The Kelsey's

Typically we don’t make a big to-do over most of our holidays. Things seem pretty much status quo for most of the day. However Laura usually cooks up a special meal. Independence Day (for us, that would be the 4th of July…) was no different. We had veggie hot dogs and burgers.

We don’t shoot off our own fireworks, but this year Laura got a box of “safe” fireworks like Snap-n-Pops or the box said “Snap-its” or something like that. Basically black powder wrapped in wax paper. When you throw them on the ground they pop. We also had the little plastic bottles where you pulled the string and they would pop and throw trash on the floor. We went out in the afternoon and littered all over our patio.

Nathan was very apprehensive at first, he wanted to be sure I was sitting next to him. Even at a young age, children understand the concept of a “human shield”. But as he saw that none of his siblings were loosing life or limb, he ventured out and with mom’s coaxing he threw down on some Snap-its.

As we were finishing up we were wishing each other a “Happy Independence Day”, but for him the syllables just didn’t seem to fit together. He listened to what we were saying but the words just seemed foreign. He shouted out “Happy…” and now he was in trouble. Everyone was listening and he hadn’t figured out what that next word was. So his mind was racing and suddenly inspiration struck: “… Popper Day!” That got a big laugh.

And so with one good laugh, that was the phrase of the day. “Happy Popper Day!”

Until the evening fireworks. I’ve posted about previous 4th of July celebrations. We settled in on our little hill to watch 3-5 different township displays. We get to see more variety and we aren’t close enough to scare the children. About half way through, Hannah had mentioned or was discussing with Nathan about the “Grand Finally”. So with each explosion of light (and a little sound…) he would exclaim, “There it is! The Grand Finally!” followed with “Are we done?” or “Let’s go now.” It was worth it to stick it out, because with the Grand Finally in full swing his face lit up so much that Joshua was having us look at Nathan’s face instead of the fireworks display. The grand finally was truly grand.

We then took our bug-bitten bodies home and tried to get to sleep with the hooligan’s in the field on the other side of the creek firing off their home cooked displays into the wee hours. Indeed, a cause for celebration.

Most summers we find a way to get out to Six Flags. I tried to do something with each child individually over the summer, but Hannah and Joshua both liked Six Flags enough that we just combined their activities.

This summer a Six Flags visit wasn’t looking too likely because of budgets and time crunches. But Hannah’s insistence that this was her “summer of freedom” before heading off to Academy (so named because all future summers might include a job, and jobs = slavery I guess??) lead to pleading and finally I said that at some point this summer we would go.

We did go. It was August 7th. We had a fun time, and Hannah brought her friend Maddie along so we were an even number. Who wants to go to an amusement park with an odd rider for every coaster? You need an even number.

There was one thing of significance that I want to record here because it has a greater relevance to life and moving on into adulthood. We all rode the Superman ride. (What? So what!)

Well, the Kelsey Kids are known (by me) as being a little fearful of trying new things. I had only been on the Superman once before, and it was scary for me. I’m afraid of heights, but I wanted to try it. The kids sat below and prayed for me to live. It was a nice ride, it’s always enjoyable to see your life flash before your eyes. It’s not an action flick, but it wasn’t a tragedy either.

Anyway, we started talking about going on it. I made sure they knew I was scared riding it last time. But Maddie was game. Joshua then decided he would do it (he did have cold feet later, but he overcame). Hannah was reticent. Eventually she decided to go for it. She claims we talked her into it. But it was clearly her choice.

We were going to ride some other rides first, but as we walked by I suggested we strike while the iron was hot. So we got in line. The anxiety boiled up and when we were finally seated we were at the point of “what were we thinking?” Hannah was practically in tears. The ride operator just smiled and held back a giggle as she said “Have fun!” in a taunting voice.

But it was over pretty quick – and no deaths occurred on that 45 second ride (41 of those seconds was going up).

But the lesson was that you can, indeed, face your fears. What we thought was going to be terrifying wasn’t so bad really. Some might even call it fun – well, some might.

Just remembering that we “rode the Superman”, we stepped up and took action and survived it, can be an encouragement when facing new experiences that we aren’t quite sure about.

The next week Hannah headed off to boarding school. We would often say, “How hard can it be? You did ride the Superman after all…”

Our podcasts are getting a little longer, 21 minutes for this one, but we were able to knock it out in two sittings. One for recording and one for editing and post production. If you want to know what we’re up to – give it a listen!

Let us know what you think by leaving us a comment. Remember, it takes a while to have comments approved – so if they don’t show up right away, don’t sweat it … they will.

At the end of August, I got some tickets to go see Tim Hawkins (who’s that? Well go see and then come back here! 😉 ).

There was some confusion because there were no tickets per se.  I got them online and I was supposed to print out the receipt.  When the day came, I had no idea where the paper was or if I had even printed it out at all.  I called the church where he was going to perform and also the contact number from his web site and finally got a call back from Tim’s brother who said if I had a photo ID, I’d be fine.

I would show you some pictures – but I was having too much fun to bother to take any.  I took a short video of Tim’s big finale song – one of Caleb’s favorites: “Fire Ant.”  But it didn’t turn out very nice.  Here is a link to it inside of Facebook. << you may have to be logged into Facebook to access it.

When we got there we say about 20 kids playing in the parking lot.  I made my kids wear “business casual” attire.  I didn’t know that it would be anything goes.  So they felt over dressed, but they got over it.  We have just become a casual culture – what can you say.  Not that I mind, I’m not fashion maven, I’m just sayin’.

So we  got our tickets and lined up at the door to get in.  There were no assigned seats (although there could have been because the church sanctuary had theater seating with rows and numbers for seats), so we were behind about 15 people in three lines.  We waited at least 20-40 minutes for the doors to open.  And when they did, the lines to the right and left of us started moving way faster than ours.  Why is it that everybody always picks the slowest line to be in?  How’s that happen?

When we got in there, the first 8 or so rows in the middle section were taken.  The kids spotted the first row all the way to the left was open so we headed there.  Another family beat us to it, so we ended up in the 2nd row way off to the side.  Even so, we were about 20 feet from where all the action took place.  The only problem for me was that the sound wasn’t designed to hit the corners,  so when there was a lot of laughter you couldn’t hear the next line very well.  It was all good though (now come on, there was laughter – I just meant that I had to concentrate to hear… anyway).

The Burkett’s came and got the seats next to us, and the Kiernan’s arrived too.  But by then some boys had taken a few of our “reserved” seats and plus it was a challenge to decide to sit so far off center.  Emily came down and sat with us though.  Everybody said they could see and hear fine where the were.

Tim had another guy up first.  He did a good job.  I really appreciated his point that he felt bad for doctors and lawyers, because when they get to heaven (if they do – in the case of lawyers 😉 ), there won’t be much for them to do.   That probably applies to computer nerds too.  Maybe I should take up gardening (and not the Facebook variety).

Tim did a great job.  He even previewed his Candyman take off.  He’s kind of a home town version of Weird Al with his spoofs of popular songs.  It was a fun time.

Afterwards, we stopped off at Dairy Queen for a little dessert and then headed on home.  We’ll definitely keep an eye out for the next time he comes into town.  He’s lives around here, so I would think he’d do local shows more often – we’ll see.

It was a long time coming…

There were threats, counter threats, and promises made.  But it came down to this…

There would be a water gun showdown.  Dr. Eddie not only took all comers, but he also mixed it up personally.  It was a cloudy and rainy afternoon on July 12th when all sides gathered together.  After a “last meal,” everyone headed outside and commenced to fightin’.  Usually things were pretty spread out.  There was one instance where the wrestling got knotted up when Joshua challenged Eddie.

As you can see – there was only one slide at the beginning.  Here is some video from my phone – the quality is not too bad, but it’s not going to be shown at any film festivals this fall… (Umm, note – your sound is not broken – there was nothing to hear until the very end where Nathan comes inside. Although a few shouts and shrieks can be heard through the glass.)

If you watched the video to the end, you know that Nathan came in freezing (did you see how my camera made his little penguin walk just that much funnier? The camera got weirded out there at the end.). But I dried him off and we watched from inside for a while. I took more video, but I am only posting the best of the best so as not to bore y’all.

These shenanigans went on for quite some time. I was tired of standing and went off to sit down. During that time, Nathan could no longer stand it and headed back out in his dry clothes. He had been quietly watching, so I didn’t hear him slip out. In the mean time the fight had been reduced to trying out a “bigger, better” slip-N-slide.

And here is some final video of sliding folks. You can also see Nathan rolling his “bowling ball” all along the way. He does get a little peeved when “Kay Kay” jams up the traffic.

Thus ends our tale of Hydrogen Hydroxide induced destruction, for now.

There were many more fun and exciting happenings this summer, including VBS, the kids going to Tim Hawkins, and stuff like that. I’ll get to them soon (maybe post one more tonight when I get home from work 🙂 ).

I know you’re starving for more scoop on the happenings around here – blame it on the chronicler. (Oh, and happy birthday, Mom! Hope to catch you some time today!)

It took us a while to get some audio together, but it’s here now.  This episode features the debut of Laura – she’s on the last segment, so you’ll have to listen all the way through.  This episode is a little longer than the others (17 minutes).

Let us know what you think by leaving us a comment.  Remember, it takes a while to have comments approved – so if they don’t show up right away, don’t sweat it … they will.

Life’s hard being the third boy. You get hand me, hand me downs! Earlier this month, Nathan faced the reality that boy’s clothes can be tough – but never tough enough.

We were sitting down for dinner and we heard a “riiiiipp”. Nathan looked around to see if something was behind him. But instead it was just the material next to the seam right around his back pocket giving way to his behind!

He walked around a little bit as he began to experience the new found freedom of movement, as well as a considerable draft.

As he made this discovery, he started to pull on the material in an effort to rectify the situation, but it was no use. He finally turned to mommy for help. After a moment of examination it was clear that these pants were done for. It took little or no effort to pull the material asunder.

So we let him parade around in his tattered jeans for a few moments. There was much laughter and he was pretty proud of the little comedian he had become. Since the camera was nearby I thought I’d take a few shots (nothing untoward) and post them up for you to see. Even the most rugged of dungarees can’t stand up to a few adventurous boys!

The End!

Here is the first episode done by the kelsey kids. They called the show “Puppy Pals.” If you don’t quite follow all the dialog – your aren’t alone. Why the show got the rating it did (Y7!) I’m not sure either, maybe I’m not mature enough to watch it myself.

I have the credits and the actual transcripts in my possession now. Here is the basic transcript:

Butterskotch (Butter): Hannah Kelsey
Bluerasberry (Blue): Joshua Kelsey
Sound (Foley Artist): Caleb Kelsey

Blue: Now, where have you been?!
Butter: Um, at school.
Blue: Ohhhh, school is for wackos.
Butter: (angrily) Are you calling me a WACKO?!
Blue: Your my girlfriend, and I have to be honest with you. So……. yes, I’m calling you a wacko.
Sound: “slap.”
Blue: Awww! That must have been a slap…. of love.
Sound: “Slap!”
Blue: Oww! You broke my cheek, baby!
Butter: Hey! What’s that?!
Sound: “Air plane sound”
Blue: And what’s that?!
Both: Uh-oh! We’ve got some funnies… coming out of our tummies!! (Barf sound)
End Credits.

Here is Hannah playing “We Three Kings” for the 13th Sabbath Program at Church last week.  I particularly like her use of tempo to add some drama to the piece.  See it for yourself.

We would appreciate it if you would let us know what you think about our videos. The filming was done by a family friend, Alex, on our tripod. That’s why it’s not so shaky as when ‘Dad records’.

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