jimmy plays basketball

Here's the baby whisperer today, whispering that unruly niece of hers.

Ahh, the child is in bed, back to knitting.

After while, it was lunch time.

 

Then we wen to James' basketball game.

Julia took over the camera and well, that's about all that can be said about it.

James is number twelve.  He's getting better over the season, a little aggressive.   Little Jay says he's way more aggressive in the driveway than he is on the court.   Probably true, nobody there with a whistle to call fouls.

Yeah, that annoying dude, calling fouls on my boy.

Okay and these are the last pictures she took:  seventeen pictures of her feet.  It was a pretty touching collection.

These two were at the basketball game too, but Julia never took any pictures.  It was this sweet little brother guy, let me hold him a long time. He's growing, getting heavy!  I had to sit down.


This guy was there also.  He arrived in his wretched just-woke-up-from-my-nap-and-hate-the-world-especially-you-people mood.   But with a bit of Powerade, he overcame it and went on to have a fine time.

This is a picture Maria took.  The date is obviously wrong. He wasn't even born until 2009.



And that is the end of that, and a very fine Tuesday it was. Onward to Wednesday, and more importantly, onward to FEBRUARY, which brings us one more month closer to June. love, Val

the end of sunday

What a nice weekend  it was.

Yesterday we went to Tim's basketball game.   That was fun.

The kid has no killer instinct.  He ducks when they pass him the ball.

He stands by politely while the other team shoots baskets.

On the way home, I told him his job is to get in the way and interfere. Make it difficult for them to aim properly.

"You know what I mean?"

"Yah."

He's the tallest, biggest kid on the court, but you'd never know it.

Anyway, after that I called my old friend to meet me for supper in a suburb halfway between us, and she said yes.

Then I ran to Fantastic Sam's for a haircut and color.

Oh, Lord Have Mercy.

This lady was so slow with the foils I thought I might DIE.  I seriously considered ripping the foils off my head and running out of there, unable to take it any LONGER.

It was so bad, the ones in the back, underneath, were done curing and she still hadn't finished the top of my head.  A co-worker intervened to help, thank goodness.

Then finally, after over two hours the coloring was done, and time for the haircut. The cute slow girl wandered off eating candy from the machine and the other lady cut my hair.

WHATEVER. Just GET ME OUT OF HERE.

Two and a half damned hours.

I raced to meet my friend, made it in time, lovely evening.

Then I stopped at Target and have been keeping an eye out for cheap dining room chairs to replace the old dried up, broken down ones we have.  (I paid $40 for the whole dining room set about ten years ago. The chairs are toast in every way.)   I found four good chairs that will reasonably match!

So I brought the chairs in and asked Tim if he wanted to put them together.

He ran for his tool box, excited.   It took a while to put that first chair together with that tiny allen wrench they send along.  (Let's work with toothpicks! That'll be GREAT!)


Then after it was all together, he came out to the kitchen and said, "Look what I forgot," and dumped a whole hand full of washers into my palm.

Okay, rewind.  Big Jay cut that allen wrench off short so it would fasten into the chuck on the drill and the whole thing went much faster.

After that, we had Chair Chunkin' which is somewhat like Pumpkin Chunkin' only for this event we tossed those old dining room chairs out the back door onto the patio. Then  others tossed them over the fence to the driveway.  (None got stuck in the trees overhead, so that was good.)

Today we went to church, and that's always a good way to start the week.  Our lively pastor has moved on to her new church, and as I listened to our friend leading the service, singing alone, all the parts, speaking, serving communion, I wondered if he felt as lonely for her as I did. 


Maybe not. He's a guy, and he thinks from a very guy-like point of view, and is a very logical, sensible person.  He probably is in a completely different place from this than where I am.

However, while we ate donuts later, I didn't put him on the spot and ask him either.

What if he started crying??  (Awkward!)  Or I did?  (Awkward!)  Or Jay did?  (Okay, enough! No crying! She's not dead, so calm down. We're going to be okay.  Everything is fine. FINE.)

Then we went to John and Dannell's for pizza.  We invited ourselves over and said we'd buy pizza and please DO NOT CLEAN.

Okay, he cleaned.  There were vacuum tracks in the rugs. The bathroom was spotless.

Please Darling, don't clean for me.  I don't care about it.  I know how life is and dog hair and all that.

I had no camera along, so even though those kids were cuter than EVER, I have not one single picture of them.

They fought and argued and played video games and trains.

t.c. found Big Jay and coaxed him into some kind of snowboarding game.

I felt Dannell's baby kick.   He rolled and stuck his back out at us, big old pointy lump.  Who IS that in there?

m.c. showed us pictures from the concert she went to a couple weeks ago.  It was a very laid back good time.   Santa was not there.  Her favorite, Brad Paisley was.

Which brings us to now, the end of Sunday.

Sigh.

February is upon us and for this I am glad.

Happy Sunday.  love, Val

the big loud 52

That was tonight. It was good.

This guy was as amused by the cart as the others.

Awww, here we go, John and Julia.

Dannell, growin' that baby, and Lydia

m.c. and Maria, cute as ever.

Here we are down in the second basement, living it up with the Legos.
 

While others amuse themselves with the cart.

Okay, see that weird box hanging from the trusses by Christmas curly ribbon?

This is the game:  fling it back and forth and the box is loaded with Matchbox car tracks to give it some weight.   These are the boxes from the party sub sandwiches John and Dannell brought for supper tonight.

Yeah, it was real fun until t.c. got hit in the face.  John said, "Yah, his only permanent teeth, smacked in the face."

Here's our new guy, growing round and juicy, bright eyes, and with the tiniest skinny hands I've seen in a while.

Oh, gifts.   My parents gave him money, which is always a treat.

Little Jay gave him M&Ms and a Cheech and Chong t-shirt (we were kids in the 70s.)  John and Dan went together on a Wii.

Tim was delighted beyond belief.  He has to beg and bargain to get time on the Wii up in Jay and James' room.   Now he figures Dad is an easier target maybe?  He's probably right.

It's Auntie Dannell and the new brother.

b.g. was way into the whole present thing. Alicia says Christmas and then the new brother has created a monster.  Well, that's understandable.  That old Grandpa guy has opened enough presents to not mind if a young whippersnapper helps out.

Oh, now we're down to business, got that Wii going.

Charming me for a Moo Jr.

Of course. He can have the whole box.  I want his babysitter to get sick again so he can come stay with me some more.   (Not fatally ill, just a rash or a headache.)

Here he's revving up his lungs to blow out those candles.

And that is the last picture we have. We have no pictures of little kids trying to scoop ice cream and arguing about how yes they can so do it.  (No, they cannot. Their arms are too short. Grow taller, then get back to us.)

We also have no photos of the dramatic departure where people demand specific beverages in specific cups and ask to be carried.

That's okay.    It was a great party, a lot of fun.  The man is officially launched forward into life as a 52 year old, and life is nothing but good.

Happy Birthday, Sweetheart.   love you forever, Val

he's 52, fifty two years old

And he can kick, and kick, and no, no, no. He'd better take it easy on his back.

We planned a party for tomorrow night, but Heidi and Joe are going to visit his mom tomorrow and stay over night, so we had a little party tonight too.

There she is scouring the mixed vegetables, looking pretty happy about it.  Like that bib?  It even covers her FEET.

These two are playing hang man, somewhat successfully. It went better when Lydia started recording all the letters Julia guessed so she didn't keep guessing O over and over.

He made supper last night while I was working, bbq pork chops and potato salad.  Pretty delicious, it was.

She just wants Sidney SO MUCH.    Sidney is so not into it.

This was one of Jay's gifts and Tim was very excited about this contraption.  It's a cart that flips in three different forms for moving heavy things. 

We hid it in Lydia's room, so Dad wouldn't find it, and I guess they were up in the room playing with this thing all last night and today.  Goodness.

Tonight they brought it bumping loudly down the stairway, and when he heard the racket, he closed his eyes so he'd be ready for the surprise.

There it is.

Here are his other gifts,  peanut M &Ms, pistachios, and these very thoughtful gifts: a gift certificate to a restaurant he's seen on Diners, Dives, and Drive-Ins which looks very cool, Cuban food. Kirsten says he's talked about this restaurant so many times she had to find it and buy him a meal there.

Aww, that's pretty impressive.

And from Joe and Heidi a filet knife Joe chose after significant research on the internet. 

He did?  He didn't just run into Fleet Farm and grab a knife?  Oh, no.  The blade on this one is from Sweden.

Wow, seems pretty high class for the little sunnies and crappies we catch at the lake.

James noticed it cut open the bag of M&Ms pretty nicely.  (PUT that thing away!)

Here they are playing with the cart some more.

Now they're giving Dad a ride out in the kitchen.

Tim was so into this cart, I couldn't help but laugh.

Now for the candles--instead of fifty two candles, we went with a group of five and a group of two. That worked.

I love you, Mister. 

Thirty-five years ago we met, and a month later went on a date, and now we're here, still us.  Somehow a community of family grew all over the place, and I've never wished for a life different from the one we have.   And I never want anybody else except you.  

Happy Birthday, Bud.  love, Me