Happy New Year

Apparently we may have scared some small children in the condo complex with our scary AVATAR sand face on Christmas Day. We set out today to redeem ourselves with the judges. In the spirit of the sunny south, here is what we came up with. Scores have not been tallied yet but we do not hear any small children crying yet today.
















New Years Eve tomorrow - Noah's grand plan is to sleep in late, rent a jet ski for an ocean cruise around high noon, hit the wakeboard cable park in the afternoon and then over to Busch Gardens for fireworks and midnight festivities. Hope everybody has a fantastic New Year's Eve and a happy 2010. Stay tuned for further Simms Family Adventures in 2010!
Simmer

Da BOLTS.. aka NHL's Tampa Bay Lightning

Since Noah is fanatical about hockey, we decided to get some Tampa Bay Lightening Hockey game tickets tonight. Tampa Bay vs Boston Bruins. Decided to take a huge stretch HUMMER to the game... check out the photo!

We ended up getting some sweet seats up in the nose bleed section (as you can see from our view). Can you see the puck? However we managed to move down closer to ice level with each period. We ended up sitting in the 300's Row A and got our faces up on the "jumbotron" for the fans to see. Good Times! Wendy & her mom who were back in the original seats when they observed us on the big screen... "hey, isn't that Hannah, Noah & Kev up there?"

Had fun in the Fan Locker Room trying on Fan Gear and getting pictures with the players.

Good night watching the BOLTS defeat the BRUINS 2-1. Wendy won the bet on final score so we have to buy her dinner. And, for the record... we didn't get the HUMMER ride, we are all just a bunch of posers.

Back to Canada after New Years where we can play our own games of hockey out on the new rink near the house. Looking for ward to a few weeks of winter now that we have had our fun in the sun. I-75 NORTH ... here we come.

AVATAR/Scream Sand Creation

We went to see the movie AVATAR a couple nights ago.... if you havn't seen it yet, it is a MUST SEE. 2 hours and 30 minutes of full on action. Cool story idea with an environmental twist to along with it. We began creating an AVATAR face in the sand today and ended up with more of a cross between AVATAR & the movie SCREAM. You can't quite see the mohawk on top of his head but hey.. it was our creative juices at the time! We are thinking it might be good to add a full skeleton since Hannah is doing "the bones of the human body" in Science. Maybe throw a femur, humerus and tibia on him/her tomorrow. Relaxing day at the beach combined with a few swims, runs & rides. Great to chat with Heather, Lizzy & Geo last night - sounds like a sweet Christmas dinner at Heather's new pad. All for now. Simmer

Wii vs Real Life

Well, this morning we opened Christmas presents to find Wii Resort under the wrapping paper - a gift from Bubba. We all tried our skills at Wii Wakeboarding! I have come to the conclusion that wakeboarding in real life is much easier than the Wii version! Or maybe its just my ego took a huge hit when Wendy and all my kids beat me quite handily. At least I hold the record for three point shots in the basketball! I will keep you posted in my continual Wii vs Real Life analysis! The kids tell me I need to try the new Tony Hawk game next - maybe I can be aweful at that too. Merry Christmas everybody!

Florida Sunset

Check out this florida sunset out our condo front door! Beach is perfect for volleyball but we totally miss the Glass & Gain Family for the annual round robin games.

Busch Gardens

Went to Busch Gardens today! Wicked Day! No Line ups! Basically ZERO wait times! So much better than Disney! We arrived at the "Gardens" early enought to be the first few people in the doors. We hit tons of rides in the first 2 hours - way more than we would have done in a whole day at Canada's Wonderland. Hannah, Wendy & Kevin loved the ride called MONTU - smooth, fast and twisty. Noah loved a ride called GWAZI which was totally old school looking with wooden stilts holding it up. We checked out a bunch of animals and thought the orangatang's were the coolest, one of which pulled a handstand for us. Good Times in the sunny south!

2010 Training

December 11... The snow has arrived in Southern Ontario. I guess winter has officially started. I was forced to do a 'trainer' ride in the basement last night so I guess winter training has officially begun for the 2010 Mountain Bike season. We will all get a small dose of summer on our annual pilgrimage down south to Florida but other than that, it's back to riding rollers and XC skiing for training. 36 week until National Championships in Canmore Alberta! Here we go!!

BEGATS

Growing up I use to hear my mom Lizzy & my Granny Delaute yattering on about all the new 'begats' that were being born and that it was amazing to get all the new recruits together. I have never heard that word 'begats' other than from them. Is it a real word? Anyway, I am pleased to announce that on the SIMMS side, I have a new neice and nephew to go along sister Heather's Torno! Congrats to my sister Sharon and husband Jamie on the birth of Riley and congrats to my other sister Wendy and husband Norm on their new baby boy Tycho. The 'begats' are growing. I know my Mom will be happy and searching for date to get everybody in the same place at the same time. 'Begats'... just thought I would say that word again!