Tag Archives: Family

Speaking of Dig…

Family, Thoughts,

(I am the luckiest guy alive!)

I really dig my wife.  Today is our 15 year anniversary.  I like to look back at the old pictures of our wedding day and remember what it was like to weigh 150 pounds (I was a skinny thing) and have hair, and look young.  Sometimes I like to look back at pictures and reminisce, but really, I prefer our life right now.  We’ve had our ups and downs, but we count many more ups in our favor.  We’re mature in our relationship and especially lately, we’ve grown closer than we ever have been before.  So today, on our 15th anniversary, I’d like to say I love my wife so very much and I would indeed marry her all over again!

Local Art

Family

There is a great artists’ community in Charleston.  A week or two ago, the city celebrated Festivall where “a city becomes a work of art”.  It really is a tremendous display and a ton of fun.

Although we love to see local/original art, we can’t always afford to buy pieces we see.  We found a new source though, that suits my needs and interests perfectly.  We have started framing art by the kids and of the kids.

This father’s day, Emily and the kids had one of Abigail’s pieces framed.  It’s one of my favorite pieces of art in the house.  We hung it in the bedroom so I could see it every day.  I’ll always hang drawings with bees!

While at Festivall this year, we ran across a caricature artist and had him draw the kids.  I am not sure that they exactly look like my kids, but they look like kids I have seen somewhere.  Anyhow, we still like them a lot too.  The most important part of those drawings is that the kids each sat still for 15 minutes while the artist did his work.  I think that time might be in record territory!

Do you hang “local art” in your place?

The beginning of the end

Family

The tooth fairy visited our house.  If you are a kid and still stay up trying to catch her, please do not read beyond this point.  This is your official spoiler alert.

So, Isaac lost his 9th tooth yesterday.  He is 9 and thinks it is just amazing to average one tooth a year.  Anyhow, he was chomping a chocolate muffin when it just popped out.  The cool thing about it is that it is one of his back teeth so he doesn’t have the toothless look.  He’s starting to care about his appearance.  I thought I taught him better. Anyhow, he retrieved the tooth from a mouthful of spit and half chewed Otis Spunkmeyer chololate muffin.  We told him to rinse it off and put it in his tooth fairy pillow (that’s actually a pouch that he hangs on his door knob…we have a smart tooth fairy).  He got a goofy smirk on his face and said, “Dad, I know you put that money in there at night”.  My heart dropped.  I knew the time was coming.  In fact, it might have come a long time ago I suppose but it sort of crushed me a little to hear him admit that he knew I was the tooth fairy.

I still didn’t admit anything to him but I sort of feel obligated to tell him everything so that he doesn’t go to school and talk about Santa, the tooth fairy and other supernatural creatures only to get teased.  Still, it breaks my heart a little to see my son (who is going into the 4th grade) lose a little of the innocence of childhood.  Like I said, I htink he has known for awhile but to make it official is pretty tough for me.

A co-worker of mine says that his kids (who are much older) still receive visits from Santa, et al. as long as they play along.  I think we’ll arrange that deal so that Abigail will still have the magic and my illusion of innocence will be maintained.  At least he doesn’t care where babies come from yet…

It’s about the time

Family

We got up early as we always do on the day we leave the beach. It’s a long drive home and we always leave early to beat the chaos around the traffic that comes when one leaves later. So it’s a tradition to leave early and that doesn’t bother me. The funny thing that I always hate about leaving the beach, however, is putting my watch back on. I hadn’t worn my watch from the time I entered the house.

The thing about time is that it matters so much of the time. We couldn’t arrive at the house until 3 pm and we had to be out before 11 am. We had to be home in time to get back for work and we had to pay all the bills on time that had stacked up in our absence. But while we are at the beach, time does not matter at all. We eat when we’re hungry, we sleep when we’re tired and we play all of the time. Time doesn’t matter at the beach and that’s why I love it so much. All the rest of my life is scheduled (or so it seems) so the time away renews me.

I always ponder the return to time and it sort of rattles my head. Time flees so fast the rest of the year. I love our stay at the beach each year where time seems to stand still. I get a chance to totally enjoy my kids and wife and we soak it up, indeed. The times without time are the only times that really matter.

A regular hootenanny

Family, Fun,

Emily is the counselor at a year round school in Charleston.  In WV there are only a handful of year round schools so her schedule is pretty unique.  Basically, she is on for 9 weeks, off for 3 weeks, all year round.  That fact pretty well guarantees that we take vacation in the middle of June.

The funny thing is that Emily’s birthday is also always in June.  It never seems to vary.  So, once again, we celebrated Emily’s birthday at the beach.  It’s a little strange to celebrate a special holiday away from home.  All of the best gag gifts have to be hauled in for the event.  We seem to have a tendency to play jokes and horse around a good bit…in case that surprises anyone, we are a bunch of goofballs.

Anyhow, my Mom and brother also have birthdays in June so we decided to have a regular hootenanny at the beach this year.  Mom brought a bunch of luau stuff and we dressed up and then danced (really loudly and obnoxiously) to bluegrass music that my sister-in-law had brought.  It was an absolute blast.  Some had liquid courage to help with dance moves but everyone had a blast.  Folks walking past from the beach certainly gave us funny looks but we put our best West Virginia on and hooped it up at the ho-down!

Somehow the porch on our house survived the dance and we finally settled down when the cops came…just kidding.  We finally settled down when the sugar highs and liquid courage ran out.  We wandered back in and crashed for the night.  I am pretty sure that we honored Emily’s birthday appropriately.  She’s pretty old though so I don’t know if she’ll remember!


(Note the touchless hug)

The color of idiot

Family, Fun,

Did you ever wonder what the color of idiot looks like?  Read on friends and I will show you…but a little back story first.

We made it to Tybee Island near Savannah on Saturday. Our house is nice and right on the beach so have spent a lot of time in and near the ocean.  Dolphins come by each morning eating the small fish that seem to be everywhere.  They tend to jump in the air which makes no sense to me.  I have taken to calling them suicide fish.  Pelicans and seagulls fly over all the time and the silly jumping fish are just advertising their location.  I guess it’s their business but really my fish friends…life is worth living.

At low tide we found that there are hundreds and thousands of sand dollars in the shallow water.  Isaac started collecting them planning to sell them on ebay for a dollar a piece.  You should have seen the dollar signs in his eyes.   Since they are living creatures, I made him return them to the ocean of course.

We also found sea stars all over the place.  I seemed to be able to find them every step I took.  No one else had the sensitivity in their feet I suppose.  I always knew I had rosebud feet.  It’s kind of silly I suppose but I sort of feel bad for these creatures that must be under foot all of the time.  I carry every creature I find back out into deeper water.  I know it probably doesn’t make a bit of difference in the grand scheme of things.  It just bugs me when silly redneck idiots gather handfuls of sea stars and sand dollars to watch them bake on the beach.  I don’t really have a solution that involves me saving these low-tide creatures while not going to jail so I silently do my part by carrying every one I find to deeper water.

So, back to the original question…the color of idiot.  When I arrived at Tybee Island, my skin color was this:

By Sunday at noon, my skin color was this:

Can you pick the color of idiot?

On the river

Adventure, Family, Fun, WV, , ,

We got a canoe many years ago, shortly after we were married.  At that time, graduate school left us with very little free time so we didn’t use the canoe much.  Then we started having babies and, though I tried to work out a safe way of buckling a car seat into the canoe, we decided not to take wee little kids on the river in a canoe.  Since we moved back to WV, we have been itching to get on the river with our canoe.

I grew up near the Allegheny river and we canoed on it quite a bit.  My hometown was very rural.  In fact, if you drive up to the edge of the Earth and then turn left and go 25 miles, you’ll get there.  Anyhow, we did lots of outdoorsy stuff and I had missed that in Nashville.  Now that we are in WV, we have more opportunity to be in Nature.

So, when we got the call to go canoeing with Emily’s aunt and uncle, we jumped.  They canoe often so showed us a fun launch on the Little Coal River (it’s WV…there is lots of coal here, of course).  The river was up some and moving pretty quickly from recent rains.  As we looked on the river, Isaac said, “Uh…I am not comfortable with this!”  Abigail quickly came down with an upset stomache as well.  They were both so funny and cautious (a definite good thing!).

We finally got the kids in the canoes and got ourselves launched and had a wonderful time coasting down the river.  There were few distractions and the lack of sound actually made my ears ring a little.  It was wonderful.  The kids settled down and we just coasted…and relaxed…and talked.  I loved being back in Nature (with a capital N for its importance!) and hearing birds and the water gurgling.  I loved hearing my kids chatter about the river and their thoughts.  I loved to see my son take his turn in the front seat, paddling pretty well.

(You’re kidding, right?)


So, we’ll get back on the river soon.  We’ll look for chances to slow down and relax together.  We’ll fish and drink too much pop and eat too many marshmallows and we’ll enjoy life the way it is supposed to be!

He hugged me

Family, Thoughts,

My son is very much like me…we don’t do people.  I mean, I would rather do 1,000,000 deep knee bends than hug a person.  Some folks I know are huggers…they want to greet me in the morning with a hug.  I always respond, “I don’t hug my wife and kids, I d@#n sure am not going to hug you!”  Usually that calls off the attack.  I don’t like to shake hands or even bump into someone else.  I am not sure what my parents did to me as a child but it’s how I am.

Now honestly, I do hug my wife and kids (and I enjoy that) and I will shake hands in a pinch or where social norms demand it, but I am not a free-toucher.  Isaac is just like me…except he barely hugs us either.

So, you may be wondering what this has to do with anything.  You may remember, this week I am going on about simple pleasures.  Uh…ok…so what’s my point?  Well, last night Isaac willingly hugged me and kissed me on the cheek!  I’ll say it again, Isaac hugged me and kissed my cheek…without coercion!


My boy loves to read and he reads at a high school level in 3rd 4th grade.  He just finished the Star Wars book that parallels the third Star Wars movie (the one where Darth Vader is made).  Until now, we have not let the kids see that movie.  I don’t know that it is all that bad really, but so many parents around us have banned their kids from seeing it.  I guess we decided to follow their lead.  Anyhow, since he finished the book, I decided to let him watch the movie.  We’ve been trying to work out a time to see it and finally last night was the night to start the show.  When he got the news, he was so excited that he gave me  a huge hug and a kiss on the cheek!  That one thing, truly, made my week!  I am a little less tired because of it!

Symphony Sunday

Family, Fun, WV, ,


The WV Symphony is based here in Charleston and is really first class.  As a part of their community outreach, they hold Symphony Sunday each year at the University of Charleston.  The university is situated on a beautiful campus along the Kanawha River directly across the WV State Capitol.

(Note my artistic shadow on the poster…uh…I meant to do that)

The symphony sets up on a stage at one end of the green the rest of the area fills with people and vendors (classy stuff mostly) and activities for the kids.  Symphony Sunday is really an all day event where local children’s orchestras and community ensembles get an opportunity to perform. There are kids’ activities all day long and it’s a great family affair.  They have special dinners and brunches and so on leading up to the event.

So, “the event” is the evening performance of the WV Symphony followed by a fireworks show.  This year, the theme of the event was “A Pirate’s Symphony”.  Mostly, the performance was comprised of music that sounds like it would be good in a pirate movie…you know eerie stuff that shivers yer timbers and makes you yell “Arrrrrgh”. Indeed, I had a strange craving for rum all evening.  Anyhow, there was one funny song that made me laugh when it began.  They started the song, “Holding out for a Hero“.  Emily asked what movie it came from and I said, “Footloose”.  The kids both immediately chimed in, “Shrek”.  Huh…yup, I guess so.  But I knew the real right answer!

Anyhow, the kids got some ice cream and completely enjoyed the frozen joy from ear to ear!  We sat along the river eating ice cream and talking and listening to the music.  A regular armada of boats anchored in the river and also enjoyed the music.  We dreamed about pirates and the looming attack from all the “ships” waiting to send their crew to land.  It was a perfect night and we had a tremendous time.

Finally, at around 10 o’clock, the barge from which they launch the fireworks moved to the middle of the river as the final songs started.  We watched and waited, not sure which point in the final number would signal the launch.  We had an unimpeded view of the men in the cage on the barge controlling the launch.  As “Stars and Stripes” got midway through, the fireworks kicked off and we were delighted by the sight!  It was magnificent!

So, summer is officially here and we are ready!  Do you have some similar event that you enjoy that signals summer at your place?