People Really Like The Rubik's Cube We Made!

 

I've shown this photo of Sarah and Jeffrey in their Halloween costumes to many people this week and several have thanked me for doing so and said it made their day! While I can't claim credit for making the Rubik's Cube for Jeffrey (one person's even suggested we scramble the colors for next year) or decorating Sarah for the Dalmatian look, I am really impressed by that. And nothing store-bought about them; the Cube is just a cardboard box decorated with masking tape and colored construction paper squares while Sarah already had the white shirt and shorts and black stockings, we just needed the marker to make the spots on them and on her face.

Our kids got to field test the costumes at the Halloween party for Jeffrey's Cub Scout troop Tuesday night in our church basement. And along with the games they played and the candy they won (of course, including Sarah beating Jeffrey in a tug of war) the party was populated by ... let's see, one Cyberman from Doctor Who, one waiter, two Rocket Raccoons from Guardians of the Galaxy (not to self: get the DVD for Christmas), one Star-Lord from same, two Hogwarts students (I asked them holding their wands who was the better Quidditch player, it was the older brother), and the den leader was doing a fair impression of Argus with all the eyes on her face!

Okay, after y'all have looked up who Argus is because I won't tell you ... I imagine Reed Richards (Mister Fantastic of Marvel Comics' Fantastic Four, the stretchy guy) would have made a Rubik's Cube costume for his son that could turn and scramble and solve itself. He doesn't quite do that, but in the ultimate collection of Franklin Richards: Son of a Genius (ISBN 9780785149248) Franklin with his robot housesitter H.E.R.B.I.E. -- pronounced "Herbie" -- gets into quite the pickle, and noses by shrinking himself down and messes by using an invention or five to help him in this laughfest that mixes super heroes and Home Alone with the drawing style of Calvin and Hobbes!

I have got to read this again before I return it to the library ... today being Thursday, I'm less that forty-eight hours from beginning my 2014 NaNoNovEl or "Nano Novel". For yes, I have signed up again to bang my head against my wall -- oh wait, I do that already before I take the kids to school -- to think of the perfect prose for National Novel Writing Month and dash away, dash away, dash away all on my planned story about the Magi (not necessarily three; please re-read the account in the Gospel of Matthew) and some adventures we don't quite hear about in their journey to and from Jesus in Beth-lehem. I've already got a Darth Vader-level reveal planned around 38,000 words or so!

So keep an eye on that word count with me!

David