thomas’ second. They both did great. Thomas was starting to move a little faster, and the instructor said that Daniel is ready for the “big hill” next time.

Kath and I decided that we’d also give it a shot today. Eventually, Daniel’s gonna want to hit the big hill and one of us will have to go with him, so we thought we’d get prepared. We picked up a coupon that let us get three lessons (with equipment rental) for $65 at Toggenburg Mtn.

We both did pretty well. It’s a little pathetic that the highlight for me was that I was able to ski on the “advanced beginner” hill under the tutelage of my six year old son. Kath and I were both turning and stopping by the end of the one-hour lesson, so we’re pretty happy with our meager progress.