Slideshow of Houston Museum of Natural Science

My mom helped me make this slideshow from our visit on Sunday to the Houston Museum of Natural Science. I took most of these photos and I asked my mom to put this slideshow on my blog.

Level 80 DK

I made level 80 on my WoW Death Knight today! It only took me about 14 months to go from level 55 to 80. I leveled several other toons as well, but not to an 80. Yay!!!!

Pants on the Ground, WoW Style

Another Brick in the Wall, WoW Style

Jay Jay the Toad eating a worm

Videos of Holden doing flips

Holden is really proud of his ability to do flips on the used trampoline we bought last month. Soon he will be landing on his feet. We watched some youtube videos on how to do these. So he asked me to make a video of him doing these flips so other people could be inspired. The sound quality stinks because of the background noise. The barking dog is at a house behind ours. You can see our dog, Shadow trying to peek over at that dog.

Enjoy!

~Heather

Me and my gang

This is me with some friends at Raccoon River by Walnut Woods State Park. We were looking for toads by the river and then there are a few photos of us on our way back out of the woods. We had a lot of fun!

Things I want to learn, do, or own before I am 9 years old

I have over a year before I am 9. Here's my list:
Machinima film making
Electric Guitar lessons
Fencing lessons
Go to Adventureland
Wii game system
Walkie Talkie set
A watch
A cat and hamster

Never a dull moment in Montana

Our day was pretty fun. We were going to go fishing, but we were up late last night and Holden slept till 11:30 today. Then Camden took a rare nap at 3pm. So we rode bikes around the neighborhood, went to see baby chics, saw some deer in a field, played WoW, ate and ate, played with the turtle, laundry, hung out with cool neighbor girl, fed horses across the street every few hours, went up the hill to the school playground, played with the cat, ordered a/c part, and various other things.

We're excited about being here and having a good time with our friends. They had to work today, but we had fun with them after work. If we're really lucky we're going to a 10,000 acre ranch near here to visit friends at the end of the week.

On our way here from Washington we saw an Eagle's nest and the views through the mountain pass were awesome. It was almost like the Grand Canyon. I can't even imagine what Yellowstone will be like.

All our best. We are going to sleep. I'll edit this in the morning.

~Heather
xoxoxo

Starfish

We're having a really awesome time traveling around the NW U.S. We saw some really huge starfish in Burien, Wa. We went to an conference called LIFE is Good and I had the BEST time! I hope we can go back next year. I really like my life. We saw an aunt (Tammy) I hadn't seen in a long time. Now we are in MT and will be heading to Yellowstone National Park. I miss my dog, Shadow. All is well though.

Holden

My WoW schooling

My mom took these photos. My friends and I, or my brother and I spend a lot of time mastering the game. It is more fun than you can imagine. Sometimes I have to write names down so I can log off a toon to send money to them from another toon. I can't always remember how to spell out names from memory. But my mom is impressed with my handwriting, considering we don't spend much time writing at this stage or age.

I wrote down a toon name, Lirn, the other day and my mom loves the way I wrote it! It is on the back of a Valentine card I got from a friend. She loves my writing. I'm picking up on upper case and lower case translations very easily. When I play WoW I have to know what the upper case letter looks like on the keyboard, because names and places are written with the first letter in caps and the rest in lower case.

I know all my numbers and how to type them in. My friend in the photo was not able to play the game for a few weeks and now he is able to play it again. His mom realized how important the game is to him and how much he is learning. His reading and writing has improved a lot since playing the game. He goes to school too. His mom and dad are school teachers for a living.

I love my WoW schooling time!

Holden

One of my WoW toons and pets

This is one of my World of Warcraft toons. It is a level 56 hunter. I have a rider and a pet tiger plus a companion cat. I am really lucky to have parents who see all the benefits of gaming. This game is for teens, but my parents play with me and we have a lot of fun together. I have friends on WoW as well. My life is pretty awesome, and I know it.

New toons...no problem

Every few days I like to make new toons on World of Warcraft. And now that we figured out how to grant levels to our first WoW account from our second WoW account, it is even better than ever! Sometimes my mom gets frustrated, but she sees how interesting this is for me and doesn't complain. I still have my higher level toons, but I have been so excited with my Druid and Priest classes lately that I hardly play on my higher level hunter and death knight. Camden and I both love to help each other with our new characters. We love picking our new toons and what they will look like and what type of weapons or powers we want with our new toons. It is beyond cool and entertaining. Our dad loves to play on his death knight and that is so awesome for him. He is on a guild and loves going to dungeons.

Our friends love to come over and watch us. Some of them play with us. It is hard to take turns, but we manage. One of our friends can't play with us anymore. He is 8 1/2 and his mom says he has to wait until he is 10. My friend is very sad about that. But he knows better than to question his mom and dad. They aren't like my parents about gaming and don't understand all that can be learned with gaming. I have learned more gaming than I ever would have learned from boring school books and it is effortless for me.

I am so happy because I have a really fun life. I do more than play WoW, but right now this is what I am passionate about. I hug my mom all the time for understanding me and honoring my passions. I know it is something she takes very seriously. My mom loves me and cares about. She does A LOT of research and she is 100% sure she knows what she is doing. She is a really caring and loving mom. She helps me when I need it. And she is always telling me how proud she is of me and how smart I am. I know I'm loved. And she is loved too. She knows it too. I give her lots of hugs and smiles. I tell her how much I like spending time with her. We have a decent relationship. I tell her when I think she is out of line and vise versa.

I wish all my friends had a mom and dad like mine. Not that their parents are terrible. But their parents can make like harder and more frustrating than it needs to be. It is so hard to explain. Maybe when I'm older it will make more sense. I feel like a little Buda and I am the master of my own happiness. My parents don't try to control me. They are guides for me. And they try not to act like they know everything. I'm thankful I have parents who trust me and trust themselves.

May the force be with you,
Holden

I'm quitting

I told my mom today that I want to quit going to tae kwon do. I have a lot of other things I am interested in, and I think the dark nights of winter are making me just want to relax at night time. My mom was not too surprised. I feel good that I can be honest with my mom and dad about my needs and wishes. I was supposed to go to class tonight, but we called the instructor and cancelled. My mom felt bad since she already told the teacher we were coming and just paid for the class a few weeks ago. At least it is an inexpensive class and I got a lot out of the experience.

May the force be with you,
Holden

written by mom

My new pets on WoW

Hi all! I have a video coming one of these days. My mom took a video of me playing World of Warcraft. I love my character and my pets. I am a hunter, named Taladria. My pets are a spider and an owl I named Screech. They are huge and really cool! I put one in a stable while I have the other pet with me. I love doing duels with other WoW players and going up levels. I am learning about fishing, herbalism, and doing quests. My mom helps me a lot, but I can do much by myself. I like helping other players when they are in a tight spot.

I'm certain I am the luckiest boy on the block to be able to play WoW with my mom and dad by my side when I need help. It took me a month to decide on a character and a world I enjoy in WoW. But now that I have found my place I am moving up levels and having such a blast. I'm so glad my mom listened to all the people who told us about this game. I am not addicted, but sure having fun when I am playing or watching my mom. She has a character as well. She was told by a smart person to make her own character, so she could learn the game to help me. It is a blast!

Now that we have pets it seems like the rest will be a cinch! My mom WAS a warrior last week, and couldn't get a pet on WoW. She found out Warlocks and Hunters can get pets though. But I am sure we'll make lots of other characters down the road. But for now my mom and I love our hunter characters because we have bows and pets. My mom's pet is a huge scorpion.

May the knight favor you,
Holden

aka mom


P.S. I still take taekwondo and love it!

Kicking it up a notch

A short clip of me looking really cool in my new dobok on October 14, 2008. The two boys next to me are brothers. The two older kids are siblings also. The two boys next to me take TKD with their parents. Their dad leads the class when the official trainer is busy working with new kids. He is always at the class. It's good to see families finding an activity to do together.

Peace out,
Holden
hlb

My 1st dobok and other delights

Tonight was my first training session with my first TKD dobok (the word uniform in Korean). My trainer and classmates use Korean numbers to count our kicks and punches. So, today my mom helped me find a one minute youtube video to help me learn my Korean numbers. I am well on my way! My trainer told me today that I am doing very well. My mom made a short video of my progress tonight and she will upload that later.

All is well in my world! The weather turned cloudy, cooler, and rainy this week so we have been reading more and watching some scary movies in our spare time. I love scary movies. We watched the Corpse Bride today and Grimm Brothers last night. I played with a friend all day on Monday; he was out of school for Columbus Day.

One day this week I am going to draw some pictures and have my mom make a book with the pictures. That was my idea. She even suggested we could do that one day with photographs I take. I like being able to come up with my own to dos based on my passions.

I started playing/learning World of Warcraft last week. My trial period ended today and my mom has to go buy me the discs at Best Buy or some place like that so I can play it again. But in the meantime I am playing my Dad's computer games: Age of Empires, Conquerors. I also have a new Gamecube Naruto fighting game I like to play.

My brother and I have been building a lot of cool ships with our new Legos. We got Spongebob Legos for Camden's birthday last week, and we have been making our own creations with our existing Legos. My mom and dad are impressed with all our designs. I think my mom was a little annoyed that our Spongebob Legos got mixed up with all our other Legos, until she saw our new creations. Hours of fun, I tell you. I'll have to photograph our designs sometime.

May the force be with you!
Holden
hlb

My second tae kwon do class

My mom took this video of me at my second TKD class on Oct. 7th. She thought I may get a kick (no pun intended) out seeing it one day! I will get my dobok (uniform) in a few days. I should have it for my next class.

If my mom is really ambitious she will take a video of me doing jumping jacks and sit ups at the next session. A grandma was at one of the training session a few days ago and was amazed at my energy. I can do jumping jacks and sit up like a mad man. It is insane! I'm not too bad considering I have never had any formal training. I do everything with enthusiasm because I don't know any other way. My mom tells me I can take classes until I don't want to anymore. I told her I will take classes until I am a master (world champion). We'll see what happens. I'm only 6...anything is possible.

That's all for now.

May the force be with you my friends.

Wild dog on the loose

Well, she's not really wild! She's my dog Shadow. She loves to be near water, in water, etc. I took these photos of her the other day. She has some black material in her mouth that we found at a park. She likes to pretend that it is a wild animal.

On another note: I am starting to take Tae Kwon Do lessons tonight. It should be a lot of fun! I am really excited! I told my mom that after my Tae Kwon Do lessons are complete, I want to learn to be a snake charmer. I like snakes!

That's all for now...

Holden

Sweet victory!

What a great day this turned out to be. My mom is signing me up for tae kwon do. It starts next month. It is an 8 (or 10?) 1 hour session class. I can't wait! There are a few bullies in my neighborhood. I want to be sure I can protect myself if there is ever a confrontation. You can never be too prepared.

I took these photos last night of my mom working on my blog and my dad writing an English paper for college on his laptop. The cards are my Pokemon cards. I feel lucky to have parents who don't believe Pokemon is devil worshipping. I don't worship Pokemom. I just worship having my own beliefs and opinions. My parents believe my opinions are important and take me seriously. I am an important part of their life. I am not someone to be molded, seen, and not heard.

I'm such a lucky dude! Sweet victory is mine!