The Pinto Family: March Memories

March was full of many fun memories - here are the highlights....

Samuel celebrated Dr Seuss' birthday by dressing like his favorite character :-)

Samuel goes in phases where he likes to sneak into our bed, sometimes even before we've gone to bed, to "snuggle with you." This is commonly what we see when we go to bed around 10 - he's snuck down after we tucked him in at 8 and gotten into our bed to go to sleep

At the Blue and Gold Cub Scout banquet, Nicholas' den performed a skit

Henry and 1 other boy from his den were present so the two of them told a funny joke together.

Nicholas competed with his team in Odyssey of the Mind for the first time this year. They placed first at the regional competition in March! Their long term problem was the "structure toss" which involved building a 15oz balsa wood structure that could bear as much weight as possible (theirs bore around 500 lbs) all while putting on a skit in 8 minutes that incorporates games and other criteria. They also compete in a spontaneous problem. The whole program incorporates building, architecture, problem solving, creativity and team work. They meet weekly all school year long and then on some weekends in the spring preparing for the competition. Nicholas absolutely loved it!!

All props and preparation for the Odyssey competition must be done completely by the kids - Nicholas designed and painted this "game" for their long term skit.

Team prayer before competition

Performing for the judges at regional - their skit was about 2 boys (Nicholas and Connor) who were hanging out at the beach on their cell phones when they got sucked into the phone by evil Siri. They had to play and win 3 games to escape and were aided along the way by You Tube and Pandora - the kids wrote it al themselves and made every single prop completely themselves.

Examining the crushed balsa wood structure afterward to see where it broke to learn for future improvements.

2 cool dudes

Way to go team and coaches....first place!!

Last October Samuel got a 12in bike with training wheels for his 4th birthday. In February Shawn said "how about we try taking the training wheels off" and Sam said "sure." He took off riding across the cul-de-sac and hasn't stopped since - it was that easy for him! Now he is a biking machine - it's the first thing he does when he gets home from school each day - he can't wait to get on his helmet and ride his bike!

Grace played spring soccer on U8 with Coach Pablo at SPC - here they are praying before their game.

Grace and Henry sang in the after school choir this year - here they are in their spring concert

Part of Elizabeth's clan - John, Ava, Hugh and Jane - came to town for Ava's dance competition - this was a great opportunity for some quality cousin time :-)

Cousin rock bands

Cousin girl time

The Regnum Christi movement, which we are a part of, held a family convention at Lake Lanier Resort one weekend in March. We enjoyed a weekend of inspiring talks for adults, fun kids tracts, beautiful masses, and quality time with family and friends.

The outdoor pool was heated so the kids were all about it!!

We were honored to be asked to bring up the offertory gifts at the conclusion mass said by Archbishop Gregory

Every year our parish has a big Italian feast for the the Feast of St Joseph. This year we finally went and were convinced we never want to miss it again..it was delicious and a lot of fun! Shawn and Henry signed up to serve- it was a full 3 course served by the knights, complete with musical seranades and all.....what a treat!