Saturday, March 23rd, 2019

Well, it's the best time of the year for basketball fans.  March Madness is well under way, and today I was able to be a part of that for the Women's tournament at least.  Since the "Twister Sisters" are a top 4 seed (a 3 seed to be exact), they get to host the first two rounds of the tournament at Hilton.  So tonight I was joined by Amy, Logan, Elizabeth, Nolan, and Maxwell to watch the 3-seed Cyclones blow past the 14-seed Aggies of New Mexico State, 97-61.  This was Logan's first time at an ISU sporting event.  It was cute watching him eat the clone cone, because he just couldn't get enough of it, and he definitely wanted more when it was gone :)

Bridget Carleton was the player of the game for Iowa State, as she led the team with 23 points.  I guess that should be no surprise, as she is currently in second place on ISU's all-time scoring list, and she has a shot to take over the #1 spot if she does well in the tournament.  Carleton was joined in double figures scoring by Alexa Middleton (15), Ashley Joens (14), and Kristin Scott (12).  This is the third time that I have been in attendance for an ISU NCAA tournament game.  The other times were oddly enough both against Florida State.  The first time was back in 2001, when the Cyclones won to move onto the Sweet 16, and the other time was a victory for the Seminoles in the first round back in 2014.  

Logan enjoying his first clone cone!

A view of the action in the first half between Iowa State and New Mexico State.

Speaking of March Madness, I was bummed yesterday when the ISU men lost a close game to Ohio State in the first round of the tournament.  Since their season is now finished, I thought I would look back to the men's games I attended this season:

I saw Cyclone victories against...

• Alabama State
• Missouri
• Omaha
• North Dakota State
• Eastern Illinois
• Kansas
• Oklahoma State
• West Virginia
• Oklahoma

...and I attended losses vs:

• Kansas State
• TCU
• Baylor

All in all, it was a fun season.  Having the Cyclones go 9-3 in games I attended was pretty good, but it is always disappointing to watch them lose.  My favorite game of the year had to be the Kansas game.  In case you were wondering, the Cyclones went 8-4 in the games I attended last year.

Sunday, March 17th, 2019

Well, I've got a lot on my mind today after a fun weekend trip to Chicago with the family.  Today is also one of my favorite days of the year, as it is Selection Sunday, and it's St. Patrick's Day.

First, I wanted to review our fun trip to the Windy City.

• Thursday: We left Ames early on Thursday morning to head to Chicago.  We were able to drop off our bags at our hotel, the Warwick Allerton.  We were very happy with the hotel, and the doorman was very helpful during our stay.  Anyways, after dropping off our bags and having the valet park our car, we walked over to Macy's where the kids got to check out the Lego store.  They enjoyed building their own Lego figurines.  Then we took a little detour you could say.  Nolan got a bad "Owie" when he stumbled stepping up a curb and ended up hitting his right ear against a fire hydrant as he fell.  His poor ear turned all black and blue, and it was really hurting him.  Poor guy.  We tried to find a doctor to look at him, but after a while it seemed like he would be ok with some TLC and a cold pack... so we didn't bother with the doctor.  After all of that, we did manage to have a nice supper at Gino's East.  Well, Elizabeth and I did.  Maxwell tried some pizza I believe, but Nolan didn't think that looked like pizza.  So we fed him some cashews and snacks that we had on hand.  The pizza was great though.  We ordered a large deep dish half sausage and half spinach.  
• Friday: We headed over to the Field Museum to be there when it opened, and we were able to get a good amount of exploring done.  My favorite part was of course all of the dinosaur fossils... Sue to T-rex, the stegosaurus, triceratops, titanosaur, apatosaurus, parasaurolophus... they were all great to see.  Nolan enjoyed the "Grainger Hall of Gems", where he was able to see all types of precious gems such as diamonds, rubies, sapphires, emeralds, amber, topaz, etc.  We also went to an "Underground" exhibit, where you pretended to be shrunk down to 1/2 an inch tall and looked at bugs and all things under the soil.  We were also able to see some mummies, which were cool.  Friday afternoon, we took the kids to Navy Pier where they had fun at the Children's Museum.  It was basically full of all sorts of interactive things for kids, like digging up pretend dinosaur bones, playing with toy cars on different tracks, being able to dress up like a fire fighter, etc.  Friday night for supper we went to a place called FTW (For the Win).  It was a bar/arcade, kind of like a Dave & Busters.  One memorable thing from that was when Maxwell won 1000 tickets playing some plinko-style fishbowl game.
• Saturday: We grabbed a quick breakfast from a local donut shop before watching the Chicago river get dyed green for St. Patrick's day.  Then we rode the "El" up to Belmont and back, just so the kids could experience the train.  After checking out of our hotel, we headed to the suburbs where we saw a performance at Medieval Times.  We ended up being sat in the Black&White knight's section, and of course he was the winner!  The boys seemed to enjoy the show, and they especially liked the toy swords that we bought them.  

Nolan and myself at Gino's East.

Pizza!!

Here I am posing with the stegosaurus at the Field Museum.

Elizabeth and Maxwell in front of the triceratops.

Elizabeth and Nolan in front of the Field Museum.

Sue the T-rex!

Here Maxwell had just won 1000 tickets at the arcade.

Dying of the Chicago River.

Medieval Times

Now today I also have quite a bit of basketball on my mind.  Iowa State had an amazing run over the weekend by defeating Baylor, Kansas State, and Kansas en route to their 4th Big 12 tournament championship in the last 6 years.  The Cyclones were selected as a 6-seed in the Midwest region today, and they will face Ohio State this coming Friday.  I am really looking forward to that game and hoping the Cyclones can get revenge for that Aaron Craft game from a few years ago.  I suppose I will save my end-of the season listing of which basketball games I attended this year for another day... as I need to start filling out my bracket!