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Friday, December 26, 2008

Freedom Rink: Mission Accomplished


There are few times in a Dad's life when you get that real sense of satisfaction. This was one of those times. I've had this crazy idea about a skating rink for months. I talked it up to the neighbors (especially the one who lives next to the rink), hyped the kids into a frenzy, purchased skates for the kids on a hunch it would work, and spent countless hours on the internet learning other's lessons and mistakes. Seeing it work and the kids have a great time has made it all worth it. Dec 23rd was actually the first skate. Here's the video from the few minutes we had before running off to another event.





The next time we were able to get on the ice was 26 Dec (today) and we had the whole day to soak it up. All the kids were able to enjoy it.

Riley - always the performer.


Mary Beth - Aggressive and quick to try even though she finds a way to crash alot.



Cory - Now he thinks he's a real hockey player.


Lucy - not quite a skater, but clearly part of the family and into the fun.





Grandpa was happy to get out and slide around with them pretending to play hockey. I scavenged around the neighborhood and gathered some sticks and pucks for everyone to get involved. Before long we had neighbor kids come over to see what the commotion was all about. The deep end is amazing, smooth and slick ice, but the shallow end still needs some time before it is solid ice from board to board. I added some snow to that end to help build it up. As it melts it will smooth out a little.

The next test is a warm-up. Sometime tonight we get a wintry mix changing over to rain and then it won't get below freezing till late Sunday night/early Monday morning. All that water may test our crudely engineered playland.

This completely rocks!

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