Huntsville, AL

What does Huntsville have to do with the following picture? Nothing. But I can't let a school year start without posting a picture of da boys on their first day.

Kevin is in 5th, Cameron is in 2nd, and apparently Cade skipped the rest of his part-time daycare and jumped headfirst into 5th grade with Kevin.

Now, on to Huntsville. Dana and I took a weekend trip to the area to check things out and see if it's a place we'd like to live. I also happened to have an interview at Marshall Space Flight Center. What a coincidence.

If you haven't been there Huntsville, (pronounced Huntsvl) is a lot like Las Cruces in that it's very green, lots of trees and water and high humidity. You know, just like Las Cruces was in the Paleozoic Era. The weather was actually beautiful the first two days we were there (upper 80's with humidity around 35%). I don't know what those whiners are talking about when they say it's hot and stuffy. Piece of cake!

A piddly little pond between Decatur and Huntsvl. Pfft! I've seen bigger bodies of water collecting at the end of my street.

The historic district is really cool. This building is almost as old as our country. If you're ever in the area, you have to go see Harrison Hardware store. It's cool!

Some hot chick I snapped a picture of when Dana wasn't looking.

Me and the hottie! Too bad I didn't use the flash. This was on my birthday too. Happy birthday to me.

Um, yeah. I really don't think I can add anything to this.

Rocket Park at MSFC. The tall one is a Saturn 1B, I believe. At something like 162 feet it's about 1/2 the height of the mighty Saturn V. It's still no Atlantis though. And, I would know that, because, like, I might have kicked the tires and left a noseprint on the window in Atlantis' airlock or something.

Dana had a nice view of the sunset on the way home.

Thanks to Mom & Dad for watching the boys while we were gone. Rest assured, they came home spoiled rotten and wired with sugar.

Summer's End

Doggone it. Summer vacation is officially over. School starts tomorrow. As always, we didn't do half of what we wanted to do this year but we've been cramming trying to get just a little more in right at the end.



I don't have any pictures as cool as what I posted last time (did I mention I sat in the Commander's seat of Atlantis?) so you'll have to bear with me as we slog through our latest update.




Rain is a rare occurrence around here. The boys try to take advantage of it when they can.





Speaking of taking advantage of... Shouldn't the little brother be getting a ride from the big brother?






We borrowed my parents' boat and hit the lake this weekend (Friday actually). The weather was terrific, there was little boat traffic and the lake was calm. Cade started to cry when I started swerving back and forth in the boat until I let him sit in my lap and steer. Then he was giggling like Elmo as we swerved our way up and down the lake.







My boys and me.





Building a sand castle.






The boys and I spent all afternoon on Sunday riding. And goofing around with the camera.


Like Cameron's helmet? He broke the visor a week or two ago and now he has that goon look.

Kevin is slowly getting better and better on his KX. I found a little jump that he likes to do over and over.






Check these out! Kevin took them. He's a natural with a camera.






He even got the crash-in-progress shot.





The rain does wonders for the desert.





Honey, I shrunk our kid.



"I'm gonna pound him!"






Poor Cameron had a rough weekend. He asked me to take this photo to show his wounds. Here's a quick rundown: 1) Chest wound (wound sounds more dramatic than scratch) due to falling on the boat trailer 2) Elbow wound due to eating dirt while out riding 3) Side wound due to little brother playing with and throwing a motorcycle.