mexicocalls: 2007

Thursday, December 6, 2007

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Carmela's Javelina

Carmela Parson called Yadira this morning to tell her that there was a javelina in her back yard. We went over and took some pictures.

The slide show is here in small

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Von Call Family Singers

The kids participated in a voice recital this week. This is the video of them.

Sunday, April 15, 2007

Bowen and the scouts from church went up by Globe Arizona for some camping and rock climbing.

In Douglas, Bowen and his dad got to ride up with Randy Robinson and Jesse Jones. Jesse spent most of the time bragging about how wonderful his cell phone is. It was cold and windy when we got there and Bowen's dad needed to call home, but Jesse wouldn't share his phone.
If you want to see the slideshow click here
http://picasaweb.google.com/jamescall/RockClimbingScouts/photo#s5053794390908855202

Click below to see the album

Rock Climbing Scouts

Sunday, April 8, 2007

When I was un-nervous

Here is another addition to Alex's "Learning" book.

Family Reactions to April's Fools Day

This is how Eric and Alex reacted to me and Janette switching places. It's pretty funny.

Janette trying to be me

This is Janette trying to be me on April Fool's Day.

Thursday, April 5, 2007

April Fool's Day

On April Fool's Day, me and Janette (our neighbor) switched places. Much to the surprise of our parents. It was fun, Eric made a big deal out of it, by saying that we had different smiles, and how we were trying to trick each other.... it was fun. The good thing was that it was General Conference so we didn't have to worry about pretending to be the other person too much. We had TONS of fun, I don't think this is something we are going to forget for a long time. And we were very grateful that our parents didn't completely freak out and call the police on us or something for invading their houses. But it was the best April Fool's Prank.

Learning "Too Many Apples" Video

Here is the first chapter to Alex's video compilation of "Learning".
You can go to http://picasaweb.google.com/jamescall/TooManyApplesLearning
to follow along.

Alex Video Learning Introduction

Alex wants to do some videos of his "Learning" book. He asked me today we could make some videos. I was busy doing something else, so I told him that when he is 12 years old we could make the videos. He walked out of the room then back in and said "that is going to be THREE years!!!".

The next thing I knew, he had whipped out a couple of videos. I am going to upload them for him. You can look at these with young children who need explanations.

Tuesday, March 27, 2007

Julia plays basketball

Monday, March 12, 2007

Victoria Goes to Prom - Click to see pictures

Here are some sweet pictures of Victoria going to Prom with Mom, Dad, and Jannette. She is beautiful, but too young to date yet.

Click to see all the nice pictures:

Victoria Goes to Prom

More Snow - click for album

Here are some more pictures from the big snow we had in January. Who is the good looking "snow bunny"?

More Snow

Sunday, March 11, 2007

Finishing the Garage

Here are the pictures we took of the garage. These start about the time that we realize that we are OUT of money. You can see more or less what the finished product looks like.

Finishing the Garage

Bowen Olympics of Knowledge

This is where Bowen got to compete against the champions from all the Nuevo Casas Grandes schools with some spanish standardized test. He got second place. We were really proud of him, considering that spanish is his second language.

Bowen Olympics of Knowledge

Saturday, March 10, 2007

Julia and aunt Zuleika

Julia arguing with Aunt Zuleika about being small or big.

Bowen's Drum Solo at the Assembly

This is the last solo performance (I think) of Bowen's. He was invited to play at the assembly at his school. If you are really smart (Vince) you can get all three of these videos and merge them together and get BOWEN'S MATRIX SOLO from every angle.

Friday, March 9, 2007

Peter has tons of homework : Learning

This is one of my favorites. Only one of the character's names has been changed. See if you can guess who???
Click to read.

Peter has tons of homework : Learning

Maria feels Sick : Learning

Maria learns a very important lesson about personal hygiene here.
Click below to read.

Maria feels Sick : Learning

Drawings : Learning

Here are some random drawings and comments from Learning.

Drawings : Learning

The Sad, sad donkey : Learning

Click to read another short story.

The Sad, sad donkey : Learning

MHX Motos Learning

These are not my personal favorite chapters from Learning, but I wanted to scan everything last night that needed to be scanned. Click to read these two chapters. Please note all pages now have page numbers.

MXH -In the riding Night and In the Roller Coaster : Learning

Thursday, March 8, 2007

Too many Apples:Learning

Here is Alex's take on eating too much of any kind of food.
Click on the picture below:

Too many Apples:Learning

When I am Unnervous:Learning

Here is another chapter from Alex's book "Learning". This has a great message and an invitation for everyone to go sugar-free. You can see that this stuff really affects him.
(P.S. Big thanks going out to google for cranking up their free photos from 250 mb to 1 gig)
Click on the picture to see all the book:

Unnervous :Learning

This is Bowen's Solo at the Band Concert

This is basically the same solo from a different angle. Bowen got chosen to do his solo at the band concert on the 7th of March.

Tuesday, March 6, 2007

Bowen's 2007 Drum Solo "Panama"

Bowen's 2006 Drum Solo "Born to be Wild"

Bowen's 2005 Drum Solo "Sing Sing Sing"

Eric testing Camera

Sunday, March 4, 2007

Bowen goes to State Chess tournament - click to see album

Bowen got to be one of the two students from his school to compete in his age group in chess. Even though he wasn't there for the in-school tournament before, the fact that he could win against the chess coach got him in.
At the zone tournament Bowen won 2nd place. He beat Cruz Alatriste, the kid who had beat him for the last few years.
After zone, Bowen went to Ascencion to compete in regionals. He beat the two kids that beat the kid who had won our zone. Bowen won 1st in regionals and was ranked #1 in the state-supervised schools in Northeastern Chihuahua. Bowen was told that now he was going to state. Bowen was really excited.

OOOPS, they changed their government mind and now the state-supervised schools had to compete against the federally-supervised schools. Bowen ended up being ranked #1 after that tournament. Now he could lay claim to the #1 spot among all the grade school kids from Palomas to Zaragosa to Flores Magon (and all points in between).

OOOPS again! On December 20th, some school person called me at the store and told me that Bowen was supposed to be at the tournament against all the 12 year olds from the Jr. high schools about 15 minutes ago. Hurray, I went to the school, got Bowen out of class, and with no warning he went to this tournament against the Jr-high kids who also wanted to go. Bowen had a close one there. He lost a game and had to replay the kid he lost to. Bowen won the second game and got to FINALLY lock in his place in the state tournament.

I went with Bowen to Chihuahua city on the 31 of January to compete. They told us about 2 days ahead of time. I had a hard time getting the time off of work, but I was able to swing it by using some "sick-days".
Click on the picture below to see some pictures we took with the cell phone.

Bowen's State Chess Tournament

Alex's visit to the Hospital - Click to see album

Alex had been up all night on the 9th of February with a bad asthma attack. In the morning, he was still struggling to breathe. Yadi decided we needed to get him hooked up with the Doctor. We couldn't get a hold of the pediatrician, so Yadi called her OB/GYN Dr. Rocha. Dr. Rocha told her to bring Alex to the Emergency room. I took a lot of pictures with the camera on a Palm Treo 680 (1.3 MP). Alex made this little picture book out of it. We are going to print this and add it to "Learning".

Click on the picture to see the album:

Alex Goes to the Hospital

Saturday, March 3, 2007

"Learning" -Grandpa Click to see Album

Here is a chapter from Alex's book "Learning". It is still in the 3-ring binder format and you can't get it at Amazon yet. He has great memories of his visit to Grandpa's and Grandpa's Farm. There are also some previews of memories that are yet to be lived.

We will be publishing chapters as we get time, but there are some really cute things. Some of them have a "based on a true story" disclaimer. Only the names are changed to protect the innocent. Rus and Liz Heggie (friends of ours from Canada) recommended the book: Thinking in Pictures to us. James read it and has helped Alex begin a compilation of writings and drawings. Click on the picture below to see the drawings.