Pinewood Derby time

Dell had his Pinewood Derby tonight. He had the best, umm, car there. It won the first two races. I took 5 blocks to make and the cab weighted exactly 5 ounces, after some drilling on the bottom. Cab and trailer weighted 12 ounces.

I asked him what kind of car he wanted this year and he said "Snowman's Truck" from the Smokey and the Bandit movie. I thot holey crap and said why not. Last year he had Bandit's Trans Am so Snowman's Truck would be perfect. Talked to my buddy Derric and we devised a plan. Everyone there loved it and Dell got so many compliments.

Brittney's Dance compatition

Brittney had a dance compatition before Christmas and she was so beautiful. We were so proud of her. She had 4 different dance partners and she won two ribbons. She has decided that she loves ballroom dancing. She wants to be on Dancing with the Stars when she's older.

Kids grow up too fast

You never realize how fast the kids grow until you find some old pictures of them when they were younger. These are so cute.

Brittneys new room

Well we painted Brittneys room, all I can say is "She is such a Girl". It does look really good tho.

The Hot Rod Shop is now Open

A friend of mine(Derric) and I have started our own hotrod shop. He accually has had it going for a few years but has brought me onboard. It is called KDRodworks. We even have a website http://www.kdrodworks.com/ He does the fabrication, we both do mechanical, and I do the wiring of the vehicles. We got our first vehicle the other day that we are going to tackle. A 1950 Chevy Schoolbus. The owner wants to shorten it, put a modern frame under it, newer engine/trans and a bunch of other stuff. The next project showing any day now is a 1957 Chevy pickup. I'm pretty excited about doing this. I have mechaniced on cars along time but I don't know much about body work or fabrication and Derric said he would teach me how to do that stuff , so needless to say I'm stoked.

Oh by the way since Michelle is a bus driver she loves the bus we just got in, I may have to find her one some day.

Brittney's Car

I bought this car back in 1999 from a junkyard for the sum of $250. It is a 1972 Buick Skylark Suncoupe. It had major front end damage, no drivetrain and most of the interior is gone. Why would I have bought such a piece of junk you ask? About 2 weeks before I got it I was in a book store looking at some books about muscle cars. Long storey short, this book said if you ever find a Suncoupe you'd better hang on to it because they are pretty rare. I thought wow it would be neat to see on of those let-alone own one. I was wandering through a junkyard in I.F. 2 weeks later and was staring at one of these rare cars and had to have it. At the time I didn't know how rare it is but since then I have found out that they only made 3924 of them. The reason this car is so rare is the fact that it has a sun roof in it. It has a section that slides back, much like the old VW bugs and rabbits did. I have only ever seen one other car that has this roof and it was a 72 Nova in Idaho Falls. The others I have seen have been in pictures. We hauled it to Mom and Dads place in Firth and there it sat until the fall of 2007. A friend brought it up to Rexburg and we put it on the lift he has in his garage and I put a new frame under it that I had gotten in 2005. So now it would roll. Today we put it on a trailer and took it to Rex's body shop and started to pull the firewall out so Brittney and I can start to put her car together and have some great memories that both of us will remember forever and she will always know that I love her. She came to Michelle and I a few weeks ago and asked if she could have a cellphone. I asked her why she needed a phone and she said that a girl in her class had one. I said "let me ask you this, How many kids in your class have a car?" She said "None" I told her that when she feel bad that she doesn't have a phone she can remember that she is the only one in middle school that has a car. She liked that answer, She is excited to get to work on "Her" car with her Dad.

I believe that kids can learn responsibility with a car almost like having an animal to take care of. If a kid has to use their own time and money to fix up and take care of a car they will be much more careful with it no matter where they are. I have a sister that got my Mom's old car when they got a new one. Becky drove that car into the ground. When she had to buy one with her own money she treated it like it was made of gold. I believe my kids will act this same way having to put their own efforts into these cars. Brittney has this Skylark, Jarrett has a 1976 Chevy pickup that used to be my Grandpa's, Dell doesn't have one yet but he wants a truck.

The first picture is on the rack, the second is the big wowie in the firewall, the third and fourth are us loading it on the trailer. Notice that I am sticking up through the roof. The fourth picture has another Skylark in the background, that one is a parts car for this one.

A man and his car

Jarrett got a new car to play with and he takes it everywhere. I came down stairs to check on the kids and he had fallen asleep and I had to take a picture.