Comic Con

For those of you who are unaware a Comic Con was held in Salt Lake City for the first time ever.  If you were unaware of that fact then you probably don’t know what a Comic Con.  It’s a convention for comic books, science fiction, fantasy and all other things geeky and nerdy.  Seeing as how those are things that I love I decided I needed to be part of the first Comic Con held in Salt Lake City.  I bought a ticket on line and went down for the opening night. 

I brought Lucy with me, since kids under twelve get in free.  I told her about it weeks before and that there would be exhibits and booths about comic book heroes and that people dress up like characters form their favorite shows.  She was way excited for it, especially about the part where she could dress up as a super hero.  So she got her Black Widow costume she got for her birthday last year and we got her a red wig and she went as Black Widow.  I decided to wear a Star Wars shirt and call it good.  Any costume I would have would have been of poor quality and looked shoddy at best.

Her costume was really popular we had about three dozen people ask to take her picture.  Like this lady who was also dressed as Black Widow and said she needed her picture with the “Little Black Widow”.  That’s what happens at these things when you dress up, people want your picture and Lucy was pretty popular.

When we saw Loki (the villain from the Avengers and Thor movies) we asked him if he would be in a picture with our Little Black Widow.  He said of course and I took a pic.  When I turned around there were ten other people taking pictures of these two, apparently it’s really cute.  Lucy was a little overwhelmed by that much attention.  When Thor walked by she said she did not want her picture with him, that she was feeling a little nervous.

We met up with my brother in law John and his wife Liz.  We walked around with them for a while and got our picture taken with the Good folks of the 501^st Legion, that’s the local group that dresses like the bad guys from Star Wars and attends events like this.    

 

They apparently also have Han Solo in carbonite in their possession.

We also visited the Rebel Legion, the good guy equivalent of the 501^st Legion, and Lucy was excited to get her picture with R2-D2. 

Lucy’s favorite part was meeting Spiderman. 

I’m really glad we went; it was a lot of fun.  I would have liked to have attended the other two days and gotten the chance to meet some of the celebrities they brought in and listen to their panels, all stuff Lucy would have hated.  But instead I ended up working the James Taylor concert at the Conference Center (Lucy also would have hated that too), I find his music boring and lame and now he’s keeping me from what I would rather be doing.  Life just isn’t fair I guess.

Jack does Lagoon

This summer Ariane and I decided that Jack might like to go to Lagoon with us.  We were right.  Jack loves Lagoon so much he thanks Heavenly Father for Lagoon in his prayers.  When we drive by the park on the freeway Jack exclaims from the back seat, “Lagoon! There it is! Go there.”

Jack enjoys the classic Lagoon rides that have been there since I was a kid.  Like Bulgy the Whale, the Helicopters and the Bumper Cars. 

 

He really likes riding with his sister Lucy.

He also enjoys the new rides like the jeeps of Red Rock Rally.

Though his favorite is the Animal Kingdom Train.  He loves trains, animals and riding with his Mom.

 

Entertaining Jack

In the previous Entertaining Jack post I told how Jack enjoyed watching clips of fire trucks on YouTube. Well we'd had about enough of watching that same 9 minute clip over and over. Ariane went out and found something else for him to obsessed with, TRACTORS.



This clip that she found is some sort of advertisement for a tractor company in England, but it works since it keeps Jack entertained.  It has however made him obsessed with tractors. 

His wildest dreams came true when on a recent trip to Wyoming my uncle James gave Jack a ride around the ranch on a tractor.  Since then we still hear from Jack, "James, tractor, ride it, blue one". 

Now anytime we see a tractor Jack insists that he needs to ride it.  What a funny little boy.

Baseball Tee Shirts

I started a tradition several years ago where I would get Lucy a t-shirt from every baseball stadium I visited.  As seen in these previous blog posts, 2009 and 2010.  During our trip this last spring to Ohio and Kentucky I thought it was appropriate to continue this tradition with Lucy and Jack.

The Cleveland Indians

The Cincinnati Reds

 I was a little hesitant to buy Reds shirts for the kids, since they are a division rival of the St. Louis Cardinals and there has been some bad blood between the two teams the last three or four year but it’s not like there cubs shirts.

We also picked up some Eastern Kentucky University Colonels shirts for the kids and Ariane as well.

Not to forget about the Cardinals this mother’s and father’s day Ariane and I got matching Cardinals jerseys. 

What a good looking pair.

Ariane Does Ragnar

I know I have been neglecting my blog as of late, but I don’t feel like there has been much worth blogging about recently.  However I did neglect to blog about one very important event that happened last June, Ariane ran the Ragnar relay race.  For those of you that don’t know what that is, it is a realay race from Logan to Park City run in teams of 12.

Arianes team was made up of members of my sister in law Brooke’s family, they called themselves the Barrett Brigade.  Ariane was sort of a last minute fill in, she had only a few weeks to prepare for this.  Every one ran three legs of the race.  Araine had a two mile stretch a six mile stretch and then another two mile stretch.  The first one she said wasn’t too bad but the next two were pretty rough, there was a lot of hills on those other two stretches, she called me after her second stretch and said she was sure she was going to die.

She was lucky enough to run the “glory stretch” as she called it, meaning she ran the last leg of the race.  She was pretty beat when it was all done, but I am really proud of her for doing it, she is amazing.

Graduation Trip

To celebrate my completion of graduate school at Eastern Kentucky University, Ariane and I took a little trip out to the Ohio and Kentucky area to do some sightseeing and spend some time away from the kids.  I love my kids more than anything but there is nothing better than a childless vacation, especially when you are just sightseeing.

Ariane has family that lives in Ohio so we were able to spend a few nights with her aunt and some of her cousins.  She really enjoyed seeing them again and it was cool for me to get to know some of them.   We went with them to a Cleveland Indians game one night.

 

 

 The tribe managed to beat Oakland, but it does help when you hit four home runs in the game, pretty exciting.

While we were up in that area we decided to go see a few sacred sites like the church history sights in Kirtland and the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton.

The hall of fame was cool, we got to see all kinds of cool football memorabilia.

Of course the highlights were the Denver Broncos stuff like the John Elway bust and jersey. 

The Super Bowl jersey of Terrell Davis and the rings from their two super bowl wins. 

There was some old Broncos stuff from their AFL days.

 

Arianes personal favorite was the jersey worn by Tim Tebow when he won that miracle playoff game a couple of years ago. 

 Probably the only time you’ll see anything that says Tebow in the Hall of Fame.

After our trip to the Hall of Fame we went up to Kirtland to see the church history sites.  We went to the Newel K. Whitney Store, where the school of the profits was held and many revelations were given that made up several sections of the Doctrine and Covenants.

We then went up the road to the Kirtland Temple, currently owned and operated by the Community of Christ (formerly known as the Reorganized LDS church). 

 

 It was really neat to be in that building where so many sacred things took place.

After a couple nights in the Cleveland area, the mistake by the lake as Ariane’s Uncle Dave called it.  We drove south to Cincinnati where we caught a Reds game. 

 

The Reds lost to the Atlanta Braves 7-4, the Braves hit a grand slam in the game.  I wasn’t to broken up about the loss since the Reds play in the Cardinals division and a Reds loss helps the Cards out.

After out night in Cincinnati we then headed across the Ohio River to Louisville Kentucky. 

 

We took a tour of the Louisville Slugger factory and museum; they make all the bats for major league baseball.

 

They had some cool stuff there like one of Babe Ruth’s bats that he used when he hit 60 home runs in a season. 

 

We got to hold some game used bats, like Mickey Mantles, that I am holding, and Johnny Bench’s, that Ariane is holding. 

 

 We even took a few swings in a batting cage, here I am using Evan Longoria’s bat, I even managed to foul a few pitches really hard.

They had a cool Lego exhibit there as well.  Here is a replica of Wrigley Field in Chicago.

While in Louisville we spent the night with an old friend of mine, Robert Valention.  He was kind enough to let us crash at his place.

We also checked out Church Hill Downs, where the Kentucky Derby is held, we were a week late for the Derby however. 

They even have former Kentucky Derby winner Mine That Bird stabled there.

 

Then it was on to Richmond KY, for graduation ceremonies.  This was the first time I had ever set foot on the campus of my school.

They offered a tour to all the on-line students so we took it.

 Here is the Johnson building, the main reception area for the university.

Students rub the foot of Daniel Boone for good luck when they walk by it.

When we got home and told Lucy all that we had done, she told us it sounded like a boring trip.  For us it was exciting to be able to listen to a tour guide, read all the plaques in a museum and sit through a baseball game and graduation without the kids bothering us because they were bored.  We’ll have to take them to Disneyland or Sea World some time to make it up to them.