the artist

my nephew is a budding artist. he is able to express his feelings and emotions through the classy world of fine art. his mode of choice is through the lens of a camera. behold, to the left, his first masterpiece. it is called: 'dads butt'.
i think he has a bright future ahead of him...

a wedding

about a week and a half ago a friend of mine got married. the day before the wedding i got a call from ali asking me if i would mind picking her up for the wedding. and boy, am i glad she called!!! i am currently in total summer mode, which means that days and dates are meaningless to me- every day is saturday! i am thankful that she called, because if she hadnt i would have totally forgotten about the wedding! it probably would have been five or six days later and i would have been like 'huh, i wonder when that wedding is?' and i would have totally missed it!
anyway, it was a really good time and we had a lot of fun. it was also cool because the church they got married in was the church that my dad grew up in! oh what a small world...

a fun day out

last week i got to hang out with some of my kids. the 'why' of this story is far too complicated, so ill just skip that part.

i picked them up and the four of us went mini golfing. it was alot of fun- those guys are a blast to be around. of course we followed the standard rules of mini golfing: you may not use real names while on the course. i didnt make up the rules, i just live by them (actually, i think i did make that one up...). after a good 18, we walked over the the ice cream shop. i told the boys that they could get whatever they wanted- cub decided that meant he could get three scoops on his cone. the end result was about the size of his head! but, ever the trooper, he worked his way through the whole thing. at the ice cream shop there is a chess board, so we decided to play checkers (much cooler than chess), and we even played a few games with 'calvin ball' rules (if you are familiar with 'calvin and hobbes' you should get that reference...) we had a great time. afterward we went to go see the movie 'surfs up' and really enjoyed it. by the time it was done, the kids had to be heading home (they had little league games to get to, after all). it was a very fun time, and a great chance to see some of the kids over the summer. i will be doing it again soon with another set of kids. im looking forward to it.

time with the kids

last weekend i was still in michigan, and i got to spend some more time with my sisters kids. i went over there in the afternoon when the kids were still sleeping because my sister wanted to learn how to set up her own blog (i would link to it, but i think she wants to keep it quite for now...). after we got that rolling, the kids started waking up and i had a chance to play with them. they are getting so big! i only get to see them once a month or so, and sometimes i forget how much they grow over that time! jackson started vacation bible school that week, and was having a great time at it. mhy sister said he got even more into it as the week went on.

best laid plans...

its summer time!!! ive been done with work for about a week and a half and it has been great! i seem to be back to my old ways already (staying up late, sleeping in late...), but other than that this summer has been anything but ordinary. my plans for (temporary) employment didnt quite pan out, a close friend had a big life change which lead to me heading up to michigan to be a good supportive friend, and a few other crazy type things too. im not complaining, its been good, just not what i was expecting.

adams visit (friday)

friday morning came up fast on us (i guess thats what happens when you go to bed around 2:30am), but we headed out and adam came with me to school. he had a storytelling gig that night, and we was going to be doing some new material. i offered him the chance to practice in front of a real audience, and he took it! so all morning my students got to sit back and enjoy the storytelling stylings of good ol' adam. and boy, did they love it!!! the kids really enjoyed it and adam felt better after being able to perform the new stuff a bit.
in the evening we headed off to the gig. it was kind of wierd because it was a junior/senior banquet. everyone was high school aged, and dressed all fancy shmancy. we sat with the two teachers who helped plan it during the meal. it was good company, and great conversation- and a welcome distraction for adam who was still a bit anxious about how the new stuff would go over.
when he got up there it was just as i suspected: a hit! all that worry for nothing. the kids warmed up to him fairly quickly, and by the time he got to the story that needed students to come up and act it out (with all the football jock types in dresses, of course), he had them eating out of his hand!
after his performance we headed home to change clothes, and we later met up with the people who had planned the event and hung out with them for the night. it was a great time and a chance to meet some new people.