Golf

Our kids dig it.  Amelia and Dylan have been taking lessons with Coach Mike at the Ken McDonald course for sometime now.  They have their own little sets of clubs and a collection of collared polo shirts to boot.  Every year, Evan takes Dylan to the Phoenix Open and Amelia to the LPGA.  It's kind of their thing.  Evan is excellent at taking pictures with his phone and sending them to me.  I am terrible at remembering to download them and put them on this blog.  Today excepting.

Below is Amelia watching Belen Mizo of Italy.  Amelia wanted to follow her through the tournament because, "She is pretty and she's wearing a cool outfit." And Amelia was rewarded for her somewhat shallow pursuit by receiving a golf ball from Belen.

That's three for three.  The last three years that she and Evan have attended the LPGA, she gets a golf ball from one of the "golf girls," as she fondly refers to them.

P.S. Evan's pipe dream: Amelia is someday one of those golf girls.

March Madness part 2

Phil and Jessica were married on March 30th at Rustler's Rooste.  And Jessica invited the three flower-girl-age princesses to be part of her wedding party.  Amelia was ecstatic.  

Here they are (Amelia, Brooklyn, and Chloe) all dolled up and looking out the hotel room window with their ringleted locks.  Surprisingly, they each sat very still and waited patiently for each curl to be formed.  (The moms worked fast...)

The best photo I took all weekend...

Amelia had a horrible blister on her toe by the end of the day, but she walked out, once again with the wedding party and braved the pain.  Then she burst into tears when she found me.  We covered her foot in bandages and she went barefoot for some of the night.   She reported that she would not be afraid to dance in front of of people and...

she wasn't.  

It was quite a night for Amelia.

Dylan was a little bummed that he didn't get to wear a matching outfit with his dad like Amelia did, so I made sure that he and Simon and I matched each other with our navy blue ensembles.  He liked that.

Evan performed the marriage.  It was an awesome experience.  

And then he got down with his robot...

I love dancing, but Simon protested with wild screams any time I neared the dance floor and wouldn't let me put him down.  So I took a picture of the two of us standing by watching everyone bust a move.

Then there was Easter Sunday at my parents' house, the final leg of the weekend.  I didn't get out my camera to take any egg hunting photos.  Josh did that, so hopefully, we'll have a few shots eventually.

This is a favorite activity for the grand kids: the basket drop.  I am fairly certain that Kassie gets credit for its initial construction  The game consists of tying a jump rope to a basket and lowering it down to cousins who wait below.  Into it they put all sorts of surprises and then the basket goes back up.  You might be surprised how long the kids can do this. 

Clark waited for his turn...

Dylan and sundry boys deciding what to put in the basket... 

Jacob, close-up and blurry (but still photogenic).

Jared, close-up 

Jared, close-up with candy 

I look at this picture and stop wondering why everyone thinks I am older than my sister.  Shiny skin, large pores? That would be me, not Deb, even though she is older by two and a half years. 

Time to to change activities... Here's my mom who has successfully encouraged at least one grandchild to sing while she plays the piano.  The rest quickly disappeared... 

And, yes, she is wearing two sets of glasses instead of bifocals.  That's my mom.

Kassie after singing...

Katherine and JD...

Mark...

Oliver... 

Waiting for the basket again...

 

  In the end, there was a three-day mess to clean up, which took the efforts of several adults to tackle.

Bryan cleaning up the gloves...

Clark getting water...

 Evan cleaning up...

Josh cleaning up...

And I took a few pictures...

Well, only for a bit.  Then I dug in as well.  

One Wild March Weekend part 1

It all started with a visit from my brother Lee, his wife Katherine and their four kids for a few days.  Toss in a wedding where Phil, Evan's brother, and Jessica were to be married, family pictures, wedding festivities and the Easter holiday and you have one insanely fun, but busy weekend.

Amelia and Kassie have a great deal in common.

Lee tossed balls to whatever kids had a bat and they whacked them all over the yard.

Tommy would not smile when I tried to take his picture.  So I got this...

And this...

And this...

And, finally, this...

 Then there was a game of backyard trampoline basketball in which players shoot from the concrete court,

The trampoline...

Or the trampoline while you are bouncing and your cousin is running back and forth in front of you...

Here's Simon relishing in 4 seconds of individual trampoline time...

And Katherine and JD who wisely stayed indoors while the crazy children ruled the back yard...

Here's Mark sporting his family picture duds...

And Samantha with a little left over lunch...

 Because I had the camera out, I made another record of Dylan's snaggled grill.

   

And we had to chuckle at the matching hand-me-down pajamas which were not only identical, put procured from two entirely different sources.

We took a Richardson (my side) family photo on Friday evening and then rushed over to a park in Mesa for a pre-wedding gathering to have a picnic and meet all the rest of Jessica's family before the big day.  I took no pictures of this, sadly.

I'm going to blame the lack of sunlight for my oversight.