Before

After

We made short work of two 17" pizzas!

That's better

Be careful! Behind those smiles are a bunch of ravenous wolves!

Silly as can be!

Final stop: Dewey's Pizza

I may have found a new favorite!

Johnny No-fear Barton

I have to give him credit for persevering! There was one time in particular that I was belaying him and told him I thought the wall was probably just too difficult for him. He refused to give up and kept climbing, eventually surpassing the point at which David had given up and making it to the top! Way to hang in there, Johnny (pun intended).

Ian, flexible and strong

Such a cool place!

It was really busy tonight, with climbers of all ages.

Johnny checks in at the front desk...

...from atop the bouldering wall!

Isaac the Conqueror

Isaac overcame his fear of heights and topped out ten times tonight on various walls.

Urban Krag, round two

Isaac and Ian really enjoyed bouldering a lot tonight and improving their techniques.

Enjoying a classic!

Raiders win!

Be sure to catch the local sports highlights tonight. That was an amazing finish! At 69-66 we thought we had it wrapped up until Idaho made a half court shot at the last second. So we were rewarded with a 5 minute overtime battle. Idaho came ahead with 3 seconds to play until Mays sunk it at the buzzer for the win! What a fun evening. The boys and I enjoyed ourselves immensely. We may all be hoarse tomorrow.

AMAZING GAME!

Looks like it might get a bit loud!

We're sitting right next to the pep band. Fun!

Let's get ROWDY!!!

Taking in a Wright State Raiders game tonight with my guys.

It's officially Christmas!

This is always the first ornament I hang on our tree, from my very first Christmas 39 years ago!

The weather outside was frightful...

But we made our inside very delightful! The boys are getting to be very good helpers when it comes to decorating the tree. I love to hear their excitement as they pull out familiar ornaments and recount memories (or laugh at my "REALLY OLD" ornaments from childhood).

So aptly named "laughter"

This is what happens when Isaac is put in charge of setting up the Christmas village. Of course, it turns into a Lego town, complete with people taking pictures, standing on a roof hanging garland, and even one stuck in a chimney!

Details

Lego City

Guess what we did today?

If you guessed went to church, you'd be wrong!

Brothers Bravely Bouldering

One of our favorite walls

Ian--bouldering

Climb? Climb on!

Here's Ian, just getting started on a route.

Isaac--bouldering

Ian got a shot of us

A good day!

We spent 5 1/2 hours today at Urban Krag, a climbing gym in Dayton. Forgive my lack of pictures of the boys on the ropes--my hands were a bit busy belaying them! Ian made it to the top of the orange rope you see just under the left-most rafter (it's the rope farthest to the right at the bottom corner of the picture) Brave guy! That's a long way up there! Isaac seemed to prefer the bouldering--closer to the ground but ropeless. I still feel like I have ropes running through my hands--they didn't let me rest for long. It was such a fun way to spend our day together and was something I promised to take them to a long time ago. They spent about three hours completely reorganizing and cleaning their room yesterday in order to go today. I'm tucking the memories of the day away in my heart. I love being a mom of boys--and I think my two are especially special!