All in the family
A very good Wednesday morning to all, at least at the time of this writing....
I want to first say "thanks" to those who have discovered this blog over the past couple of weeks. I have taken note of a much larger group of viewers than previous entries had enjoyed, and I appreciate more people reading and hopefully enjoying these posts. Please feel free to comment as you like.
We just said goodbye to our daughter and her family, as they came to visit a couple of Fridays ago and left last Saturday. I've mentioned here before that this branch of our family tree resides in the Denver, Colorado area, and we used to see them two or three times a year. But between the high cost of air travel, their kids both being school-aged and the fact that I no longer travel by air for my work and collect frequent flier miles to use, those visits are now annual.
And it's probably for the best, as we heard what our "Colorado grandkids" (my colloquialism, not my wife's, as she hates the term "grandkids") are into on a regular basis, over and above being enrolled in a very good and challenging public school. For instance, our granddaughter, who just turned 12 in July and is now as tall as my wife, is playing volleyball on her school team AND will be doing the same for a select group later in the fall. Games and practices for both, and she also has a couple of other extracurricular activities. Our grandson is involved in taekwondo, and really enjoys it. He is now a green belt, but despite frequent playful wrestling during their visit, he did not use any of his expertise on me.
We helped our daughter and her hubby move to Colorado (twice) and they've called it home pretty much since she completed her education. So these visits are very special to us. We learned a few years ago that it works much better not to plan too much or too far ahead. About the only thing we did wrong in that regard is we overbought milk, but we were able to share that with our daughter-in-law for our local grandkids.
I threw a wrench into things when I accepted a new job in late July, so would have been off work for the week they were here. But I was able to shuffle my schedule a bit and ensure that I didn't miss anything really good, as my new boss was very quick to say "family comes first" and that meant a great deal. So we attended two volleyball matches featuring the nationally ranked University of Kentucky team (they won both), the visiting party shopped for UK souvenirs and saw some of the local sights, enjoyed some good family meals and capped things off with a great dinner at a local restaurant, celebrating two grandchildren's birthdays (our "local" granddaughter and our Colorado grandson).
The most amusing aspect of all of this is watching my wife, who again had people in the house to care for (apparently I'm not enough of a challenge!). She does this routinely for our son and his family, helping them keep up with laundry and housecleaning and picking up their kids after school. But she was in her element with our daughter and her gang visiting, cooking breakfast and serving lunch most every day (I handled dinners that we had here at home) and just generally taking care of everyone.
So we miss them, certainly, and while we'll see them on FaceTime and on the phone and via messages, it's just never the same. Suppose absence really does make the heart grow fonder.
I want to first say "thanks" to those who have discovered this blog over the past couple of weeks. I have taken note of a much larger group of viewers than previous entries had enjoyed, and I appreciate more people reading and hopefully enjoying these posts. Please feel free to comment as you like.
We just said goodbye to our daughter and her family, as they came to visit a couple of Fridays ago and left last Saturday. I've mentioned here before that this branch of our family tree resides in the Denver, Colorado area, and we used to see them two or three times a year. But between the high cost of air travel, their kids both being school-aged and the fact that I no longer travel by air for my work and collect frequent flier miles to use, those visits are now annual.
And it's probably for the best, as we heard what our "Colorado grandkids" (my colloquialism, not my wife's, as she hates the term "grandkids") are into on a regular basis, over and above being enrolled in a very good and challenging public school. For instance, our granddaughter, who just turned 12 in July and is now as tall as my wife, is playing volleyball on her school team AND will be doing the same for a select group later in the fall. Games and practices for both, and she also has a couple of other extracurricular activities. Our grandson is involved in taekwondo, and really enjoys it. He is now a green belt, but despite frequent playful wrestling during their visit, he did not use any of his expertise on me.
We helped our daughter and her hubby move to Colorado (twice) and they've called it home pretty much since she completed her education. So these visits are very special to us. We learned a few years ago that it works much better not to plan too much or too far ahead. About the only thing we did wrong in that regard is we overbought milk, but we were able to share that with our daughter-in-law for our local grandkids.
I threw a wrench into things when I accepted a new job in late July, so would have been off work for the week they were here. But I was able to shuffle my schedule a bit and ensure that I didn't miss anything really good, as my new boss was very quick to say "family comes first" and that meant a great deal. So we attended two volleyball matches featuring the nationally ranked University of Kentucky team (they won both), the visiting party shopped for UK souvenirs and saw some of the local sights, enjoyed some good family meals and capped things off with a great dinner at a local restaurant, celebrating two grandchildren's birthdays (our "local" granddaughter and our Colorado grandson).
The most amusing aspect of all of this is watching my wife, who again had people in the house to care for (apparently I'm not enough of a challenge!). She does this routinely for our son and his family, helping them keep up with laundry and housecleaning and picking up their kids after school. But she was in her element with our daughter and her gang visiting, cooking breakfast and serving lunch most every day (I handled dinners that we had here at home) and just generally taking care of everyone.
So we miss them, certainly, and while we'll see them on FaceTime and on the phone and via messages, it's just never the same. Suppose absence really does make the heart grow fonder.
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