A Method To My Madness

I am considering hiring someone to follow me around, with one of those weird little voice recorders,
and then having them type up whatever I tell them to so that I can post more regularly on this here blog.
I just can't seem to get the hang of doing it regularly.
Time.
Time is what I blame.
Oh you ever marching, steady trodding, long pause ignoring, crusher of creativity & freedom.
Phewph!
That feels better....eeep!
Except it took a whole 17 seconds to type that....Arggh!

I will not freak out...

I will not freak out...

I will not freak out...

Here is what you may have missed out on since my imaginary personal voice recording assistant is falling down on her imaginary job...

A trip to Nashanoogida. (That's weird talk for I flew to Nashville, stopped by Chattanooga, drove to Florida, and back again).

It was um...interesting.

I must say that my baby-sister-in-law knows what she is talking about when a quartet of people who share a last name & a childhood, get together and plan a visit to their family in Florida. One should heed baby-sis-in-law's words when she says "we will be exhausted from all that driving, we should fly".

She was right, we were exhausted.

Upon reflection I personally was glad for the slow change of the scenery from South to Southerist, the time to think about the last time I was there and when I had last seen each person I was going to be seeing. I figured it had been about 20 years since I had been to Florida. I was surprised at how much it felt like Papua New Guinea, because of the palm trees, the humidity, the nudity, & the bouganvilla. It was beautiful, and the weather was just perfect.

Since time is ticking & the only words the imaginary flaky assistant wrote down are technically "not suitable for children", I will show you photos & skimp on the verbage.

An Easter meal shared with Julie's group of girlfriends in Nashville

Adventures in van repair before a long trip

Delightful & delicious coffee dates with tall, dark & handsome men who may or may not be related to me

his shirt says "ctrl z" & the sign below says "Lost Weekend Dark"

A surprise visit with our adopted Aunt Doris & Uncle Mac just one month before they headed back to Papua New Guinea

Unexpected chances to enjoy Southern hospitality...

...& to intrude on epic 30th Birthdays!

Introducing old adorable friends to new adorable nephews

Speaking of adorable nephews, I found a photo that pretty much sums up the trip.

Every morning Tim & Jill would send a text when they & Little Dub were awake, so one of us could go get him & play with him. Of course, "one of us" actually was more like "3 or 4 of us" scrambling past each other to get to the kid first.

Yes. We are so so gone.
All of us.
It's really rather pathetic.
And yet, I just love that this little person has a solid crew of people that love & delight in him. Between us & the Kimmels our little man has got love & delight coming out the ying yang. So far he seems fine...we on the other hand may need a shower.

While sightseeing in Florida, here is what was seen:

a wild beach baby kissing (or possibly eating) it's mother

2 fairly tame sisters sporting amazing Rocker Style

A lovely famous couple trying unsuccessfully to avoid the paparazzi...

...and their special sister.
hand models

or 3 almost identical hands from 3 different generations (mine, my Aunt Linda's, & her grandaughter Lily's). Here's something weird; Lily looks almost exactly like I did as a child, and we both look almost exactly like my Aunt Linda did. Tim kept laughing and commenting on how wild I was as a kid when we would see Lily do something funny. Weird? Yes. But not as weird as me choosing to take a photo of our hands instead of our faces to show the similarities.

Now that my friends, is weird.

After the sightseeing we had a Family barbecue at my Dad & his wife Donna's house. We got to see my Papa & his wife, Grandma Kaye, Aunt Linda, my cousin-in-law Jocelyn and her five beautiful kids. I especially enjoyed the time spent with Haley, Jaelyn, Ty, Cole & Lily. I see a little bit of my cousin Justin in each of them. Jocelyn made a point of telling us which part of each kid was like their dad. I almost cried when she told me, so grateful that she has that to give them, something shared with their father. It made his death seem more real somehow, to see them so alive and a little bit wild, like little Justin's running around...and the only thing missing was him. That was probably the highlight for me - time with those kids.

Here's a photo of us kids & my Dad & Donna.

It was good to be able to see for ourselves that he was doing ok after his health scare.

We also drove to see Uncle Gary & Aunt Mary Lu.

my heart was stirred to see old photos of us in their home realizing that we are loved even though we don't live close by. We wished we could have had more time.

But with Jill & a sick Little Dub flying back to Chattanooga, the stragglers had to head out by van quickly so as to not have to spend any time separated from this

He (& Jill) were such troopers for the trip. He was running a fever off & on the whole time & was stuck in a carseat for way too long stretches, and still he wanted to be happy. It was heartwrenching & sweet.

Once back in Chattanooga we rested & took family photos...