christmas tree construction

today was the day. mrs k takes the christmas tree construction very seriously. she spent half the day cleaning in preparation. here, the boys begin putting on the ornaments. note eli's grateful dead t-shirt.

before the tree was decorated, the boys made a thomas track around the base, sort of like their favorite video.

the boys fought over who got to put up which ornament. yeesh, you'd think they were battling over a million bucks or something. hanna's ornaments will have to wait until she's here to put them up.

tyson doesn't look pleased about eli's ornament placement. eli, naturally, doesn't care.

sometimes during the fiasco, you could see the look of sheer horror on mrs k's face. she just couldn't believe that two boys could be so much trouble. neither can i.

ooooh, that's a cool one.

hey mom, how come we can't put up those little glass ornaments??

hey mom, move your foot, i think i see another spiderman ornament!

good thing the fake tree has strong limbs. they were getting loaded down with all sorts of stuff that probably shouldn't hang on trees.

santa's going to love this!!!

check this thing out!

eli had to document the train derailment before the authorities arrived.

found the camera

this was a photo of the biker chicks after we got back. note there are no casts or splints or ice packs of any kind.

eli and isabelle were cooking up a storm in the playhouse....

.... and i was asked to preview it before it was to be sold to the general public. not bad, i say.

mountain biking with the girls

black friday was quite busy at the store. we started early (NOT 4am, as some stores!) and it was pretty much busy the whole day. which was why the beautiful mrs k and i were ecstatic to be able to let it all hang out on a mtn bike ride saturday.

we met up with cristel and jen on saturday morning at castlewood. it was chilly, but the trail was dusty dry, witnessed by the girls backsides. all of them were very powdery when we got done. it was a lot of fun leading them around the trails. only a little carnage, a few tip overs. in the end, i followed deanna up the lone wolf climb as she cleared the entire thing! that little chainring was working overtime!! i rode a little extra while the girls were changing into warmer clothes, and ran into doug nishumora. seems he's the man in the adventure racing category. yikes, sounds like a lot of work to me!

we converged back at cristel's place where eli and his little girlfriend were hanging out with a sitter. after watching a little tour of africa on the dvr and a ham sandwich, we were on our way.

there would be photos of this great adventure, but i can't find the camera now. sigh.

random hanna photo

whoa!! is that a quarter down there??

santa rides a train

we've been watching this video for the last couple of months. eli makes us watch it nearly every night. i have to admit, it's pretty fun.

santa rides a train, or "ornaments" as i think it is officially called.

talk about perseverance....

turkey day ride

sitting on the trainer last night, watching the 2001 tour de france video for the 25th time, i was certainly dreaming of greener pastures. like chubb. i haven't been to a thanksgiving day ride for a number of years, and it's just not right. well, the circumstances all came around to make this turkey day different.

with everyone here still pretty much in bed this morning, i hit the chubb. the first smiling face that i saw was none other than super cake ethan johnson. we talked a bit, and got ready to ride. there were lots of others, though, like matt black james, boz, craig thrasher, farrrrinnnnellla, you name it.

sc still rides a good ride. as a matter of fact, even with my super bike, super cake keeps up with me in the technical sections like it was 1997. he was bellyaching about not being in shape, but we had a fine ride anyway. down the flint quarry, he was giving me cold sweats. i didn't ride down the drop off on the way back, and he did. ug. i'm going to revisit that and see what i can do.

all in all, it was a killer day. we warmed up to the point of sweating and got a killer workout. we saw the team seagal ballers in the bottoms going the other way, and lots of others.

too bad there isn't enough time to do turkey day rides every day.

lost valley

despite my immensely painful pinched nerve, i slogged out to lost valley tuesday morning to ride the single speed. it was pretty cold early on, but the sun warmed things up and the trail was in absolutely superbe condition.

i've chosen a 32/19 combination for gearing, and it's working out pretty well. i successfully climbed the center gravel road and even climbed the nasty little pitch up to the hamburg when i was done. i'm getting used to the rigid pace fork. it's a pretty rough ride for those of us that are accustomed to a suspension fork, but it flexes a LOT over obstacles so you know it's working as hard as it can to keep the comfort flowing.

there weren't many people out there. in fact, i only saw one other person. it's pretty lonely during the week.

chubbin'

i took a very brief escape to chubb trail today. although still pretty cold this morning, the promise of great trail conditions was too good to resist. i loaded up the jet and did a little chubbin'.

tons of hikers on the trail today. all of them quite courteous, i must add. a few bikers, too. i had to slip out of the way of a couple of gonzo riders smashing their way down the gravelly peak on the west tyson side.

the jet is just freakin' awesome. the suspension is very well sorted, the big wheels just keep rollin', and i'm in love. seriously, i adjusted nothing from my maiden voyage on tuesday. i take that back...i added 10psi to the rear shock. i was lovin' it.

i even saw schvonzie and his maiden hiking on the flint quarry trail. he failed to tell me about the sweet little note he left me on my car. thanks, schvonze. love ya. now go get your mtn bike and be a real man.

short but sweet. that makes 3 short but sweet mountain bike rides this week.

BOLT

since i sold my rats nest of tires on saturday, we had fun money for the movies. the previews for BOLT had been out for a while, and the promise of miley cyrus being one of the characters' voices made sure it was a must-see movie for us.

it was a great movie! it was exciting, the characters were adorable, and the action was pretty much non stop. the super dog concept was hilarious. and i don't think you'll look at hamsters the same again.

shhhh, it's time for a nap

eli gets really crabby when he doesn't get his nap. somehow, he really seems to take well to hanna. he was very tired on saturday afternoon, so she coaxed him into laying down on our bed, and soon he was asleep. it looks like she was whispering something to him right here. they are so sweet together.

train works!

he's pretty proud of something here. maybe those bridges were giving him trouble. seems to work ok now.

great smile

hi, welcome to the kakouris household, can i help you?

rock a by rosco

yes, his eyes have rolled back into his head. i wish i could sleep that hard.

thursday morning ride with the missus

it was a cold thursday morning. eli kept us up all night. i would have just as soon rode the trainer in the basement. then the beautiful mrs k piped up: let's go mtn biking.

think about that for a minute. she and i haven't gone mtn biking together for more than a year. hell, we haven't ridden road bikes together in a couple of months, at least.

how could i say no?

we loaded up ourselves and 40 pounds of winter cycling gear into the freestyle, bikes on the back, and off to the 'wood we went. it was the inaugural ride for the orbea ss 29'er, and i was psyched. i was also psyched that she was so excited to ride.

instantly, i knew the ss was a winner. it was so fun! much, much more fun than the single 26'er.

so we played on the milder trails for a while, then we got cold, then we left. it was way too much fun to leave after a little more than an hour, but numb fingers don't make for good biking.

we've GOT to do that more often.

i'm sold

wow. i'm sold on 29" wheels. wow.