Welcome to our Family!

In a word, OTIS!



























I'll add the story later, but I had to get these photos up for our extended family!

Nicholas' 8th Birthday

Did you ever have parents with older children tell you, "They grow up so fast..."? Wow, I never fully understood that when I heard it. It seems like just yesterday that we moved to Memphis, and I was holding Nicholas with one arm, or sleeping on the couch with him sleeping right on my chest.

The "little guy" turned 8 this past June 6th, and for the first time, he got to celebrate his birthday at school; on the last day of school no less! What a way to go out!

Here's a slideshow from the birthday festivities, which included a party at school, a best-buddy (Reed) spending the night, and of course, cake & ice-cream at home.

We also celebrated Nick's birthday (41 years young this year) and Father's Day along with Nicholas' birthday, and we got the family a Wii...It's an absolute blast. Our favorite games are Mario Kart Wii, and Speed Racer. The best part is the opening phrase, where Mario and friends sing/say "Mario Kart, Weeeeee" and the kids chime right in with the most gleeful "wee" I've heard.

Princess Camp 2008

Caroline had her first camp experience this summer - she attended a "Princess Camp" here in Memphis! Her Princess Camp was a morning camp, and included everything from "table manners", "charm school", "make-up and hair", "acting their favorite princess role", and finished the camp week with a song and dance they prepared. Absolutely smashing...

The girls were able to earn stickers for positive behavior, and Caroline was none to pleased when she didn't receive one for not singing one day, though she was certain that she did. Needless to say, Queen Mommy had a conversation with the madams at the court, and things were happy ever after from there...

Here's a slideshow from her camp performance, as a young Tinkerbell...

Down! Set! Tune?

If you haven't heard yet, Nicholas is playing tackle football this fall, and in June had his first oboe lesson! What a combination!

He actually asked for oboe lessons in the summer of 2007, but Nick couldn't get him connected with the oboe professor at Memphis, and we put it on the back burner. There's actually a funny story behind this - last summer during music camp, Nicholas would come hang out with me after Coach Cal's basketball camp (basically the late afternoons and evenings). One afternoon, I was working with an African hand-drum ensemble, and I got a picture text on my cell phone - Nicholas in his basketball uniform, leg crossed, playing an oboe in the band office with the rest of the staff. I chuckled, and continued. After rehearsal, I walked down the hall to my office and heard a beautiful "A" on an oboe. I assumed that one of my students was showing Nicholas some stuff on the oboe. When I rounded the corner, it was him!

After several reminders and hints throughout the year, we finally got him a lesson with the oboe professor. I expected a 30-minute lesson, max. I really didn't think he was that interested! 50 minutes later, I had to leave and sign for the music camp pizzas...even later than that, Dr. Vigneau escorted Nicholas downstairs to me...wow!

During his lesson, Dr. V put him through his paces, working on "crowing", posture, putting the instrument together, and producing sounds. He quickly mastered B, A, and G, and after some time added F-sharp, E, and stretched to D. Then, she played a tuning game with him; she produced a tone, and he had to match it (tune with it). She played a B, he played a B, and matched her. She looked at me in disbelief. She played an A, he played an A, and matched her again. She said, "I've never seen anything like this...but let's check some more." She played a G, he played a G, and matched her again. He had to "hunt" for her a bit, but eventually landed right in tune with her. Stunned, she said, "Oh My God! That's never happened in all of my years of teaching! Even my college students couldn't do that when they got here!"

I immediately felt incredibly guilty; I always thought Caroline had all the musical talent. Boy was I wrong! That being said, he sure is excited about his football season as well. He loves to put on his full pads & helmet, and go out in the back yard just to have Dad "pound him". Too much fun...

Praise Team Practice!

Well, not exactly...But, this was a neat moment captured by Karen!

Nicholas was attempting to spend the night at a church camp with some kids from our church & the youth directors just north of Memphis, and Nick agreed to help lead the youngsters in a few songs the next day.

Nick and Caroline were working out their lyrics, among other things, while Caroline enjoyed playing in Nicholas' loft bed. Yes, her microphone is pink with leopard spots, sponsored by Hannah Montana...

Nicholas didn't make it...Nick went to pick him up just before midnight. They did make it back out the next morning, and had a great day. Nick even capsized his canoe, all by himself! Soaked to the bone, shoes & all, with no change of clothes...neat.

Here's a short video of the "Praise Team Rehearsal". Remember, Nick is NOT a pianist...

New Floor!

With the help of a great friend from church, Nick put down new laminate wood flooring in the living room and the hall in mid-June. Over two days, the guys ripped out the old carpet, cleaned the concrete sub-floor, and laid down this beautiful pecan laminate wood flooring...Beautiful!

It's a bit noisy, but lots of fun. Movies & music in the living room have a GREAT sound now, with the added reverb in the room. It was actually easy...

The best part of the new floor is that we can resume the family SOCK-SLIDING competitions held periodically in the household. Nicholas is perhaps the strongest, wildest, most un-graceful sock slider of the clan, but he currently holds the distance and flair records...

Here are some views of the masterpiece!

Camp Calipari, 2008

Nicholas returned to the John Calipari Basketball Camp here at The University of Memphis this past June. He came last year, and had a great time.

This year he worked on dribbling, shooting from the elbow, and competed against LOTS of other boys and even a couple gals.

One of the highlights of the camp is that current and former players on the Memphis Basketball team help coach and work the camp. We've seen Chris Douglas-Roberts, Joey Dorsey, Jeremy Hunt, Robert Dozier, Willie Kemp, Pierre Niles, and Antonio Anderson at camp, along with former NBA great Rod Strickland and of course Coach Cal. Here is a short slideshow of Nicholas posing with Pierre Niles and Robert Dozier. One of my favorite images of Pierre is from the region final this spring in Houston, TX, where Memphis destroyed Michigan State and Texas to advance to the Final Four. Pierre, along with reserve guard Chance McGrady, would lean over to the band and say, "Mr. Band Director! Can you play "We Da Tigers"?" They all loved to dance to that one...

Go Tigers Go!

Spontaneity

I remember the last time Karen was this spontaneous...it was before Nicholas was born, in the spring of 2000 I believe. One Sunday afternoon while relaxing in Greensboro, Karen looked at me and said, "Let's go buy a video camera." So we did...

If you don't know this about Karen, she is a planner. We research everything before we buy it, to get the right product and the best deal possible. Moments of spontaneity are rare, but one came around again Memorial Day weekend...

We were driving to church that Sunday morning, and Karen said, "I wonder if the Braves are in town." It seemed an innocent question; the Braves play 7 hours away in Atlanta, we needed a new tire on the Odyssey to replace one with that had picked up two screws. It turns out the question was not as innocent as I had suspected...Chipper was batting over .400 at that point. Who could miss that? Check out that .420 batting average in this photo...














Once we got home, Karen had to go to work at the clinic, and asked me to check on the Braves. It turned out they have a 1:05 PM game Monday afternoon; about 24 hours from that moment. To pull this off, we had to 1) get a tire replaced on a Sunday afternoon, no less, and 2) get to a Memphis Redbirds game that Sunday night. I helped out the new organist for the Redbirds, and he offered comp tickets to any games. We had tickets waiting for us at Will Call that night...

But, we needed a tire, we needed tickets, and we needed a place to stay. Nick ordered the tickets online, and had to wait for them to be emailed to us...More on that later! We booked a hotel room near Six Flags, and the plans were underway. I called Karen with a report, and she said, "Why don't we let Nicholas skip school on Tuesday and spend a half day at Six Flags?" The hits just kept on coming...Now for a little perspective, I've said that many times throughout the school year, but not for Six Flags. I'm all for Nicholas skipping school to do fun family stuff, even thought that will come back to bite me one day. At this moment, I became the voice of reason, and exclaimed..."Nicholas can't miss school!" To which Karen replied, "why not? It'll be fun!" I was all in at that point...and promptly bought Six Flags tickets online, mostly to seal the deal so there was no turning back.

So, after amazingly locating exactly our tire at a local Sam's Club, off Nick, Nicholas, and Caroline went, and had to kill 2 and 1/2 hours at Sam's getting our tire fixed. We enjoyed reading books in the office chairs, visiting the "cookers" several times, and sitting in the dune buggy...

Finally, with tire replaced, we made it home in time to change clothes, pack the backpack with snacks, and hit the trail for downtown Memphis and the Redbirds game. The plan was to do the Redbirds, watch the fireworks afterwards, and get to bed at a decent hour; to make it to Atlanta in time for the game, we had to be on the road by 5:00 aM at the latest. Normally a Redbirds game is only a couple of hours; this one just happened to be 12 innings! We still stayed...Hey, fireworks are not to be missed! We got to bed between 1:30 and 2:00, and were up again at 4:30, out the door and off to Atlanta...and oh, by the way...we took the Corolla and not the Odyssey, but we still got a new tire! Geeeesh...














In a word...SPONTANIETY!

We did have a truly awesome time, and the Braves beat the Diamondbacks and Brandon Webb that day, which is no small feat. We had a blast at Six Flags the next day, and drove through a severe thunderstorm in Birmingham to make it back by about 10:00 that night. Off to school the next morning for Nicholas...whew!














We have some pictures that are truly priceless...Here's Caroline right before riding her first roller-coaster...














Here is Caroline right after riding her first roller-coaster...














Wonder Woman, Bat Man, and X-Man Jean Gray (the ultimate power) await our SuperHero photo...















Here's a slideshow of all of our pictures over that trip, including different baseball shots, Six Flags shots, and of course, jumping on the hotel beds...



Peace and love to all!