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| Colton, Caroline (Destry's girlfriend), Destry, Tom, me, Dad, Martin, Martha, Donna, Craig |
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| Jumping for joy with Martha and Donna (Corny, I know. Couldn't help myself). |
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| Not to be outdone by the sisters . . . . Colton, Donna (got in on both acts), Destry, Caroline |
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| Combining the best of two cultures. Hola NOLA for sure! Courtesy of Donna. |
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| When we were in Shreveport this past weekend (March 24, 2018), Martha shared some old photos with me. She and Craig took Ryder, age 5, with them to see my parents in London for Christmas 1984. Dad was there with Murphy Oil, which was involved in drilling in the North Sea. |
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| Ryder, Martha, and Craig at Broadwater, the house on the Thames, where Mom and Dad lived. |
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| Ryder and Mom |
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| Ryder with a bobby |
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| Spring 1979: Dad, Charles, Donna, Mom and Ryder, Martha, me. Colton saw the photo and teased me about my safety glasses. I promise you, that was the style in 1979. |
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| October 1979: Ryder (7 mos) chillin' with Dad. |
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| Fox fights for Spiderman's candy. |
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| Papa Tom tried the jousting method. |
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| Still trickles of candy. After this, Amon's whack sent candy showering all over the back yard! |
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| Happy 7, Fox. She didn't want candles on her cake. |
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| Fox cut pieces for all of us. |
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If you saw her on the playground, would you guess she's a first grader?
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| I'm up on the railing for a reason. Don't you see that dog in our yard? |
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| She's over there! |
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| It's Juno! She lives a block away and can somehow climb the chain link fence in her back yard whenever she wants to have an adventure. |
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| She's very friendly. We invited her inside and she went straight for the cat food! |
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| Luckily Juno's phone number is on her tag. She hitched a ride home with her owner. |
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| The Invest Collegiate Imagination (ICI) charter school team placed second in the Destination Imagination competition and first in the instant challenge part of the competition. They wrote and acted in their own play, creating their own costumes and set. Go She-wolves! |
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| Jim concentrates on his art project. |
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| I offered Lucy a marshmallow, and she requested a s'more. Luckily, found graham crackers and chocolate to go with the marshmallows. |
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| Horseplay with Jake, Lucy, Uncle Tom, and Jim. |
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| Jake, Aunt Sharon, and Lucy |
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| We only made one day of the 9-day SXSW activities this year. So much creativity, sunshine, energy. |
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| Music, music everywhere. Literally on street corners and in parking lots. |
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| Hybrid of online/in person dating. |
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| This all girls band's rendition of Nancy Sinatra's "These Boots Were Made for Walking" included boots taking a walk on a Trump pinata. |
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| The day's highlight for me was catching the blues showcase at Kenny Dorham's Backyard, a food trailer court, on East 11th. Anthony Wright plays as well as Stevie Ray Vaughn did. |
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| As is our tradition, we started the festivities with lunch at Guerros on South Congress. |
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| Here's Anthony Wright, meandering through the crowd. Weird to hear his hot licks screaming from the speakers on the stage instead of from the guitar in his hands. |
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| Poinsettias, sprinkled with raindrops, still think it's Christmas. |
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| The calla lilies are sturdier than they appear. |
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| The lilies and daffodils will wilt in the summer heat, but the cyclamen and mint will thrive. |
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| Papa Tom prepared the garden plot with amended soil in anticipation of juicy red tomatoes and crisp sweet bell peppers by June. |
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| About 18 tomato plants are in. We'll be delivering home grown tomatoes to you by this summer. |
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| We're raising ladybugs for the garden in their very own Ladybug Land. Are all ladybugs girls? Do the gentleman bugs mind being called ladybugs? Right now, they're in the phase third from the left. |
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| Our Painted Lady butterfly caterpillars are starting to cocoon. |
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| The Brentwood Elementary kids held a storybook parade on Friday, March 9. Fox went as Stellaluna, using the cap and cape Anjanette used when she was in a storybook parade as a child. |
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| The day before our trip to Asheville, Super Fox helped Papa remove a tree. With lots of supervision, of course! |
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| So happy that Mama and Daddy are on their way home from Florida! Hard to tell from the photo, but Mya and River are standing on the outside of the staircase overlooking the dining room. Don't worry! They're hanging on to the railing. |
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| I went with Mya to her Destination Imagination meeting on Saturday. The team of girls has written their own play, and will perform it at the Destination Imagination competition in March. Here, Mya works on the set. Destination Imagination is a volunteer-led, educational non-profit organization that teaches 21st century skills and STEM principles to kindergarten through university level students through creative and collaborative problem solving challenges. |
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| Later, Mya went to a friend's birthday/costume party. She's an Austin bat! |
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| Meanwhile, Papa Tom and River bounced on the trampoline. |
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| The movie night features were "The Odd Squad" and pizza, of course, with Mimi. Mya finally lost that canine that had been hanging by a thread. Yea! |
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| Piper accessorized for the movie, complete with her Frozen high heels. |
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| Bedtime story with Papa |
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| We dropped the kids off at school and pre-school Friday morning. Many, many thanks to Mimi for picking them up, giving us time to tour the Biltmore House and make a stop at One World Brewing. You walk down an alley to this nondescript door. Did we need a password? No. But we had to walk down a few flights of stairs into a dark basement. The building used to be a department store and is now apartments above and One World below. |
