On our way home from the Great Wolf Lodge, we had some tire trouble with the minivan. Cruising along at 65mph, I started noticing a vibration. Just barely noticeable at first, but after a few minutes it became a worrisome bumping. The steering wheel wasn’t moving, so the problem probably wasn’t with either of the front wheels.

Wifegrit noticed it, too, and asked what it was. I didn’t know for sure, but we both had a flashback to a couple of weeks ago when one of the rear tires on the van started doing the same thing.

A couple of weeks ago, we had the tires balanced and the alignment straightened. Then just two days after that, one of the tires started bumping. I thought it was just a bad balance job, and so we took it back in to the shop to have them correct their sloppy job. Turns out it was the tire falling apart. The steel belt had split, and the tread was separating; a blowout was imminent. Well, we had to fix that right away.

Just a couple weeks prior to this, I had inspected the tires on the van to make sure they didn’t need replacing — the treads looked fine to me. So we replaced just the one tire that was breaking down. I should have gone ahead and replaced both tires at that time. But I was thinking that would be a waste of money, because the other tire looked to have probably another year or two left for wear.

Well, then this trip back from GWL. The rumble we were feeling, and then hearing, sounded disturbingly like when that other tire was near a blowout. So we pulled off the highway and into a parking lot so I could inspect things.

Sure enough, the other rear tire was showing the same tread separation and steel belt fringe. Damn. We still had another 70 or 80 miles left before we got home.

So everyone got out of the van, and I set to work changing out the tire for the spare. I was still in my bathing suit from the pool that morning. To the boys, it was a great little experience to see Dad change a tire. They were excitedly surprised to learn that a whole tire was kept in a secret compartment right beneath their seats that they hadn’t even guessed was there.

Anyway, we drove home on the spare tire, with the damaged tire riding in the middle of the minivan, between our boys. And now we ended up having two new tires, like I should have just done when the first tire went fooey on us.

Bullgrit

We just got back from our second annual mini-vacation to the Great Wolf Lodge in Concord, NC. Two nights, one day and two half-days, of fun water park play — pools and slides. I described the whole park in last year’s post, so I’ll skip all that this time and just get right to the new: Calfgrit11 went on all the slides as much or more than his little brother.

CG7, last year, was my only slide partner, (aside from a couple times Wifegrit plucked up the courage to slide a couple of times). This year, big brother and wife joined the little brother and me for many, many slide down the tubes. I even managed to get each one of them, individually with me, to go down the Howlin’ Tornado — and both boys said it was, “Awesome!” (But I couldn’t get them on it a second time.)

Here’s a short video of the Tornado, (from YouTube — not mine or my family):

Anyway, so this is why my blog went without an update for a few days. We had a great time, and now we’re home and back into our normal Spring routines.

Bullgrit

Our neighbor across the cul de sac just sold her home and moved out. We liked her, and we’ll miss her.

All during the selling process, we always kept a look out for who was looking at the house, wondering who might buy and move in. We saw lots of people looking at the house, some apparently with kids, some apparently without, but we never got to see the actual buyers, until yesterday. Now the new neighbors are starting to move in.

When I came home from work, my boys were out in the cul de sac kicking soccer balls around, and there was a new kid, holding a football, kind of standing around at the end of his driveway. I pulled into our garage, said “Hey,” to my boys, and went in to see Wifegrit. We mentioned that the new neighbors looked to be moving in — no moving van or truck, yet, though. We stood in our living room looking out the front window and watched our boys still playing, and the new kid still watching. After a minute, he walked back up his driveway and sat on the bumper of his parents’ car.

“I’m going to go introduce them,” I said.

“Great idea,” Wifegrit agreed. “Go do that.”

So I went out our front door and my boys came running up to me. “Play soccer with us, Dad!” they both shouted.

“OK,” I said, “but let’s invite the new kid across the street. I’ll introduce you.”

They agreed, but they followed behind me a good ten feet as I walked across the cul de sac and up to the neighbors’ driveway. I greeted the new boy, asked him his name, told him my boys’ names, and invited him to play soccer with us. He smiled and immediately came out with us. He’s in 5th grade, just like Calfgrit11, at the same school — the school literally right across the street — but he’s on a different year-round track.

We played 2-on-2 soccer, (me and Calfgrit7 vs. Calfgrit11 and the new kid), for about 45 minutes, until Wifegrit called us in for dinner, and we said bye to the new kid.

At the dinner table, both our boys seemed happy to have met a new, cool friend, their age. I don’t have anything particularly funny or insightful about any of this. We’re just happy that our boys can have a new friend in the neighborhood, and I’m glad I got to show our boys how to be friendly to new neighbors.

Bullgrit

I’ve volunteered to be the “T-shirt Chairperson” for our elementary school’s 5th grade classes. Each year, these classes take a field trip together, (all track schedules, together), I guess as a sort of “last hurrah” of elementary school before heading on to middle school. Part of the event is every kid gets a school t-shirt commemorating their graduation out of their first school. (Calfgrit11 is in this 5th grade class.)

So it seemed perfectly proper for me to offer myself as the lead for the t-shirts. I mean, obviously.

I talked with the principal and a couple of the 5th grade teachers to get an idea of what they wanted, and what they had done in previous years. Now I’m in the process of designing the shirts, (gratis, of course). Their previous designer was the art teacher, but she’s moved to another school this year.

Let me tell you, there is a difference between designing fun shirts for my store and designing something for someone else. My kid sense of humor doesn’t really match what a public school needs to present. I can’t put bathroom gags on the school shirts.

But this is still a fun project. I have to incorporate a school logo, several sponsor logos, and teacher names all on the small space while still wanting to put something [appropriately] fun and/or cool for the kids. I’ve come up with a handful of fun slogans, but making any fit among all the other text and graphics is proving challenging.

None the less, this is a fun opportunity to do something for an organization my kids are a part of. I’ve had and turned down prompts to coach kids soccer and tee ball, and to chaperone field trips, but sports and herding two dozen kids is not my forte. Maybe this is my chance to shine among my sons’ peers.

Bullgrit