Telly Award

I recently had a bit of good news regarding my side business..."Framework." I recently won a Telly Award for one of my Great Lakes Loons pieces from last season. The project that won is the open I produced for the Midwest League All-Star game that was held last year here in Midland. I'm pretty excited. I've won 3 other Telly Awards in the past, but this was my first under my company name. So it makes it extra special.
Here's the video.

Feeling Buggy!

I think it's fun to watch the kids interact with each other all the time, and I find it especially interesting when I see Ben introducing something to Megan for the first time. Megan up to this point has never been on one of Ben's "Bug Hunts." Today we took a walk after lunch, and as he usually does Ben was hunting around for bugs. Well...Ben found a "rolie-polie" bug crawling around on the ground. Rolie-polies are one of his favorite bugs, so he got to share the experience with Megan. Megan found the bug fascinating and even tried picking it up as well. So I guess that would suggest she's all geared up for a summer full of Ben's "Bug Hunts" in the backyard.

Flower Power!

Our tulips are just now starting to bloom. Today we had our first. Ben was pretty excited. He's been going around the yard examining all the buds for the past week to see which ones have bloomed yet. Finally our wait is over.
You might be thinking..."Wow! They're just now getting tulips?" Well...Jenny and I agree with you. I can't recall when we've had to wait this long for our tulips to bloom. My birthday is in 2 days, and they are usually all in full bloom by my birthday each year. So this is a little unusual. Anyway...it's nice to see flowers popping out finally.

Gone Fishing!

Ben and I went up to the nature center today for a fishing course. We got to tie our own lines and hooks, get worms for the hooks, and we of course got to sit by the water and fish for a while. This was Ben's first real fishing experience, and he had a great time. He did great with his casting, and he enjoyed being outside. We didn't catch anything, and eventually it started to rain...but we had a fun time. He had fun playing with the worm on the hook. He kept pretending to give it a kiss.

Signs Of Spring

One sign of spring around here is when we start eating meals and snacks outside. It's always a nice way to eat a meal, and the kids love it.

Take Ben To Work Day

Jenny took Ben up to work this past week for "Take your child to work day." Dow had a few activities going on for the kids. Ben got to have lunch with Jenny and hang out at her office for a few hours. He loved it.

At The Movies

STARTING OUT IN THE EVENING - Frank Langella stars as Leonard Schiller, a novelist who is in his last days and whose novels are out of print. Schiller meets Heather Wolfe, a young graduate student who decides to write her thesis on Schiller's writing and novels. As she interviews Schiller she discovers he is trying to finish his last novel before he dies. And in the course of their interviews about novels and writers the two form a "light" romance. Now the subplot to this film involves Schiller's daughter, Ariel...played by Lauren Ambrose. Ariel is a free spirit, and is close in age to the young graduate student. Schiller is constantly distracted by Ariel's constant wanderings in life, as she goes from one man to another in search of happiness and a family. The main storyline here between Schiller and the graduate student is first rate and top notch. There's a great balance of intellectualism and tenderness in their dialouges. However, the subplot involving the free spirit daughter becomes more and more distracting as the film goes on. Still though, as a whole this movie is really good...primarily because of Langella's first rate performance here. I really enjoyed this one.

PURPLE VIOLETS - I've written in previous entries how I'm a fan of Edward Burns movies. Let me clarify - the ones he writes and directs...and not his Hollywood roles. Here is his latest low-budget independent film..."Purple Violets." I've always thought Burns as a Woody Allen-type of storyteller with his films, and this one comes across as his most "Woody Allen" like. In "Violets" we have 4 old friends (2 couples) who become reacquainted with each other after a 10 year hiatus. This is one of those storylines where everyone's either a writer, a writer-wanna-be, or somekind of young New York intellectual/professional. Some of the performances here are interesting, such as Patrick Wilson's character as a successful novelist trying to change his style. But other performances here are not as convincing, such as Selma Blair's character as the talented writer-to-be. Overall this is one of Burns' better independent efforts.

HANCOCK - Will Smith stars as Hancock, a not-so-typical-super-hero in Los Angeles who wants no part of the public spotlight. He befriends Ray the publicist, played by Jason Bateman. Ray works with Hancock to change his image and become more "public-friendly." The first act has some mildly amusing moments, but somewhere in the second act the story takes a dark turn that never recovers. Eventually you're left with a movie that leaves a bad taste in your mouth, and one that should have been a lot more funny.

THE ROCKER - Rainn Wilson (THE OFFICE) plays Robert Fishman, a former 80's metal drummer who's never gotten over his missed opportunity on fame. Fishman teams up with his nephew's band and they become the hottest ticket in high school. I realized this might be a movie targeted more for teens than adults, but as a fan of THE OFFICE I thought there would be enough laughs here from Wilson to make it worthwhile. Uh...I was wrong. I think I laughed 3 or 4 times here. Definately not worth the time.

MAX PAYNE - Mark Wahlberg is Max Payne, a New York City cop who is bent on getting revenge towards those who murdered his family. The film didn't get great reviews from critics, but I have to admit I thought it was okay. The style and look of the film resembles something out of SIN CITY and CONSTANTINE, and is actually pretty cool. In fact, the stylized look does indeed help make up for an otherwise laughable script. I'm not going to say this is best picture of the year or anything. But I thought it was good enough as a rental.

QUIET CITY - Uh...I don't know how it happened...but I recently watched 3 movies all about young New Yorkers. This is the third. Here we have a guy and a girl who meet at a subway station. She is supposed to meet her friend but the friend is no where to be found. So she starts killing time with a guy she happens to meet. Then somehow in the course of 24 hours the two form a romantic bond. Uh...huh? This film is as indie as you can get really. Very little additional lighting, a stripped down script, hand held camerwork, etc. While I admire the effort, the result was so annoying to watch. I was so glad when this was over. In fact, I struggled here just to keep my attention focused on this one.

What Is Ben Up To?

Ben is one of the best big brothers I have ever seen. Right now he's trying to be more involved with Megan. Ever since she was born he has always loved playing with her...but now he's taking his love to the next level. Now he's getting into the actual "caring" for her, or as Jenny calls it "mothering." Ben always wants to help Megan get into her high chair at the kitchen table. Then he will put her bib on her and push her chair in. When she wakes up from a nap he wants to go with me to go get her. He also enjoys telling her to eat her food at the table, and tries to explain to her that she won't get any dessert if she doesn't eat all of her dinner. This of course cracks Jenny and I up. We tell Ben "people who live in glass houses shouldn't throw bricks." He of course looks at us like we're crazy. Anyway...you can really see the love and care Ben expresses toward Megan. It's cool to see sometimes.

What's Megan up to?

Megan is slowly making the turn from babyhood to toddlerhood. She's starting to talk more and more. Sometimes it's understandable, but she's definitely making the effort. In fact, she's (unfortunately) saying words like "NO!" and "WHY?" more and more now...and those seem to be her clearest sounding words. So she's already testing the boundaries as she gears up for the terrible 2's. But she's got a cute personality. She literally says hi to everyone she sees. Unlike Ben at this age she is very outgoing and a lot more social. She also loves playing with Ben. Ben and Mommy are her favorites without a doubt.

Easter Weekend

We had a nice Easter weekend. On Friday we did some shopping in the late morning, since Jenny had Good Friday off. Then in the afternoon Jenny and Ben decorated Easter eggs. On Saturday Ben and I went to the planetarium, and we took the kids to one of the neighborhood parks. On Sunday we let the kids play with their Easter baskets, and then after church we met our friends the Manchesters in town for an Easter brunch. There the kids got to get their picture taken with the Easter bunny. After that we came back home and the kids got to do an Easter egg hunt in the backyard. They really enjoyed that. So we had a nice 3 day weekend.

The Planetarium

Last Saturday I took Ben to our local planetarium over in Bay City. It's a small one of course, but it offers everything a big city planetarium offers. He didn't know quite what to expect, but I could tell he was excited to go. The show we saw was called "The Little Star That Could," and it was a kid-friendly story about stars and planets. Anything space related Ben seems to love, so naturally he loved it. After the show our tour group got to go on the roof where there's an observation deck.

Butterflies In Bloom

Today I took the kids up to Dow Gardens for our first visit of the year. We spend a lot of time there in the summer, but once in a while we make visits at other times of the year. Today was "Butterflies In Bloom," where they release butterflies in the greenhouse and you can go see them, and touch them. Ben loves interacting with bugs in the summer, so he was really into holding the butterflies. He was actually better at it than I was. I think that's interesting because I can remember a few years ago when I brought Ben to this event he was freaking out all the time whenever the butterflies got too close. As for Megan, she thought it was funny when the butterflies got too close to her, but she seemed to really enjoy it. Anyway, it was a nice way to spend part of Ben's spring break.