Kelly Times Two

Today I joined Christopher at his school for the annual cookout, which is really a day to go have lunch with your children, and not so much a "cookout." Most parents take a bag of fast food to the school and everyone sits out on the lawn to eat. (It's not exactly a grassy knoll, but rather a cramped corner of the school property underneath a patch of live oak trees, filled with rocks, leaves, ants, and tiny patches of rough Texas grasses.) About the only ones who actually sign up for the hamburgers from the school cafeteria are those new to the school. I always enjoy the artwork and decorations on the walls at the school, so I took a few pictures, and got some shots of Christopher coming down the stairs with his class for lunch. It's a big move up, psychologically and physically when the students go into third grade where all the "upper" classrooms (3rd, 4th, and 5th grades) are all held upstairs, on the second level of the building. This isn't the most ...

Our friends (and neighbors) Chad and Adele have a toy store in Austin that opened two years ago and tonight, we celebrated with them at dinner out at Kobe Japanese Steakhouse. Happy two-year anniversary to Wonko's! (It's located near the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema and Hobby Lobby on Hwy. 183, in case you're interested. Buy from our friends!) Kelly and I got the kids McDonald's for dinner while we dined on steak, shrimp, lobster, and sushi. Hunter ordered this, and I thought it looks so delish, that I conned him out of one of his pieces of sushi for one of mine, which were all the same. Our chef lit up the tower of onions for volcano of fire. The shrimp and the salmon looked so tasty on the Hibachi grill. One of my favorites is the grilled vegetables. The only thing that takes away from the feast is seeing how much oil and butter they dowse on all the food. Kelly's fillet mignon was so tender that it tasted like butter. It was the most tender steak I have su...

Last Saturday morning, I flew to Salt Lake City and stayed for a few days, returning home Wednesday morning. I got to hang out at my sister Julie's house Tuesday evening, after spending the day with her and three of her kids at Temple Square. I'll post those pictures after these, by the way. Here's Julie at the end of the evening, while we were chillin' in her basement. This is the stone wall built around their garden that my brother-in-law built. Nathaniel and Morgan were throwing the football while I was checking out the garden. Morgan is a sophomore in high school, the same grade as Lindsey. There's one other cousin their age too, my sister Valerie's son, Parker, in Las Vegas. Tom built this chicken house for Morgan's chicks, which produce fresh eggs daily. Here's Tom and Julie just before dinner. I brought some tomatoes in from the garden and Julie went out to get some fresh basil too, then whipped up some incredible sliced tomatoes with ba...

One week after his birthday, we had Christopher's 10th birthday party yesterday in a traditional, old-fashioned birthday party (as opposed to renting a skate rink, a rock climbing gym, hiring entertainment, etc.), and enjoyed games, cake, and pizza. Musical chairs was fun with music by Lindsey. Christopher's hip-whomping technique led to him being the champ of the first round, and Rutger won the second. From left to right, here's Christian, Adam, Cole, Max, Ian, Alex, Christopher, Garrison, Matthew, and Rutger. The boys were participating in a pumpkin seed spitting contest. Here the boys were lined up for a popcorn ball toss. Christopher's big wish for his birthday party was for me to bake an extra cake to smash in his face. This was one of his requests, but here he puts up a struggle for show. The boys thought this was awesome. One thing that I forgot to plan for was a towel for Christopher's face afterwards. He waited patiently while I ran into the house to c...

My friend, Kay, who moved to Bastrop, used to help in the church nursery when Christopher was a little guy and took this picture. She recently emailed it to me--doesn't he look cute? His personality matches that smile too. Here's my little boy a few years later, posing with another cute grin, but quite a bit bigger. He is ten years old today! This picture was taken by a classmate last week when Christopher and I were at a field trip to the Bob Bullock Texas History Museum with all the fourth graders at his school. About two weeks ago, the two of us hand delivered his birthday party invitations for a celebration we had planned today from 3:30 to 5:00, which Christopher's been looking forward to. Sadly, he's had a stomach ache and fever and has missed school ever since I picked him up in the nurse's office on Monday morning through now. Yesterday he had a fever again, and the students cannot return to school if they've had a fever of more than 100 degrees in the ...

Obviously, my children have been taking notes of the foods I serve them. Look what Christopher brought into my office recently to surprise me. This goody plate was his idea and I thought it was so cute.

Rather than going to the overpriced ($25 per person) high school homecoming dance, where most LDS youth aren't exactly in their comfort zone (with the often immodest dress standards and not-so-nice dancing), Lindsey organized a night out on the town with these youth from our ward. They all met at our house and went out to dinner then to the movies, followed by some dessert at our house. I had the teens look online at the Cheesecake Factory menu before I attended the Relief Society General Broadcast at our stake center, then stopped by to pick up their selections on the way home (with Preston's mom). Lindsey, Hayden, Preston, and Lauren had a wonderful evening together, with a lot of laughing. It was an action packed day and I still had all the baby shower decorations out, some dirty dishes (it was a two-load dishwasher day), but the kids didn't seem to mind. Christopher had a ball with his dad for the evening playing Halo 3 for hours while Lindsey was on her group date and...