Paul and Patt: more from North Dakota, though it did not seem like it weather wise.

Yes, we had short pants and t-shirt days in late October in North Dakota! People were excited about the weather and after a cold day or two of introduction, Patt and I were quite pleased.

Front yard football throwing and soccer ball kicking was a almost every afternoon activity. Isaac and Luke enjoy "going out for passes" and I enjoyed throwing them.

John Paul bought this kite and proudly flew it. Sometimes his mind wanders while he is flying it and he finds that it is in trouble. Surprise surprise surprise. So far it has not been fatal. John Paul is lucky. And the sky was blue that day and credit to Lydia for capturing both kite and John Paul with the camera phone.

During fall break we went to Winnipeg, Manitoba a few hours to the north in Canada. Everyone's favorite part of the trip was the polar bear exhibit at the Provincial Zoo. Better than the exhibit at the NC Zoo by a long shot. The bears swim in a glass enclosure above and around those who wish to see them swim. We were fortunate to see three of the four put on quite a show. Diving, swimming and playing/fighting with one another for quite some time.

Luke would have spent the rest of the day in the walk way just watching.

The Manitoba History museum was also very good and had big attention getting exhibits such as this with a mural and stuffed buffalo and model indians pursuing them on horseback.

Not all of our games are challenging but all are competitive. War is WAR and it is competitive. Luke will play as long as you will play. Patt will play a long time too.

Matt, Luther, Isaac and I went to see the UND Fighting Hawks play Sacramento State in a Big Sky football game. They are having a season I can easily identify with. They lost. It was close for a half.

We did if you will note have good, as in very very good seats.

All was not lost as that evening we watched UND hockey team beat their number one rivals the Minnesota Gophers 4-0, while simultaneously watching Wake lose to Georgia Tech, so there was some disappointment. It was close for a while. Sounds familiar doesn't it. Good times and the kids stayed up late and celebrated touchdowns, goals and and such.

There being no ice yet we played backyard football, here John Paul and I are drawing up "plans"

The offense is about to go into high gear with our ace running quarterback.

One one afternoon, Patt and all five kids played with four and three teams. Had a great game. Two kids had blood on them, four cried/fussed/discussed energetically, (over rules interpretation, down and distance, tag or no tag, blood, tagging to hard, not giving enough time prior to play starting, I could go on) To say the kids are competitive would be a disservice to the word competitive. It was fun. I think everyone scored a touchdown. We finally quit when three were crying at the same time. It was also snack time.