Boydee playing in the sandbox

Boydee enjoying the nice weather at the Abasolo's house on Memorial Day weekend...

The plate

Here Evey is with the plate she painted at Sunfire Ceramics the other day!

Will and Seth... old as hell

 

Saw one Will Baxter on Tuesday night. Here is photographic evidence.

This was taken at Wade and Katie's place, after a night of heavy drinking. That's why we look like hell. (And because we're old as hell.)

The framing of this photo I can't quite explain, but, whatever. I do appreciate Ed Von Feldt snapping us before I left.

Will is back in town (well, America) from Cambodia. It had been three-and-a-half years since I had seen him. He is staying for the week in Chicago with his brother, so I added the drive to Chicago onto the tale end of a business trip to Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

It made for a long couple days of driving... but Crikey, when your college roommate lives halfway across the world, you make a trip to Chicago to have a few beers when he's back in the States.

Of course, it was also great to see Wade, Katie, Pat, Katie and the kids -- Rory and Blake. The girls even made me a nice card and shouted "Uncle Seth is here!!!" when I knocked on the door. That was sweet.

Hopefully it's not another three-plus years before I get to hang with Will again. Good to see you, W.B.

Saw Grandma Joyce

Great seeing my grandma Joyce over the Memorial Day holiday. She is the only grandparent I have left. Her age is catching up with her but she is still as friendly as ever. She can't stop telling me how beautiful my two children are and I have to agree with her!

Evey is in a SILLY mood!

At Gambino's for lunch... Too much shake-shake!

Boydee learns to walk

This is old... if my computer is to be trusted, this was shot on January 18th of this year. Boydee started walking while I was in Daytona Beach at a conference. As soon as I got home, I wanted a demonstration, and this is what we saw... shot on my iPhone...

I see daddy do this all day

Clearly, it's not very hard.

That's a wrap!

Soccer season ended on Saturday! Whoo-hoo! Our first winning season!

The Eudora Eagles (named by Evey, all the team got to come up with a name, luck had it we pulled her name out of the hat) got off to a soaring start, going undefeated in their first five games of the season. But then some bad luck, a few bad calls, and a couple nagging injuries down the stretch* cost us the last two games, and we finished the season 5-2.

I was the head coach, our assistant was Brandon. We brought back almost the exact same team from last fall (we lost one kid, and got one new kid). That team went 1-6 last season. So to get to 5-2 was a huge improvement.

The kids drove me crazy at times. It's hard to wrangle a group of 6-, 5- and 4-year-olds. But they were overall a fun group. I know I enjoyed coaching Evey. Heck, I enjoyed coaching most of them.

Evey's season was solid. It was hindered a bit when she fell off the money bars at school... it took her a few weeks to get back on track after that. Her best game was two weeks ago when I gave her a little pep talk on the ride to the field. I told her to play aggressive, and that I wanted her to get no less than 10 kicks on the ball and two shots on goal.

Out of nowhere she accomplished both, in the first quarter! Both shots were good, one hit the post, the other was stopped by the goalie. She didn't score a goal this year, but in all, I think only three different kids scored for our team anyway, so it was a hard year to get the ball in the net for most of the team.

Evey did play some goalie for us, and she did a nice job as GK. But I do think in the field she lost a little of her aggressiveness that she's showed me in previous seasons. It might be because the boys have gotten a little bigger, it might be because she was a step slower with her hurt arm, I don't know. But we'll work together and get back that aggressiveness.

I'm happy to have Saturday mornings back, and I'm happy to not have to worry about practices on Mondays. But I will miss kicking it around with the kids, especially Evey.

But we'll be back for more in the fall!

EAGLES!!!

*I'm joking, of course, but we could have won the last two games as well... we were outplayed a little, and had too many shots hit the post this season. Plus, we had a few deadbeat goalies, and my policy is to let anyone who wants to play goalie get a quarter...

Happy Mother's Day!

Evey and Adro at the kindergarten field trip to the Topeka zoo two weeks ago.

Happy Mother's Day to all of the moms out there, and especially to the mom of my two beautiful children!

Adro wanted to have a relaxing day gardening, and that's what she got. She also got a barbecue dinner, a few backyard beers hand-delivered and an extended back rub at bed time. Oh, and she also got some funny money for the casino on Saturday. Overall, I think she enjoyed her mother's day.

Evelyn, on the other hand, got a little sick of mother's day. She thought mother's day was last Thursday, when they had a program at the school for all the moms. She was ready for an "Evelyn Day," which she doesn't realize, is actually every day.

I called my mom and talked to her but did not get to see her. She sounded well, though, she had a wedding she went to on Saturday night. I think I'll take her out to the casino the next time she's in town... mom asked that me and sis not spend any money on flowers this year.

I called Grandma JoJo but no answer. I called Bea and got to chat with her for about 10 minutes. She sounded well. I texted Jess and wished her a good one. And Judy was there to enjoy the barbecue with us. So I think I almost got all of the moms covered, except for my grandma.

Happy day, mommas!

Happy birthday, old man!

This is the Jones family on my 36th birthday. Look how happy Evey is!