Organizing???

Mom thought this was a miracle.  She has been asking me to organize my schoolwork in a binder...but I kind of liked one folder for EVERYTHING.  But I finally took the plunge...and spent some time organizing my work into a binder!  What?  Yup!

Brendan's party

I invited a few friends to Brendan's birthday party.  We played video games, and basketball.  I should have them over more often.

Thanksgiving

Went to MSY for Thanksgiving.  

Of course, we ate beignets.

Spent some time at the WWII museum

We played some tennis

Had Thanksgiving

I must've eaten something funny.

I held this baby...for a minute.  She was a good baby, but she was heavy...and I didn't want to hold a baby.

Halloween

My brother and I invested in this panda costume.  It was expensive, but I've wanted one of these for a long time. 

Here I am at the DAUPC Halloween party.  Everyone loved my costume.

TOT-ing with my brother.  We went to find out classmates and went with them.  It was a fun night!

Mom's trip

Mom went to Paris with her friends for 2 weeks to celebrate their 40th...together.  And we boys survived.  

1st day of 7th grade

First day of 7th.  I'm much taller after growing like a weed over the summer.  I'm taller than mom.  On my birthday I was 5' 1.5"...and now I'm pretty sure I'm 5' 3".

Seattle - Summer 2016

Got to spend a few weeks in Seattle this summer.  It was a short 3 weeks, but we were able to do a lot too.  Mom flew us up, along with cousins Jenna and Enzo.  

 Took a little nap on the plane.  We just got back from London a few days ago!

We built a fort in our bedroom.  

Waiting for golf camp to start.  Only B and I took the camp.  It was pretty fun. 

Practicing our putting

Hiking at Bloedel Reserve.  

Find me.

Rest break.

Sailing camp?  Yes, that's right.  I can actually sail.  Amazing.

Just watch my moves.

Ugh! Braces!

So we started the braces process a couple months ago.  First they took a bunch of measurements and xrays and then the Dr came up with a game plan.  It seems my upper jaw is growing much slower than my lower jaw...and it's also sticking out further.  So if we didn't do anything, I would have a serious underbite.  So...of we go.

This was one of my first appointments.  For measurements and molds and things.

Here is my latest...actual brackets on the top teeth.  What Mom missed (she didn't take any good pictures) is when they put the jaw expander on a few weeks ago.  It's basically a device that is wrapped around 4 of my teeth and Mom uses a special tool each night to twist the device more open.  It's just a small twist, but we did it for a few weeks...until I had a gap in the front!  Then he told us to stop and wait.  While I waited, the gap closed itself!  Phew!

So now he's putting some brackets on...cuz I have a super wonky tooth up there on your right.

He used a small blow torch on the ends of the wire.

And now I'm all set.  Now where's the wax?

Dance Videos

Here are the videos from my last dance competition of the 2015/2016 season.  

I'm as tall as Mom!

Yeah, it's official.  I'm as tall as Mom....and growing fast.  In August of last year (2015), I was probably a good 5 inches shorter.   And now....BOOM!  Growing like a weed!

Science Expo - Tower

The Science Expo at school was for extra credit and Mom and Dad said it would be a good idea to try it.  We had the choice of building a tower, a bridge, a catapult or do the traditional science fair board.  I decided to go for the tower.  We could use 1 box of flat toothpicks, glue and a spool of thread.  Also, there was a specific base and top size.  That part was given to us by the teacher.  And it could only weigh 71 grams. Oh, and the tower had to be able to hold at least 2 science books.  All these things had to met to qualify.  Mine came in at 70.1 grams and I knew it would take at least 4 books.

2 students went at a time and stacked books on their tower...this picture isn't me, but you can see that the books flattened this girls tower.  Smoosh.

Here's my video

I got to 19 books and then I tried to adjust the stack....and it came down.  There were loads more people after me, so the winning tower held 34 books....I still have a couple years to improve my tower.  Nice try though, huh?

Here's another video

Another video, not of me though.

I'm getting braces!

I'll be getting braces in a few weeks.  Here I am getting measured up.  

Lake Louise

Here we are in Banff.  This was a travel/explore day, so we stopped in Banff to take a look around.  This weekend was a holiday, so it was incredibly crowded.

We were able to ski 4 days total.  All days were pretty good, fresh snow fell during the night, so we had nice snow to board on.  The greens were more like blues on this "hill" so we did not get bored of greens.  Plus most chairs had at least one green to get down, so we explored all parts of the mountain.

The Temple Lodge is in the back of the mountain and was a nice place to eat lunch and rest.

Um, they have ramen at the main lodge?  Yes please.  We ate here twice.  Much better than having an overcooked burger.  Prices were decent given the favorable exchange rate.

Looking down at the main lodge. Between those two mountains is Lake Louise and our hotel.

First night checking out the lake.  Resting on the ice bench.

Beautiful ice castle!

Peekaboo!

20 minutes from Lake Louise is the Johnston Canyon.  Here we hiked about 3.5 km to the upper ice falls.  We had to wear yaktraks because if the icy trail.  Hike was easy and very pretty.

Lots of rest breaks. and pictures.

Icy patch, watch out!

The path was sometimes elevated with rails.

How cool is this?

How much further?

Wow!

It's loud!!!!

Made it to the end.

Crazy ice climbers behind us!

Another stop in Banff.  This time...nobody there.

Yup, we had ice cream and it was 0C outside.  It was good though and the waffle cone was really fresh and crispy!

Dogsledding!!!!

The dogs knew we were getting ready to leave and got really really excited.  They barked louder and louder until we left.  They really wanted to go.

Mom and B in their sled.  One of the skis broke at the halfway point, so they had to get a new one brought in.  At the halfway point, they had hot chocolate and cookies for us.  A nice treat.

All the dogs were very good, and B like this one a lot.  Her name was Susan.  But we also liked Kimo.

Break at the halfway point.

Another trip to the lake and ice castle for skating!

Skating was a lot harder than I remember.

Now hiking on the lake

Thanks Lake Louise, it was super fun!