Justin and Tom's Excellent Adventure

Justin left for school last week. He and Samantha packed all his stuff into his car, and there was still room left!

Neal wanted to go too. "I'll drive the first leg" he said.
And off they go! They left Strafford at 9am Wednesday and arrived in Tuscaloosa, AL at 6:15pm EDT Thursday.

Bama Bound!

Justin and I attended Orientation at U of Alabama last week, and I have to say, the boy chose well! It's an absolutely beautiful campus and there is tremendous spirit and pride there. I'll share a few snapshots with you but I did not do the school justice.

This is the Student Recreation Center. This is about a quarter of the building. It has 100+ cardio machines, 100+ weight machines, an indoor lap pool, an outdoor pool with a water slide (think Water Country) and a lazy river, 8 full size basketball courts, a climbing wall, etc., etc.
This is looking across "The Quad". Again, this only represents a fraction of it's size. We are standing on Capstone Dr facing University Bld. For refernece, the Football Stadium is about a half-mile ahead and to the right.

Home Sweet Home :-) This is Paty Hall where Justin will live. Coincidentally it also houses the package delivery center, so he will only need to go downstairs to collect his care packages. Unless we use USPS. In that case he will have to go to the Student Center where there is a full fledged and service US Post Office!

This is the main entrance of Shelby Hall which houses the School of Engineering. I was able to go with him to meet a representative from Engineering to begin course selection for the fall. The lecture room we were in was very up to date, and intimate enough to encourage discussion in class.
The visit was fantastic. He's excited for his future. I can't believe he leaves in two weeks!

Slip Sliding Away

Look out below!

Wheeee!!!

Strikin' a pose

Geronimo!

This is what summer vacation is supposed to be! Friends and Fun!

Here are the details on the Supertronic Slip-N-Slide 2009..... A 3' X 50' piece of plastic from Home Depot, rocks from the yard to anchor the ends, the hill at my house and the garden hose from the garage because Mr. Peterson HAD to have a hot water spicket too to wash cars year round, and a little dish soap to really get things moving. Add it all together and it equals BIG FUN!

NHYLA Festival

NHYLA had it's annual year end festival this past weekend. All the youth teams from NH are invited to participate and put into brackets of teams with similar win/loss records. Chandler's team lost every regular season game. Some were close, others not so much. So it was AWESOME that they won BOTH of their games in the festival. Even more impressive is that they were the only team to play their games back to back and they had 5 minutes between games to change fields! Hard work and a "Can Do" attitude really do pay off.

Did I mention that it was also World Wide Knit in Public Day? (No, I did not make that up, it truly exists) Guess what I was doing during the games?

Justin's Graduation Party

This weekend we celebrated Justin's graduation from High School. It was a great day filled with lots of friends and family. Thank you to everyone who shared it with us!

Fun Times in the Backyard

It's all fun and games until you want to come in the house and Mom makes you have a bath! But I'd do it again in a heartbeat.
Luv, Emma

Justin's Baccalaureate

It's a big week this week at our house. Justin graduates! Baccalaureate was tonight. At Coe Brown Northwood Academy it is an evening celebrating the success of the class as a group and individuals. All of the students are introduced by the headmaster and their plans for next year are announced. It is also a time to showcase the many talents of the graduating class. Although there are some very bright kids in Justin's class, what stood out tonight was their amazing artistic talents. The band played a beautiful selection, the chorus sang a very moving piece, and the select choir brought tears to my eyes with their rendition of The Star Spangled Banner. But what was truly amazing was the art. In a word....... stunning. This group of kids has crazy talent for capturing their world in every media imaginable. I would love to send you to the school web page to view their work, but the class of 2009 has not been posted yet. This is Justin being introduced. His plans for next year are to attend the University of Alabama where he will major in mechanical engineering and be a member of the waterski team.
GO BAMA!

Spring Lacrosse

Justin's Prom

Justin and Samantha went to the Prom Saturday night. It was at the Grappone Center in Concord and was a complete evening with dinner and dancing. They had a great time!



On the cheek smooches so they don't share mono. Yikes!



Doesn't he look handsome?

In which my kids can still amaze me

Strafford School held a Science Fair last week and all the 7th & 8th grade students were required to participate. I was prepared for a "poke my eyes out" experience but in fact was amazed at the thought, creativity and execution of the many experiments. Chandler and his friend Jeremy collected hockey sticks from their various hockey playing friends and devised a way to test flex vs. accuracy. Some of the other experiments included training chickens, does ice cube shape affect how fast it melts, is Orville Redenbacher popcorn worth the extra cost vs store brand kernals, do male horses and female horses react differently to the same stimuli? There were rockets and catapults, and electromagnets. The best part though was seeing the kids with their projects. Most of the projects had a connection to a personal or family interest and it was so much fun to see how proud they were to share their interests. It turned out to be a very fun evening!