Monday, April 26th, 2010. Deana and Martin hosted the entire Heath
family at a beautiful beach house in Emerald Isle, NC in celebration of their 5
year wedding anniversary. Just a wonderful,
fun relaxing weekend. I have more photos
here. Tons of ultimate frisbee,
volleyball, badminton, pool, sandcastles, hot tub, movies, go karts, miniature
golf, an awesome cookout with steaks, shrimp and home-made cookies-n-cream ice
cream. It was a nice break from our crazy, house selling/buying schedule.
Wednesday,
April 21st, 2010. This past Friday, Amy ran 3.2 miles on the Virginia
Tech campus, along with a group of friends that traveled to Blacksburg with her and six thousand other Hokies, in remembrance of
the 32 students and faculty that died as a result of the attack on April 16,
2007. A highlight of the run was touching the Hokie stone as she exited
the tunnel onto Worsham field in Lane Stadium.
Tuesday, April 20th, 2010. It seems like I'm only posting weekly
updates lately. This past week Amy went on a field trip to Ba Moo farm in
Olin, NC with Ben's kindergarten class. They had an amazing time feeding
chickens, milking cows, collecting eggs, going on hay rides and all sorts of
other fun farm activities. We played tee ball and soccer. The tee
ball record is 1-1, soccer is now 2-1. We spent almost every waking hour
of the weekend and many late evenings packing. Our dining room is almost
full of boxes now. It is amazing how many photos we have accumulated over
the last 12 years. The boys have enjoyed playing with long lost toys that
have been unearthed in the moving process. Our closing date is a week from
Friday, so if all goes according to plan, we will move out of our current house
and into a new one on the 30th.
Tuesday, April 13th, 2010. I got to see my first soccer game of the
season tonight and posted pics on Jackson's Soccer Page.
He has a really good team this year. They won tonight 3-1, giving them a
2-0 record. Great game, we love watching soccer.
Monday, April 12th, 2010. Amy ran the Charlotte Racefest half
marathon Saturday morning. I woke the boys a little after 5AM, took them
to my parent's house, then rode with Will to Southpark Mall to watch the girls
cross the finish line. I was amazed at how well she did, finishing a full
19 minutes ahead of her first half marathon time. She ran the entire 13.1
miles without walking. She is unbelievable. She ran with friends
Timmesa, Christie and Shannon. Amy said that it was very, very hard.
Running pros Timmesa and Shannon stuck with her and helped motivate her during
the final miles. Not long after the race, Amy starting feeling bad, but perked up
after stretching and taking a long nap. The nap didn't
hurt my feelings either. Shannon had to leave, but Jeff joined the fray in
time for us all to enjoy a nice dinner and an evening of story telling and
laughing. Jackson and Ben had a full day at Mo and Papa's house, playing
and working hard.
When Jackson was small, only a few years old, he stepped onto an elevator ahead of Amy and I. We were in a large hospital and the doors closed before we got to it. Amy ran and hit the button and fortunately the doors opened back up. Those few seconds were horrible. Had someone pushed the elevator on one of the dozen or so floors, we would have lost him. Those were seconds, today, we went through that same panic for much, much longer. Jackson accidentally let the dogs out of the back yard and chased after them into the neighbor's yard. Amy was outside with him and kept waiting for Jackson to come back into sight. He didn't. After looking for him for ten minutes, she called me at work. I was home within minutes, she loaded Ben and Anne Rachel into the van and I searched from my car. We talked to neighbors, talked to strangers, I yelled and yelled for him, minutes ticked by, ten, then twenty, then thirty. Our friend Timmesa left a doctor's office to help. Our friend Steve left his office at the church to search along the river and walking trail. One of our neighbors started driving through town looking for Jackson and was the one that found him, a few blocks from the house, a full forty minutes after he disappeared. Jackson was still with the dogs and said that he was afraid they would get hit by a car if he left them. He had chased Emma and Zorro through yards, woods and down several streets. After having forty minutes to think about every possible bad scenario, all I wanted to do was give Jackson a hug. I'm a practical person and knew that the odds were in our favor, but I just kept thinking about how every news story starts out with "The last time they saw him he was..." I was also worried that he had been hit by a car and taken to the hospital. But thanks to friends and neighbors, we found him safe and sound. We went to tee ball and soccer practice and now both boys are safely tucked into bed. Ben wanted to sleep with his brother tonight.
Friday, April 9th, 2010. My wingman, fellow photographer and all-around awesome kid, Ben.
Jackson had his buddy Tanner over today, Amy left for the Queen city this afternoon, the boys and I had a Nerf war during my late lunch, they then joined me at my office till five and this evening we hit the gym for an hour of basketball.
Thursday, April 8th, 2010. A hundred years ago, in high school, I
ran track. We did not have a cross country team, so I ran both the one and
two mile events. Distance running was my thing and I loved it. I
liked running solo on the road, I liked running with my friends, I liked the
Track & Field meets and I liked that I was pretty good at it. I
won some races, lettered twice and have a lot of positive memories from track. For a long time, one of the things I was
most proud of was that I could run eight miles. Wow, was that a long time
ago. But that ancient history is
why I enjoy cheering for the two current runners in our family, Amy and Jackson.
Amy routinely knocks out far more than my personal best eight miles and will run her
second half marathon on Saturday. She trains hard and diligently and
I look forward to seeing her cross the finish line Saturday morning.
Jackson seems to enjoy racing and might run another 5K in a few weeks.
Jackson ran a very hilly course last weekend in his basketball sneakers, so we were surprised
and impressed when he finished 19 seconds
ahead of his previous record. So to both of my runners, I am very, very
proud of you and of all that you accomplish. You guys rock.
Wednesday, April 7th, 2010. On Saturday, amid the
many Easter events, my incredible wife Amy celebrated her birthday. She
started her day with a 5K and ended it by blowing out her birthday candles while simultaneously coloring Easter eggs. Amy works harder than
anyone I know and does so with beauty and grace. It isn't easy to
accomplish all that she manages to pack into each day. She is one in a
million and the boys and I are blessed to have her. Jackson and Ben
are on Spring break and enjoying this week's perfect weather. Temps have
consistently been in the eighties. We had another fun tee ball practice
last night. Because we left Ben's glove at the field last week, he is
breaking in a new one. If you haven't tried, it's hard finding a decent
glove for a leftie. He is playing really well and I have been proud of him.
Proud of the entire team actually. I've said it over and over recently, we just have
the best group of kids and parents this season. I only wish I could coach
and take photos at the same time. It's killing me not to have any good
pics of Ben playing baseball. I do have the photos below though of him playing at the
Lillie's Friends festival. Jackson spent his day helping his Papa work on
projects, then tonight he, Ben and I squeezed swimming, basketball and weights
into a single hour at the gym.
Tuesday, April 6th, 2010. We had such a busy and fun Easter
weekend. I did some class IV creeking at Wilson Creek, Amy and Jackson ran
in the Lilie's Friends 5K at Tanglewood Park, we played games at the FPCMA's
Easter party, the Easter bunny visited the house and we participated in my
sister Deana's annual big Easter Egg Hunt. Prior to that, Ben won his
first tee ball game of the year. He scored three times, hit a double and
made an unassisted double play by tagging out a runner at first and home.
Jackson won his first soccer game. He, as he put it, played beastly on
defense. And yesterday, Ben lost tooth number five. He most
definitely now has the snaggle toothed grin of a soon to be seven year old.
(more Easter photos here)