Jumping Castle

Today the hinkypunks went to a homeschool party at which there was a jumping castle. For those who haven't seen such a thing, this is a very large air-inflated building with springy floor. Everyone had a ball throwing themselves around.



Poor Mattias was invited to the picture but couldn't make it due to his heavy schedule commitments (i.e., continuing to jump after being told ten times to get in the picture). We hope he makes it to the next hinkypunk photo session.

Norwegian Socks

Now that fall has come to Wisconsin (meaning that the temperature has plunged from an average of 78F to an average of 74F) we thought it would be good to dig through fall clothing boxes. One of our finds was a pair of beautiful wool socks knitted in Norway by the mother of our good friend, Thale.

They fit perfectly. However, we put them on and Sylvia refused to take them off for hours.





If they're not off by next week, we'll just make sure to dry-clean Sylvia instead of bathe her.

Purple Pegasus

Today we discovered that we have a horse living in the house. Ever since she was old enough to point, Sylvia has been fascinated with horses. This started when we lived at Grandma and Grandpa McMullin's house. Every morning she would wake up and want to go see where the horses were who lived across the street.

This was all well and good until today, when she showed her true colours.


Purple, to be exact. With wings.

We took this in stride, knowing that children change and develop in their own special ways. However, it wasn't long until she wanted to go outside, and we soon discovered why.


Flying was not exactly traumatic for our purple pegasus, as you can see.

(In reality, Sylvia will be wearing this for Halloween this year. We plan to take lots of pictures and show them at her wedding reception.)

New Glarus Visit

Do not be alarmed! The hinkypunks in the following picture are not preparing to take over the world.

They are, instead, visiting a very famous swordsmith hidden in a tiny town in Wisconsin. Mike at Albion Swords was kind enough to invite us down for a visit and tell us all about the history of the blades they make. We even got to meet Peter Johnsson, the lead designer/researcher for Albion, who lives in Uppsala but was visiting for a couple of weeks.

Asher was a bit dazed by it all. I could tell, because he even smiled for the picture.


Following this adventure, we visited a village square set up to show off this little town. New Glarus, Wisconsin was settled by immigrants from Switzerland's Canton Glarus, and they have a very well-made museum about the early days. The favourite parts of the place for the older hinkypunks were in the blacksmith's shop and the farm shed. Sylvia, on the other hand, seemed to like the leaves and the colourful bee landing areas on the beehive. Swiss bees know their colours!


We also sampled wonderful local cheese, salami, and bread for lunch, with home-made fudge to top it off. The wasps tried to eat Mattias' lunch. Luckily he didn't still have a sword in his hand or his frantic waving would have knocked all our heads off!

All in all a fun outing to a town we will surely visit again. For the fudge mostly.

Talk Like A Pirate Day

Cap'n Asher says: "Shiver me timbers, it's International Talk Like A Pirate Day! So what are you landlubbers sittin' there for readin' this here blog? Get back to swabbin' the deck, or we'll be keel-haulin' ya before morning! Arrrr!"

Hinkypunks At Work

Some may ask, "It's fine that hinkypunks exist, but what do they do all day long?" Well, here to answer this is our experienced reporting staff.

Mattias spent the day playing with electromagnets and trying to keep brother Asher from magnetising his head. Then came soccer practice. I could tell that this was a stressful time for Mattias. He was expected by the coach to run up and down the field at least twenty times chasing a small ball and stealing it away from everyone else! No wonder once he got home all he wanted to do was curl up in bed with a good book.


Asher's day consisted of trying to magnetise Mattias' head (see text above) until fencing practice. Fencing is the art of poking people with very sharp pieces of thin metal. Asher is quick on his feet and likes poking people, so he excels at this. The picture below shows him on the left behind the tall fellow in blue, as well as some of the people from Asher's local fencing club crossing swords.


And finally, Noel's day consisted of doing difficult algebra problems in her head, and then going off to swim team practice. She and Deb decided they would bike to practice through the crisp Wisconsin air (see this entry if you think I'm serious) just for fun. Luckily she (and Deb) survived that outing, and Noel went on to help Sylvia organise a very large pile of thumbtacks. The picture below shows the two happy workers.

Hinkypunk Ball

Yesterday was the blog writer's introduction to the game of Hinkypunk Ball. I won't explain the rules (because they change regularly, depending on whether Mattias is losing or not). Instead, a couple of pictures:


There are long sticks involved, and a large pink ball, and the side of a building (in this case, the shed). It is not a team sport. The goal is for the person who controls the ball to hit the shed with it, however he can.

Editor's Note: I would say "he or she" except this seems to be a male-dominated sport. We will have to work on that.


And here is a penalty shot. Asher seems to have violated some rule (offsides?) and Mattias now gets to whack the ball away from the goal however far he can.

More exciting Hinkypunk Ball news when the World Cup of Hinkypunk Ball (WCHB) begins!