May 2015

May started with the church sponsored father-son-campout.  Scott, Jackson, Grant (soon Pierce Charlie) look forward to this every year.  Jackson helped me prepare the foil dinners, and packed the whole car himself, unfortunately he only remembered 1 sleeping bag :-/

While the guys were gone, Taylor got to chose the activity for the evening. Despite my pushing for pedicures and Melting Pot, she selected planting flowers, which ended up being fun and educational—wouldn’t you think that annuals came back every year (annually)??  Nope.

Scott is still on that killer case, his most demanding one yet.  We would try to look for another job, but there is no time!  Even with his busy schedule he took Jackson to work one day, really out of necessity because Jackson had a game and the rest of us wanted to go to the lake!  Here he is below at Michael’s desk (Scott’s younger brother) while Michael was out of the office.

While we are on Mr. Jack, he had a month worth celebrating.  His regular baseball season ended (Blue Rocks—check out the sponsor!)

He was selected for the allstar team (48 chosen out of 144), He played a great game, then found out he was selected to represent Murphy Chandler on an elite tournament team (24 out of 144 chosen—split into two drafted/equivalent teams—blue and gold).  Jackson was put on the gold team with a super hardcore coach (we loved him).  They practiced for 2.5 hours everyday for 3 weeks, and have participated in 2 tournaments.  The coaching is superb, plus the coach said he recruited on character and coach-ability.  It was an amazingly talented group of boys—so kind, intelligent, and full of integrity.  It was interesting to us that half of the team was Jewish.  I truly wish this could be his team until he graduates.  The last really neat part is that all the game stats/plays were tracked and recorded live.  So Scott was able to access/watch Jack’s games in AR, and we have been able to follow them in Italy.   

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Taylor and my Blue Angel softball season came to an end this month.  Coaching was fun, and I’ll most likely do it again.  I’ll just have to give myself a break for the next 3 seasons—it was more work than anticipated.  But the parents were super appreciative and I think Taylor really enjoyed me being the coach.  Taylor (and Jackson and Grant) had her last day of school.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Summer has begun, and we finally bit the bullet and joined our community pool (Byrnwick).  It is right in Brookhaven, so we know most of the people there.  It’s nice because I don’t really need to schedule playdates for the kids (or me)—everyone is at the pool!  I didn’t schedule anything for the kids for the first 2 weeks of summer.  It has been wonderful, as we all really needed a break from schedules.

Grant and Pierce are great.  I’m actually writing this on the plane home from Italy and this pic makes me miss them so much!  Grant said 2 funny things this month, and I just want to make sure I have the memory.  First, at Jaemor’s farmers market we stopped for strawberries on the way to the Lake.  Grant insisted on going into the male restroom by himself to go to the bathroom.  After checking with him a couple of times I told him I was coming in to help him wipe, to which he loudly responded in his deep husky voice “But Mom, I’m 29.”  He had the whole bathroom in hysterics. 

Then later in the month Taylor was really upset about something, so I asked the boys “What can we do to help Tay feel better” to which he quipped “Give her a book.”

Just cracked me up because it was fairly perceptive and funny!

 

 

 

 

Guacamole has now dropped off Pierce’s favorable food choices so we are down to just hummus people!!  He loves to gnaw on any adult food with his 4 teeth, but hummus is truly the only “baby food” he will eat.  Supposedly my mom has had better luck while we’ve been gone in Italy.

Grant and his favorite girl Madison.  We go to church with this family and I know these 2 will be trouble, both the 3rd out of 4 kids.  They ADORE each other.

In other quick news, I was able to host a jewelry party at my house with 2 of my best friends from high schoolhighschool.  I think we sold ~$1500 all benefiting the charity Noonday.  Plus Susan, Alyssa, and I had so much fun catching up—not to mention we scored some really nice jewelry.

Another highlight was getting to visit Manoj and Daveesha at the hospital to help them celebrate the birth of their new baby girl.  They will be such great parents!

Of course the best part about May is always Memorial Day Weekend at the lake with family celebrating Jeff’s birthday.  We were delighted that Laura, Nana, Dianna, and Rebekah could join us also! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And that wraps up May!  Here are a few last pics.  Much love to you all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am obsessed with this snack—had to share!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TFK