Back to the Grind...

My winter break included some notable introductions, including an introduction to some new games. We spent Christmas Eve and Christmas afternoon with my best friend’s family, who taught us to play a new and incredibly easy dice game called Farkle and a fantastic new board game called Ticket to Ride. Apparently, there are several versions of Ticket to Ride – the US version, the Europe version, a Germany version that we played, a Scandinavian version, and one other from somewhere more obscure. They’re all made in Germany, and the cards and board are lovely and artistic drawings. We liked it so much that we tracked down the US and Europe versions of the game and found them at a discounted price. It’s unusual to find a game that only two people can play successfully without it being repetitive, so we’ve enjoyed it a lot.

I also started a new sewing project, met a new nephew, and got lots of pictures and videos from my parents, who bought a new video camera so they could record more of my niece’s adorable life. She’s able to pull herself up on things and even walk around as long as she has something to hold onto. My favorite part is that, in some of the pictures and videos, you can see my brother’s little Boston terrier Lenny following her around. The dog follows her everywhere as if he intends to catch her if she falls – even though he’s rather small and clumsy and probably wouldn’t be able to catch his own butt if it fell off.

So now we’re back at school again. As it turns out, my 85% homework return prediction was not far off for the compare/contrast assignment. Not too shabby for 13-year-olds fresh from two weeks of little to no academic thought!