A Surprise Snowy Day

Just recovering from a busy, but terrific weekend here. I was on dorm duty so I was up later than I am used to being up. In my salad days in Gainesville, I was routinely up to silly hours - especially on the weekend. Now, when I am up until about 1 AM or so (as I am on dorm duty nights) I am just wiped out the next day. Since Monday is my normal study hall duty night, whenever I have a weekend of duty, I am up on Friday, Saturday, and Monday night. Since I am getting old, this results in me being tired for a few days. It was a great weekend to be on duty since it was international dinner on Saturday. This event is one of the highlights of the year here. We had students from China cooking all afternoon in our kitchen and the gym hosted tables from 21 countries serving food native to their country. So much fun!

Woke up this morning to a pleasant dusting of snow here. I must admit that I am shocked that I would ever type that previous sentence. The air is still, the light snow fall this morning was actually pretty tranquil. My kids have not inherited my gene that would like to keep snow at a safe distance. Both of them were pretty amused to see the snow this morning and the boy was kicking around in it at the bus stop this morning.

Some highlights of the past few days -
Mo told me that it is very important to go to school. If you don't, your brain will turn to jell-o.
Gram has discovered The Tick on TV. Netflix carries the very odd live-action show. He was devouring this last night.
I was talking to Mo about one of her after school teachers. She told me that this teacher was 'Boss of the Town'

So much for TCB...

So, after a winter break lasting from Dec 20 until Jan 5 we were in school for a total of 1 whole day. Now, due to severe cold  we are out of school for the day.



That's the sad news on the front of my weather.com page.

The sadder part is this picture


Make careful note of the temp in Lake Worth. Sigh…

Time to TCB

Our long, cold holiday is finally coming to a close. We hosted grandmothers from Dec 19 to Jan 1. Since then we have seen temps in the negative (in fahrenheit!), 3 - 6 inches of snow, high winds and now it's raining. Today is a moderate day in the 30s. Tomorrow is due to go from the mid 40s down to the negatives. Yipes! I am not sure I have ever lived through a day with that type of temperature shift.

Took the kids out today for sledding after Gram's basketball game. He's had a good basketball weekend  yanking down rebounds and he scored yesterday (a free throw) and today a field goal. He's on fire!

I'm looking forward to getting back to work after a long stretch off. I need to get disciplined this week and finally get working on my Geometry project. I'm also looking forward to spending some time visiting classes in the next few weeks. We've got a busy January ahead of us. I have two dorm duty weekends, one more home basketball game to do the scoreboard for, a church board meeting, a trip to NC, Gram has 5 more basketball games and 8 practices scheduled this month, and all the normal craziness of life.
Here's a snapshot of the snow we've had.

New Year - New Determination to Communicate

I have spent a good deal of time and energy writing my teacher blog in the past few months and I want to do the same here for the family blog as we move forward. The past few months have seen real sadness and great fun and happiness. The loss of my dad right before Thanksgiving was a sad shock. Below are some photos of his last trip to see the kids in early October. At the time we had no idea he was sick. The next week he found out he had pancreatic cancer and, sadly, it was a fast downhill trip.

Our Christmas holidays have been a grandma-palooza. My mom was here from Dec 19 to Dec 26. My in-laws arrived that night and left this morning. We had a lovely family christmas break. Fun day trip adventures, nice grandma time, spoiled kids, a couple of date nights for me and Beth, and now we are counting down to the beginning of manic daily life. The kids and I start again on Monday and Beth starts tomorrow. My goal is to blog at least once a week to keep a moving diary and to share with anyone who wants to drop by.

Here is a partial photo gallery with pics from my dad's last visit and a charming one of the kids in front of our Christmas tree. More to come.

Catching My Breath

So, I had promised my self I'd post as soon as I returned from FLA with the little one but I let my self be lazy instead. Now that it's August, thoughts are turning toward school already.

The southern trips were good to the Dardy family. Little girl and I went to FLA to see grandparents and friends. We spent time with my parents near the coast and visited the pool and the beach while we were there. Pools are a lot more fun now that the girl is (relatively) self-sufficient there. Give her a floaty vest and she's good to go. Beaches? A little less fun, I must admit. Never was a big beach fan even during the 35 or so years I lived in FLA. I enjoy being near the water and listening to and smelling the water. She had fun there, so it was a good day. We spent time with my mother-in-law as well where my little one got to spend time not only with her grandma there but with some cousins as well. She had a blast and I spent much of the time there catching up with my Gainesville folks. A great couple of days there. Next up was a south FLA trip and a delightful night at the house of our old Boca pal. Back to my folks for the last few nights and an opportunity to catch another baseball game. This time is was Space Coast Stadium. So, for those keeping count, I have now been to four minor league parks this summer and two major league parks. The season's not over yet, so I may be able to add another one to the list.

Photos soon.

Busy July

Our month of adventures (and spending!) continues. We just got settled back home from a weekend in Pittsburgh. What a lovely city it is. We were really impressed. We spent Sunday at PNC Park to see the final game of the first half of the MLB season there and my Mets won the last of the three game set. We originally had outfield seats but we would have melted has we stayed there. Instead we headed up to the 300 section under shade. Here was our view

Those sunny seats in the lower right hand corner of the photo were our assigned seats. Technically there were better than where we sat, but we were comfy and had a great view of the game. Dillon Gee was fantastic and I have now seen the Mets three times this year and they won each time. What's ridiculous about this is that the three years I lived in Jersey I saw them live a total of two times. Really missed out on being a baseball geek during my time there. I guess it's cause I thought it would last longer than it did.

Date Night!

The wife and I were fortunate enough to land an overnight babysitter for our kids (who are not babies anymore!) and we whisked off to Philly for an outdoor concert. The openers were my favorite band Yo La Tengo and the headliners were Belle & Sebastian who are on tour for no particular reason since they have no new songs to back. It was my first time seeing B & S (about my 10th for YLT) and it was a blast. Fun to be out with the wife, beautiful view of the downtown skyline, good beer, good food, GREAT music. Below are a couple of tastes of what we experienced last night.

This is a live version of the last song from YLT's most recent album. The tune is called Before we Run and they played a beautiful version of it last night.

This is a crazy video of Your Cover's Blown one of the highlights of last night's set. There were many.

Woke up super early to drive back home but it was well worth it. Humid, sweaty, bouncy, night of singing, dancing, and clapping along.