It's Time for the Instrument Party

I have been negligent in posting photos lately. On the weekend prior to Memorial Day, we took a day trip down to New Braunfels to see Natural Bridge Caverns and the adjacent Safari. I had been to Natural Bridge Caverns when I was about 7 or 8 and (being a cave, after all) it hasn't changed much. I remembered a lot of the high points of the tours. Kenneth and Evelyn liked the "fried eggs" (cave rock formation that looks like fried eggs) and the gift shop. :) For some reason I don't have any pictures of the safari--it is one of those places where you drive your car slowly through the safari park and throw pre-purchased food pellets towards animals like zebras, deer, and my personal favorite (sarcasm intended), the emus. Emus are crazy-aggressive when it comes to the food pellets and they have no issues with putting their dinosaur-like head into your car to grab at the bag of food.

The end-of-school-year awards assembly was on June 2nd. In addition to the regular academic awards, Evelyn received the "Most Responsible" award and Kenneth received the "Most Athletic" award for their respective classes. Kenneth's soccer team had their end-of-season party and since Ken is a kick-butt defensive player, his coach gave him the award "Thou Shalt Not Score!" (against Kenneth's defense).

Evelyn and Kenneth participated in an art camp this week through the Austin Museum of Art. All of the teachers were college-degreed working artists and the AMOA site was on beautiful grounds, some of which were buildings from 1913. The grounds were meant to replicate a place in Italy, which I guess was the home country of the original owner. At any rate, they thoroughly enjoyed themselves this week. Evelyn's class was called "Sea World" ("Paint, draw, and sculpt with inspiration from our watery friends of the deep. Use vivid colors, wild shapes, and amazing textures to recreate the world under the sea. Develop skills in basic art elements, such as line, shape, texture, and color. "). Kenneth took a class called Beyond Basic Drawing ("Take your drawing to the next level! Venture into real and imaginary worlds with the stroke of a marker, a piece of charcoal, and pastels while learning more advanced design and drawing skills. Expand your use of different artistic styles as you draw self-portraits, nature, and still life environments. "). Nana helped out a lot by dropping them off & picking them up every day, except for today when I got them. This picture says it all for Friday: a sweet (and increasingly rare) moment with two exhausted kids sleeping in the car.

Elizabeth, Josh, and the kids visited this Thursday-Friday and as I was getting ready for work this morning, I heard Caleb tell Elizabeth "It's time for the instrument party, Mommy! Where's your instrument?!?" I'm going to have to save these simple statements from the kids because they're so applicable to other situations. Next time I'm at work and some yahoo is causing churn, I'm going to bust out Caleb's phrase.