Tales of a Shoebox Princess

Matt had his senior pictures taken last weekend. Jen, my brother's wife, was kind enough to come out for the weekend to take the pictures. The following pictures are not the senior pictures; they are my pictures of the place we went to have them taken: Mills Ruin Park, which is a fun little park set down by the Mississippi River by St. Anthony Falls, where there are ruins of a grain mill that exploded. There were many people there taking pictures and I can see why. It's a pretty place. Matt's requirements for industrial, decrepit, and nature were all met in this little park by the stone arch bridge. the stone arch bridge. We are on the downstown Mpls side Jenny crouching down under one of the stone arches to get a cool picture of Matt.  Minneapolis framed by an arch some mill ruins in the park an archway in the ruins that black sticky out thing is part of the Walker Art center. Haven't gone there yet, but it's a goal more ruins ...

..even though it should. A few pictures from before the play begins.  Flo sits with the two Spanish guys View from my seat onstage. The script won't be there some opening night. Dang.  Makeup trial The Pure-a-tron is onstage. Don't know what a Pure-a-tron is? Come to the show and find out.  My costumes are compiled (all 3), but I need more jewelry. The hair is still TBD, but the hairstylist says she's going for an 80s Madonna look for me. My bio is written for the program, my lines are mostly learnt.  This will be fun!  Nov 4-5, 11-12 at Twin Oaks.

My little baby chose to grow up, the stinker. He went and turned 18. He's registered to vote, he sports long sideburns and some chin fur. He argues all the time about trivial things and we pretend debate and then it ends up as a "yes way, no way" back and forth. I wish I could remember what those debates have been about because they are really trivial and amusing. Anway, he grew up, dangit. As is tradition in our family, I asked him what kind of cake he wanted, and meant it not just flavor-wise. What theme or design did he want? He said, "I've had two Doctor Who cakes, an X-Files cake, and meme cakes in the past. How about robots. I'll leave it to you to interpret it." So a robot cake. He's on the high school robotics team so that was not an off the wall suggestion. I did incorporate the KING TeC logo on the robot on the cake. I also incorporated lights! Flashing lights. When I was thinking about what to put on the cake, I searched LED flashing...

...for me as a parent of a band member. Katie, Paul, and Matt have all participated in marching band, although Katie and Matt are the only ones who stuck it out til they were seniors. I don't think Hayley ever marched except maybe as a 9th grader, and that would have been at only one game. And she probably played the clarinet for it. But I digress.  We've reached the limit. Matt will no longer play in the Laker Marching Band at a football game. Later in November, they will have an indoor marching band concert (and that will be our last one of those, closing out our involvement with marching band).  Fun times, and I could pick him fairly well. Gotta face the crowd even if your lower body is marching a different direction  Matt told me that the first day in Math this year, Mr. B called out his name and asked "Evans? Are you one of those Evans kids? Katie, Jimmy, Paul, and Hayley?" Matt said "yep, those are my brothers and sisters." Mr B said, ...

Magic the cat escaped the house last night. I came home from play rehearsal with a catnip candy corn mousie for him, but after clicking my tongue as a signal for treats for several minutes with no response, I saw that the deck screen door was open. Magic can open the screen door unless it's taped shut, and guess who didn't tape it shut last night? Not me. I was at play rehearsal. So I went outside to track Magic down, using my flashlight app because sometimes I can spot the kitty's eyes with it, even into neighbors' yards. But after two circuits of the house and several literal cat calls, still no Magic. Jim even tried, although Magic probably wouldn't come in if Jim was calling him. We went to bed, confident that a homesick kitty would be waiting at the bottom of the deck stairs in the morning (why he waits at the bottom of the stairs and not right at the door, I have no idea). He's escaped dozens of times before and the few times he's been out overnigh...

When I was a kid, my dad had a book 101 Uses for a Dead Cat  that I found amusing. I'd probably still find it funny, except for last Saturday, when we found that Servo had gone to make his kitty Maker. Under the couch. He'd been sick for a while, skinnier than was good for him, in fact, on Friday, I petted him and thought him frighteningly skinny. He vomited later that evening and Jim and I discussed taking him to the vet on Monday to have him put to sleep. He vomited nearly every day for the last several weeks. He didn't seem in pain, but what do I know? Servo would just hide after he vomited, which I attributed to not liking our reaction to his vomiting. He didn't refuse food, but judging by his weight loss, he was not getting any of the nutrients into his system, but probably vomiting the food back up. Sigh.  My tribute to Servo: You have been a good kitty. You were good around new people in the house, in fact, I'd say you were curious about them and liked t...

The baby of the family is a senior now. When I started this blog, he was a chubby-faced 9 year old in whatever grade 9 year olds are in--third? So now he's a senior, last one at home. The day after Labor day was our last day of the first day of public school. Last Friday was the last first football game any of our kids would march in. Pretty much anything related to school will be a last time. It's ok with me, but I can't help thinking all those years of raising naughty, loud, disobedient, and yet hilarious children went by pretty quickly. Matt's last first marching band performance in pictures: You have no idea which one he is, do you? He's not on the ladder, directing. Think short, with a bunching of extra pant around his feet.  It's obvious in this picture which one is  Matt. Always making sure he's heard by the audience. Jim and I were at the game and I was taking pictures right and left, hoping that one of them would have Matt in ...