It was a happy stomping out the snakes day.

I know, I know, St. Patrick didn’t really drive snakes out of Ireland but it makes for a good story. We aren’t much of a beer drinking crowd  and we had to find some way of celebrating the holiday in honor of our potato famine fleeing genes and snake eliminating seemed as good as any. Well not so much my genes but Clint’s genes are very Irish. He did some research on ancestry.com and discovered to no great surprise that  he is pretty much all Irish on his dad’s side with the family migrating over to escape the potato famine. He was surprised to find some Irish on my mother’s side but a bit farther back. At any rate with a last name like Conley one must honor the holiday. We did it by hunting for green  in the freshly sprouting gardens and driving the snakes out of our yard. Well not really- it is still to cold for snakes but like the St. Pat’s day legend- it makes for a good story. Caelun Rhy Conley enjoyed every bit of his Irish heritage rousting about for non-existent snakes. Come look around – I promise no snakes are to be had- we drove them all away (wink)

 

Okay – lets get rid of those snakes!

 

 

None under the ball.

    Let’s check the sand box.

 

 

 

       

None here either.

 

Still none.

 

Well mom – we looked and looked and no snakes but we did see lots of green turning up outside. Time to come in and get a bath. It was a fun St. Patrick’s Day- snakes or no.

4N6 Nerds- Yep that’s us.

Another Saturday, another forensics tournament, and thanks to some really hard working students another set of trophies. Andy in extemp was again on the podium and a new face Jen broke to semis. We also had Devan and Erin – not pictured because they had to leave before awards. We again won first place sweeps. Three first place sweepstakes three weekends in a row I hardly know what to think. I am just incredibly proud of these very smart, hard working kids.

   

Andy on the post sheet for final round.

We gather in the auditorium.

    

Again the extempers line up by height and of course our wonderful Andy is the tallest.
and the trophy goes to…

Yea for us!

A visit from Grandma Webster and Aunt Jodie.

My wonderful mother in law Rita and my sister in law Jodie stopped in for a visit to get some face time with the kids. As soon as I got the camera out Caelun started to pose. It is the funniest darn thing. He just loves to have his picture taken. Abbi is just the opposite. As soon as the camera came out she tried to scoot out of the picture. She had one of her rats in her lap and that is the only thing that let me get her picture at all. Enjoy the goofy kids.

 

Love you Aunt Jodie :-)

Caelun LOVES to count. EVERYTHING right now MUST be counted. He counted how many of us were sitting in the living room going from person to person giving us a number.

You will notice Miss Kitty on the back of the couch is paying no attention to us.

“Hello World!” yep that is Cae-Cae.    

Did you ever wish you had a hairless rat? How about 2?

My dear daughter’s rat Chessie died and in his place she got 2 hairless rats named Izzy and Iggbie. As she told me they are so ugly they  are cute. I am not sure that I agree but beauty has never been a requirement to enter our family so welcome little hairless rats may you live long and prosper.

         

Abbi giving snuggles and showing them off.

      

That is what a hairless rat tush looks like- aren’t you glad you scrolled down for  that?

         

Want a nibble?

My mother turns 74

This post is a bit on the late side as my mother’s birthday was in early February but better late than never. I made her favorites and requests for dinner. We had peel and eat shrimp, baked salmon, salad, assorted vegetables and per her request home made blueberry pie rather than cake. Caelun loved the shrimp- go figure. At one point I was finishing  dinner and he and his grandma were both just snuggled up to the shrimp, elbow and match box cars deep in cocktail sauce. We  a nice day and enjoyed some good company and good food. As my grandmother would say “come sit a spell’ and share some pie. Happy birthday Grandma Del.

 

Everyone seemed to enjoy dinner.

Who knew plastic cars are good with cocktail sauce?

 

Okay Grandma make a wish.

Happy Birthday Del!

Forensics – the fear of NOT speaking in public.

      We had another good weekend of forensics competition at Portage Northern HS. Andy my extemper had a semi-final round break and Talya took 2nd for the whole tourney in oratory including beating last years state champ. Once again the combined efforts of the team won us a 1st place sweepstakes team award. Way to go Andy, Talya, Rachel, Alecia, and Caden!

Looking down the hall where the informative speeches are being preformed.

 

Where else in America would you find a teenager in a kilt but at a forensics competition?

 

Our little band waiting for awards.

and the trophy goes to…

 

Talya!

Go team!

KCTC open house

Clint teaches for Kent Career Technical Center and twice a year they hold an open house. The purpose of the open house is for current students to get an opportunity to strut their stuff academically speaking regarding their new found skills and for prospective students to have a look and decide if any of the programs pique their interest. It is a nice opportunity for Abbi to have a look see at the various programs and for both the kids to have a look around at where their dad works. The culinary program also makes some wonderful cookies that both the kids LOVE. That alone would almost be enough to make the trip. Our neighbor “Grandma Amy” -who is a nurse- got Caelun a little set of medical scrubs as a shower present. This is the perfect opportunity to show them off and fit right in with the rest of the health careers staff. Come have a look around and maybe if you are lucky one of the kids will share a cookie.

  Welcome to dad’s room.

And Caelun is off…

Gosh dad – your lab is cool!

COOKIES!!!!!

Look it is an actual air plane! One of the programs is aviation maintenance.

 

   Loving those cookies!

At the end back in dad’s office outside his lab.