Cute pics of “Dakota Melody”

Along with her hero, Sheriff Billy Bold (Titus Soderberg), and the villain Professor Silias Snakebreath (Luke Hughes). Also pictured are the four "Harvey Girl" waitresses, which include cousin Greta. All the pictures were taken by Luke's mom, Lisa.

Dakota Melody gets her hair curled

Chelsea Niemeyer, who is in charge of all the costumes and hair for our play, was exasperated trying to get Signe's stick-straight hair to hold the curls. So she resorted to some extreme measures Saturday morning before our matinee. The curls lasted for days; Signe got quite a reaction when she wore them to school Monday.
Chelsea's daughter Esther, a very good friend of Signe's, played Wild Prairie Rose (the "female Jesse James").

The Snake in the Grass

It's been a rough day for Jr. High actors - both my lead villain and Signe, the female lead, came home early this afternoon from school with fevers. Other kids are also ill or fighting off sickness. So I decided to cancel our Family Night show tonight - to some great disappointment - in the hopes that the kids can get lots of rest and be ready to go for our opening tomorrow.
The grandparents are also sadly unable to make the drive from Oregon to see it, as the weather has been dicey. After a warm start to winter, this last month ended up being the 2nd snowiest February on record (first place is from the 1890s, I think). We are ready for spring!
Signe drew the artwork for the poster (that's her, tied to the tracks!)

Dare to be a Daniel

Today was Karsten's 1st grade class play, and he did a great job angrily storming the stage as King Nebuchadnezzar. He blanked on a line in the middle (he had many to remember!), but he recovered well and finished strong. Sadly Nick had to miss it for a business trip in Orlando.

When the cousins come over, the Holloway kids party hard. ;-)

Brothers...

Searching for wood in the snow

Cold dog or old dog?

What a difference a year makes!

The first photo is from a year ago, when Zane first got his braces and expander to push his molars apart.
Below are pics from today, both immediately before and after he got his braces off.
In a few years he will need another short round of braces when he gets more adult teeth, but most of the work has been done.

What Signe does when she doesn’t have homework...

She draws caricatures

Zane’s BB game

And because we need more to do...
Zane's team won a squeaker tonight in their first 3rd/4th grade game of the season, with a score of 10-9.

Signe plays basketball

Signe's Jr. High team dominated the first two games. She was sluggish this game after being sick for a few days, but still scored several baskets.
And take a look at her shorts... she stole them out of Karsten's drawers. He's 7. In the 1st grade. Good grief.
She is in a busy season, with dance once a week and play practice after school 3 days a week.

1st/2nd grade basketball

Karsten has his first basketball game ever last night! His team won 14-8. Cousin Jerome, a 2nd grader, scored a chunk of their points, and Nick is assisting Uncle Rob as the head coach.

Signe’s first basketball game as an 8th grader

Signe played point guard, had at least 10 points, and a number of assists as her Logos Knights team crushed a Pullman team.

Dad loses!

Gunnar has been staying after school two days a week to partake in a chess club, and his practice paid off as he beat his dad for the first time this evening. He was pretty proud of himself.

We have also been enjoying Mancala, which is a game Grandma gave us for Christmas. It is a short game, but good for developing simple strategy.

Rip City!

The kid's first Blazer game, also joined by the Sentzes and Anderson families.

And the last picture is of my looser children playing Minecraft in their pajamas at noon. At least they are all playing together... right??