REJECTED!!!!!!!

Our phone conversation went something like this:

g-ma: Hi, Drew, do you want to come spend the night at grandma's house?
D-man: No.
(obviously he's not comprehending)
g-ma: Drew, you can pack your suitcase, come spend the night at my house.
D-man: No your house.
(what? Drew usually loves to come over, he really must not be hearing this right.)
D-man: No your house. bye.
Finally Ashley get's the phone, she can explain to him what I'm saying.
g-ma: I'm trying to ask Drew to come spend the night.
Ashley: He has a play date with his friends tonight that he wants to go to.

What? He has friends? And play dates that he remembers? I was rejected for pistol pete's? But I bought you fish to feed....We have Nemo and Cars and popcorn....I even have koolaid that I don't water down when your mom's not watching.

From this moment on, grandma's house will have to compete with his friends. I am crushed.

Happy Birthday, Kara!

Here's Kara with the group

Kara with Charlie

Kara with her mom

Kara with Brad

Kara with the graduate

Kara with presents

We love you, Kara. Thanks for being a part of our family - and our pictures....I hope you have a great day.

I've been thinking a lot this week about Malcolm.

I usually go through my days and weeks having no clue whether A shift or B shift is on, and which shift is he anyway? I know he's told me, I know I can look on the Saginaw Fire Dept. webpage and there's a calendar for the shifts and I could at any time know his schedule. But that's a lot to remember, I just know he's always a phone call away. And I usually don't even think about his job. I've seen the fire house complete with it's cushy reclining chairs, satellite tv, fancy kitchen and bunk rooms with personal computers in them. So that's the image I think of when I think that Malcolm is at work. It's easier to think that.

Until Monday morning when the news was on with stories of flooding in the Fort Worth/Dallas area. Malcolm is on the swift water rescue squad. "Oh, Malcolm, I'm sure you're out there, be careful."

Later that night there was the story of the furniture warehouse fire in North Carolina that killed 9 fire fighters.

Suddenly the reality of Malcolm's job was different.

Malcolm, be careful. I want you to always be a phone call away.

Scotty Graduates!!!

You did it, Scott!

More pictures:

With G&G Mitchell - thanks for coming from Texas!

All of Scott's family support

With G&G Marx

They are a team. Jenn was a supportive sister in Scott's high-school years -- projects, homework assignments, ideas for asking girls to dances, making sure he left the house dressed right... Scott bought a graduation card for Jenn to thank her and even wrote her a little poem:
"Roses are Red
Violets are Blue
You got me a C
And for that I thank you"

Kara's Baby Shower

It was the perfect timing for Brad and Kara to come for a visit. I'm sure they were pretty tired after a week because they had various family activities planned every day. On Tuesday - right in between the two graduations - we all stopped to celebrate the arrival of Baby X in September. Kara's pretty tight-lipped on what her name will be. Since they're big Napoleon Dynamite fans, I'm bracing for Lafonda. Here's a few pictures from her party:

I'm thankful for great-grandmothers. How else would babies stay warm in this world?

Little Baby Girl Marx will be here before you know it, and she will be so well-dressed!

Jennifer got an A


Jenn's big news this week was getting an A in one of her summer school classes. She starts every semester off with "this semester I'm really going to do good in school." Congrats Jenn. There's three summer school sessions, and you really did it on the first session. Keep up the good work in the next two sessions!
These are the BYU Boys as they're called at our house (L-R Chad, Jeff, Tyson, & Shawn). These guys are friends of Jenn's who are here from Utah for summer-only jobs. After seeing their dietary habits during the week, she jumped into Relief Society compassionate service mode and invited them to our family Sunday night dinners.

And finally, Charlie looked especially stunning tonight in her blue polka-dot dress and cute little white shoes:

O.K., O.K....I'LL UPDATE MY BLOG

Sometimes I just get busy, the same as all of you, and I wonder if the day in and day out stuff is interesting. But after three people have commented that I need to update the blog - here's a few pictures from lately.

Scott went to prom with Kayla:

I love seeing them in tuxes - it only happens a few times in life.

Charlie continues to be adorable:

Ron, by accident, has started a new tradition with Drew. Drew stores his tricycle in our garage. He hasn't perfected peddling because I think since he's the oldest, he just hasn't observed anybody peddle anything so he doesn't realize the boost in his mobility that learning this skill will be. Grandpa decided to take Drew on his bike over to the park a couple of blocks away to play. After a few feet Grandpa decided this was going to take a long time and tied a rope to the frame of the bike to pull Drew along faster. Drew thought this was a ton of fun and now begs non-stop to 'go, ride'. I think we need to take him to our neighbor's house, the Roundy's, and let Drew watch their kids riding bikes and he'll get the hang of peddling. When this finally happens, none of us will be able to run fast enough to catch Drew in the neighborhood - so maybe grandpa walking around the block pulling him is o.k. for now! I'll have to get a picture of this in action this weekend.

Scott has had a fun two weeks of final high school activities. Here he is with Devon, a.k.a. Prom King, at the senior bbq. I was only there to take this shot because I was helping grill 450 hamburgers...

Monday is graduation. All of my kids will be graduated, so I guess I will officially be in the 'old' category?? This can't be! Oh, and in other news, a week from tonight I will be at The Police concert - holla!