Category Archives: Family Life

Stephanie and Marcus headed south Saturday morning after Nikki and I dropped off some dresses Stephanie packed, but left in her bedroom.  The first day they made it down to Birmingham, Alabama.  Stephanie really liked the area and thought all the houses looked like brick mansions.

Garden District

Sunday they made it into New Orleans late afternoon and checked into the Wyndham Avenue Plaza Resort, located in the Garden District in New Orleans.

The beads were all over every tree and fence.

They unpacked and then walked to Magazine Street, but most of the places were closed because it was Sunday.

Monday they walked back to Magazine Street and checked out the shops.  Stephanie really liked the boutiques, but was unable to find anything in her size.

Ice cream and macaroons

For lunch they stopped and had pizza and then went to a French Pastry shop and had macaroons and ice cream for dessert.  Stephanie and Marcus both were getting sun burnt and at that point Marcus decided to buy a hat for himself.  That evening they decided to go back to St. Charles Street, which was near their resort, and ate a place called Zea.  Stephanie had BBQ chicken and ribs and Marcus ordered the shrimp pasta.

Small Voodoo Museum in the French Quarter

Tuesday they took the Street Car to the French Quarter District.

#NOLA

Once there, they visited the little voodoo museum and then did some more window shopping where Stephanie found a fedora to help protect her from the sun.

Shrimp Sandwich, Gumbo and fried alligator

They stopped for lunch and shared a fried alligator appetizer, Marcus had Gumbo and Stephanie had a fried shrimp sandwich.

Live music was coming out of almost every door.  They did more window shopping and had a cold drink at Starbucks before taking the Street Car back to the Garden District and went back to the hotel.  They decided to try Mr. John’s Steakhouse located in the same building as the hotel.  They should have known it was going to be expensive when there were no prices on the menu.  They both said it was the best meal of their lives and it should have been for $160 for two before tip.

Mr. John’s Steakhouse, cost a lot more than expected. Worth it.

They felt a little out of their element as Stephanie needed to send pictures to Nikki to determine what to do with some of the things they were bringing to the table, such as a little yellow cloth tied with a green ribbon.  Inside was a lemon that was to be used to wash the smell of the seafood off her hands.  Stephanie took her dinner to go, for fear that she was going to embarrass herself at the dinner table in the restaurant.

Heading down to Camelias.

Wednesday they took the Street Car to Camelia’s, which is a breakfast joint in the Garden District.  It was crowded, but the experience was well worth the wait.  From there they walked to a city park with a pond and jogging/bike path where they tried to play some hacky sack.  Since it was really hot that day they decided to go back to the hotel and took a swim at the pool.  They walked to the cafe and Marcus had a coffee before they went to back to hotel again and changed for dinner.  They took a half hour walk from the hotel to a place called Superior Seafood.  They had Crab Cakes as an appetizer, Stephanie had Shrimp and Crawfish pasta and Marcus had Catfish.  After dinner they took the Street Car back to the Avenue Plaza Resort.

Thursday morning they checked out of the resort and took a Street Car back to the French Quarter.

Beautiful flowers

They were going to have breakfast at Cafe De Monde, but the line was out the door and down the street.

Hardy breakfast before the trip to FL.

So instead they picked a cafe next door and had beignets for breakfast and a frozen coffee.  They walked to the cemetery, but were told they could not enter without paying $50 per person to have a tour guide take them around.

They took the Street Car back to the hotel to get the car and headed east to Pensacola, Florida and after checking in to a hotel, they found a pizza place that had the biggest slices of New York Style Pie that was very good.

Pensacola Beach, FL

After lunch they went to the beach and they had the pleasure of watching some dolphins porpoising near the shore.  They then spent some time shopping at the tourist beach shops and Stephanie talked Marcus into stopping at a pet store and had fun talking with a Macaw.  They had dinner at the Texas Roadhouse before calling it a night.

Uncle Sandy’s Macaw Rescue, feeding the birds

Friday morning they went to Uncle Sandy’s Macaw Bird Park Rescue.  A non-profit organization that takes in all kinds of birds.  The admission gets you a bucket of peanuts to feed the different birds.

Uncle Sandy’s Macaw Rescue, feeding the birds

They spent about 2 hours there and really enjoyed a Cockatoo that was there.  They had trouble finding a hotel and had to drive farther than they anticipated.  They drove all the way to Clarksville, Tennessee and didn’t make it to the hotel until 1:00 am.

Saturday they stopped around Louisville at an outlet mall to stretch and do a little shopping to break up the 6 drive to Columbus.

Today Jonny ran in the Granville Turkey Trot which benefits the Licking County Food Bank.  Jonny was one of 20053 runners participating in the run.  They staged the starts into 3 starts.  The competitive runners, the fun runners and the fun walkers.  Jonny started with the competitive runners. At race time the temps were 31 degrees and snowing.  He met several of his high school cross country racing buddies and they warmed up together before the race.

Jonny finished 8th overall out of 2053 participants with a time of 17:40.

After the race he went and had hot chocolate and donuts at one of his coaches house that is located on the race course.  It was very windy and cold today and Nikki and I were numb standing and cheering the runners on.

We had our Thanksgiving diner with Ashley and Shane the day before Thanksgiving.  They were going to be going to Shane’s mom’s house on Thanksgiving and asked to have diner at our house on Wednesday.  Instead of Turkey, Ashley is not a fan of Turkey, Nikki cooked a delicious ham dinner with mashed potatoes, cooked carrots, mashed pumpkin and homemade cranberry sauce.

Stephanie’s best friend from high school, Ryan, was home from college and brought a friend from college, who was from Mexico and unable to make it back home for the long weekend.  They were all over for dinner as well.

Ashley and Shane brought Apollo and all the dogs played together until they all ran out of energy, which was much later in the day.  They stayed much later than expected and we had nice conversations and went through old pictures later into the night.  It was a very nice visit and Nikki and I enjoyed the night very much.

Tomorrow, Thanksgiving morning, Jonny is running in the Granville Turkey Trot 5K race held in the streets of Granville.

Jonny asked a friend, Destiny, to the Homecoming Dance which was held on September 27th. Nikki took him shopping last week to get some nice clothes for the growing boy to wear to the dance.

Nikki took them to the dance, which they stayed for about an hour and then she drove them into town where they meet some other friends for dinner at Brews Cafe. After Brews they went to the bowling alley and had a good time with a group of about 6 people.

Jonny and Destiny – Homecoming 2014

Jonny ran at the McGowan Invitational today held at Watkins High School in Pataskala. The weather today was partly cloudy with the temperature at 79 degrees and 82% humidity. They run all the boys together, both varsity and open, there are 291 kids running in one race.

Jonny got off to a good start and made sure he was in a good position before they entered the woods where the path narrows and there are limited places to pass if you are in a large group. He kept himself in a good position throughout the race and ended up 17th overall out of 291 racers. He finished 3rd for the team with a time 17:12, which helped his team take first place out of 24 total teams.

The official race results can be found on the Watkins Track Site or the Granville Aces Running Database.

I did take some video of Jonny running which can be seen below.

 
Jonny finished this race last year at 18:24, so he was able to improve his time by 1:12. He ran at the Licking County League Championship on this same course last year as well and finished in 18:00, so he also beat that time by 0:48.

Also, to give you a better idea on how well Jonny ran, there were several divisions that raced at Watkins today. There were 1,217 high school boys that raced. If they all would have raced together Jonny would have finished 57th out of 1,217 runners.

Nikki and Stephanie ordered 5 chicks in the mail early in the summer. They started off being raised in the house and moved to the garage after about 6 weeks. They spent the night in one of the dog crates and I built a little chicken tractor out of poultry netting and PVC pipe that was light enough for one person to move around to different spots in the yard, but sturdy enough to keep curious cats and dogs out.

Over the 4th of July we inherited 3 full grown hens from the Ward family. At that point I started digging out an area in our garden to build a semi permanent chicken coop and run. It took a week to get everything measured out and level. Nikki talked to friend that had just disassembled their kids swing set and we decided to recycle some of their 4×4 wooden frames. We painted the wood and pocked up some more lumber to start building our 6×12 chicken run with built in coop. The chicken run is still being worked on, but the entire run and roof has been framed in. The coop is completed to the point where the hens are now staying in it for the night and are starting to use the built in nest box.

The chicken coop includes a web cam with night vision infrared capabilities so we can keep an eye on them during the night when they are in the coop. Anyone can check in on them at http://chickens.ourhobby.com. The username and password is guest. If you are using Internet Explorer select Active X mode or Mobile Mode. Any other browser, select Server Push Mode or Mobile Mode.

Hammy, one of our male cats, was found this evening by one of our neighbors. He had passed away under their front porch. He had been missing for a week and we had an idea he has passed, as he was never gone that long before.

He was a real character who couldn’t just walk by our other cat, Joey, without slapping him on top of the head and just continue walking. He had the typical cat mentality that he was too cool for the rest of the world and we were here to entertain and serve him.

When we got him as a kitten he was very hyper and active and the movie, “Over the Hedge” was just out. He reminded the kids of the hyper active squirrel in the movie and was named after him.

Zoey makes Hammy upset

Stephanie graduated from Granville High School today.  We started the day with a nice breakfast at Nikki’s cousin’s house.  Nikki’s Aunt and Uncle were down as well and it was nice getting to visit with them for a couple of hours.

Not only were Nikki’s parents here to witness it, but my parents and my two sisters also came down from Michigan to help Stephanie celebrate.  After the graduation ceremonies, we picked up Chipotle and brought it back to our house.  Every ate and chatted and then Stephanie opened her cards and gifts from everyone.  Then my parents and sister’s made the trek back to Michigan, which had to be a very long for them.

We thank all our family members who traveled 300 miles each way to celebrate Stephanie’s big day, it meant a lot to her to share this exciting day with family.

Ashley turned 25 on May 30th.   Nikki’s parents came down on the 31st to celebrate Ashley’s birthday and Stephanie’s graduation.  We went into Columbus so they could meet Apollo and we had a very nice dinner at Marcella’s.  We then spent some time back at the kid’s apartment and had a nice time socializing.  It was a very nice day will the family.

Jonny ran in the Licking County League Championships this week.  The meet was held over two days, Tuesday was mostly field events and preliminary events.  The one final event that Jonny ran in that day was the 4×800 relay.  He was also scheduled to run the 4×400 relay and was a last minute entry into the 400 meter dash as a replacement for another Granville runner.

The 4×800 meter relay the team took 2nd with a combined time of 8:16.85.  Jonny ran the 2nd leg with a new Personal Best of 204.1.  The next race Jonny ran was the 400 meter dash.  He ran it in 54.98 which was a fast enough time to get him in the finals on Saturday.  He was only one of three freshmen to run in the heats and the only freshman to make it into the finals.  His last race of the day was the 4×400 relay.  The team took 2nd overall with a time of 3:34.9 which also put them in Saturday’s finals.  Jonny ran his leg in 56.7 in the windy conditions.

Saturday, Jonny only had the two races.  During his warmup and the 400 meter dash race it started to rain and the wind picked up with the temps falling back into the upper 40’s.  Jonny ran the race in 54.39 and did not place.  He was one of two Granville runners in the finals.  This was the first time he got to race against his team mate Casey Lenfest who won the race with a time of 49.73 in the less than desirable conditions.  The 4×400 relay the team took 3rd place with a time of 3:33.6.  Jonny ran the final leg in 54.1 which is another personal best for him.