Reblogged:Friday Hodgepodge

[Gus Van Horn blog]

Four Things

Since my daughter doodles and draws a lot, I have to watch out for random artwork whenever I declutter the living room. Here's something of hers I found a couple of days ago.

1. I had finally gotten around to putting together my daughter's new bicycle. It did not have training wheels and I figured I'd be spending time teaching her how to ride it. Pumpkin hopped on and started riding it around in short order. She'd already picked it up while playing with friends down the street.

2. Back at Christmas, our son got a magic set and would perform tricks for us from time to time. Although he sometimes can get flustered doing unfamiliar tasks, that did not happen when he messed up some of the tricks: He'd laugh it off to the degree that it was almost more fun when that happened.

Note to self: Ask him about that some time when it makes sense to do so. Maybe I can understand the fluster better or help him get past that tendency.

3. My son enjoys playing a few online games with real-life friends. One day, I overheard the following on his end, "Kill me, but don't unfriend me."

4. This season, I am coaching my son's soccer team, and I decided to let them come up with and vote for their own team name.

But Gus, won't every kid just come up with their own name and vote for it?

My solution to that possibility was as follows: Every player could EITHER (a) suggest a name, which automatically gets a vote, and vote for one other name; or (b) vote twice on other suggestions.

This worked even more smoothly than I thought it would. About equal numbers chose each option, resulting in a manageable number of suggestions and enough votes for a clear winner.

-- CAV

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