Ragnar 2011- Part 1

 Allie starting to climb the ski slope that started her nearly 9-mile second leg.  Kill one accomplished.  (A kill is when you pass someone on the course.  Some teams kept track of their kills with washable tally marks on their car windows.)

 Garrett, our fastest runner in the van, ran up the hill to take this picture for me.

About 100 yards ahead we began running through snow.  I had just changed into dry socks.  Clearly, it didn't do me any good.

 Water bottle exchange.

 This was the prettiest course I have ever run.

 About here my pasta lunch began to churn in my stomach. 

Check out that stride at mile 8.3!  Running toward the exchange. 

 This guy's target says, "Kill me now."  He wore that face mask for whole race.

 This car had Barbies taped to their car.  The runners even looked like Barbies.

 Everyone decorated their vans.  On the back of this car it read, "Van #2 sucks."  Obviously there was a lot of camaraderie between both sets of vans.

 This was the Marine from Boston that was assigned to our team. His duck has a beer in hand.  I don't think he knew before hand that his entire team was comprised of Latter-day Saints.

 Mike showing Garrett his app.

 Huh?

 Maegan and Brett

 Napping while waiting for van #2. 

I had no idea I was going to be running up that ski slope.  I knew I was going down the mountain, but I didn't know I had to run to the top first.

 The lodge where we ate lunch.

Picnic in the Back Yard

Our sweet kiddos.  Ben is a tiger, I think.

Spring Soccer

Marie the cheer leader does a hand-stand.

Cousin Bryson came to the game.

Ben stops the ball and turns it around.

Running for the goal.

Ben scored two goals in his final game.  Notice the expression of the opponent to his left who couldn't believe he scored a goal.

Ben wasn't intimidated by size.  He'd plow into people just to get the ball. 

Good job, Ben!

James

The best decision I ever made.

Cute Grace

After admiring the cute three-year-old, I'd like to draw your attention to the long hair which no longer flows past my shoulders. But that is another post...

Ben and Grace

They only come out of the box for food and an occasional bath.

Tessa's Research Project

Over spring break, Tessa was given the assignment to tour a local business and write a report on it. She went to Hay's Market, a mom and pop supermarket here in town. The morning of her interview with the owner, Tess asked me what she should wear. I told her she needed to wear something nice. The next thing I know, Tessa is walking down the stairs in her hot pink feather boa. I don't know now the owner was able to keep a straight face when she leaned over, looked at him over the rim of her glasses and asked, "Mr. Hays, can you please explain how your store is competitive with Walmart and King Soopers?"

Marie's Science Project

Marie turned in her first science project today. I have to say it was the idea of the century. Here it is, in her very own words (with the exception of her procedure, since blogger isn't allowing me to copy and paste). The project is titled, BFF: The Third Grade Social Network.

Background

In third grade, kids start to think that you can have only one friend. For example, sometimes my friends get upset if I’m not always their partner in class. Or maybe there is someone I want to invite to play with us at recess, but the kids I am already playing with don’t like that person. I chose to do this project because I wanted to prove to the third grade that we are all friends.

Question

Are we all connected by the friends that we share?

Hypothesis

I think we are all connected because we have friends, and our friends have friends, and they have friends, too.

Research

Before I could begin my project, I needed to learn about social networks and how to display one. My dad, James Thornbrue, is a real-life scientist. He taught me some of this stuff. I also had the help of library books.

The Complete Idiot’s Guide To Facebook taught me that it used to be hard to stay in contact with friends who moved away. Now, we have Facebook to help us. Facebook is a website that helps you send messages and pictures to people. Facebook is an example of a social network.

In A Smart Kid’s Guide to Social Networking Online, I learned that there are many different social networking websites for kids (Facebook is not for us). Using websites for kids can help us be safe, but we don’t need a website to stay connected. Third graders connect by playing on the playground, talking at church and on the phone, and visiting with each other at home.

Beautiful Visualization had some good examples of tag clouds. I decided to create a tag cloud to show how 3^rd graders responded to one of the questions on my survey.

My dad James Thornbrue taught me that graphing a social network is like filling in the branches of a family tree.

My dad also taught me that scientist don’t just use their brains; they need tools to help them. For this project, I needed software tools such as Excel and Visone. We also used the same software used by the FBI and CIA to catch bad guys.

Sources

Kraynak , Joe and Mikal E. Belicove. The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Facebook. New York: The Penguin Group, 2010.

Jakubiak, David, J. A Smart Kids Guide to Social networking Online. New York: The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc., 2010.

Steele, Julie and Noah Illinksky, ed. Beautiful Visualization: Looking at data Through the Eyes of Experts. Sebastool: O’Rilly Media, Inc., 2010.

Thornbrue, James. Personal interview. March 23, 2011. April 2, 2011. April 18,2011.

Conclusion

My hypothesis was correct; we are all connected by the friends that we share, but not in the way that I thought. If you look at just the best friends graph, there is one group of friends that are only friends with each other. But if you add the other friends and people you would like to be friends with, everyone is connected!

Here are some other interesting facts:

· Most people are friends with people in their class.

· Girls generally have more friends than boys (as much as 13), but most boys and girls have 3 best friends.

· 3 sets of people want to be friends with each other and don’t even know it.

· Some boys have only girls as best friends, but no girls have only boys as best friends.

So the next time someone wants to play with us and the kids I am already playing with don’t like that person, I am going to tell them it’s okay because we are all friends anyway.

Random Pics for Staci

Bathroom Remodel

I wish I could find the before pictures, but they're hidden is some secret file. James did quite a bit of work. We antiqued the cabinets and the only materials we re-used were the tub and sink basin. I asked James if he'd mind if I cooked dinner in the bathroom, considering the new bath is a more pleasant place to work than my kitchen.

Tessa Gets Glasses

I always wanted glasses. I mean, who doesn't want a cute accessory that insurance will pay to replace every two years? As a kid, I remember lying to the optometrist every time he tested me on the letter chart. He saw right through me, though, and much to my annoyance, I was always declared to have better-than-perfect vision. This week, I got to live vicariously through my 7-year-old. We had a lot of fun choosing frames.

Should my vision decline any time in the near future, I take comfort in knowing there is an amazing pair of green, crocodile skin frames that perfectly match my eyes and personality.