Blackmans on the Web (log)

Whew! Great day. As always. Food was terrific (turkey was especially good this year). Bill and Lorette were here for the first time in a long time. New babies: Anthony and Allison. Great to have the boys home too.

FR: Sam, Sarah, Amber, Oliva, Peter, Allison, Amy SR: LeAnne, Jacob, Lorette, Bill BR: Pat, Diana, Joe, Anthony, MariFe, Matt, Alex, Shelby, Ann, Scott

Earlier picture:

Thanksgiving 2009

68 Photos

 

..and present. And boy have they grown. The photo on the left was taken when the boys were in elementary school at Smith Elementary. Ashlee Verbruggen and Sam were in the same class together. Ashlee’s dad, Hans, suggested Sam and Alex go to a dance recital with him. He took this picture. Ashlee ended up going to a different middle school and they lost touch a bit. Then, back in High School Ashlee is a Sweetheart. Sam’s girlfriend Sarah is a Sweetheart. Sarah introduces Sam to her friend Ashlee and – shazam – the friendship is rekindled. This weekend we went to the State Fair. Big group of us. And there were Alex, Ashlee and Sam and that picture popped into my head. Sure glad I got it!

More photos from the 2009 Texas State Fair HERE

The countdown began for Sam’s last week at home with a nice evening with friends at Billy Bob’s. Billy Bob’s is in the Stockyards in Fort Worth and is billed as “The World’s Largest Honky Tonk”. Wouldn’t argue with that. Six of Sam’s friends and several parents went along for some two-steppin’ and knee slappin’. Great time was had by all. Even Alex and Shelby came up from Stephenville and showed us all how to REALLY two-step. Wow, somebody is going to throw their back out doing that, for sure. Click on the photo to see the fun.

I earned it!

For us, summer this year started last Saturday, the day of Sam’s high school graduation. The graduation parties of friends started the week before and, in fact, he’s at another friend’s graduation party tonight, but we squeezed all his celebrating into that same day as the Centennial High School graduation ceremony, June 6. That allowed us to take advantage of out of town family to attend both ceremony and party.

To quote Jane Austen: One cannot have too large a party. That’s exactly how we do it around here! We are truly blessed with loving and supportive family and friends. Like with Alex’s graduation last year, the menu and other party plans all came from Sam. Needless to say, with fajitas and slushees on the menu and the volleyball net up in the pool, it was a fun day for everyone.

Click on the picture to the right to see more photos from the day. NOTE: There are not 200+ photos like we normally have because Scott was having as good a time as everyone else, just hanging out and enjoying the day to celebrate Sam!

Click to see Slideshow

Tomorrow’s the day. Sam graduates. After a lot of planning, hard work and dedication, Sam has finally achieved his goal of graduating a year ahead of schedule. He commented on Wednesday evening, after we watched this slideshow, that it “hit him” that afternoon – he really had finished high school. It hit us, too.

We couldn’t be more proud of you Sam! Next stop: The University of Texas at San Antonio, School of Architecture.

The song is “Over the Rainbow” as sung by Israel Kamakawio’ole from the Album Alone in IZ World

(L-R) Cavi, Sam, Mikayla and Joe in action!

The school year is winding down. The last Centennial Sweetheart performance of the year was the Spring Show. One of the traditional performance for the seniors is a dance routine with their “honor guard.”  After a number of weeks of practice, Sam was ready to go. It was hilarious and fun to watch. More photos from the show are in our MobileMe Gallery.

Click to see more photos

Ann, Sam and I took a long weekend a couple weeks ago and visited Alex at Tarleton (conveniently it was parents weekend) and then on to Lubbock to visit Texas Tech.

It was the first chance we’d gotten to visit Alex at the ranch since he took up residence part time (soon to be full time) in one of the trailers that Kobie Wood has on his property. It was nice to finally have a picture in our head as to where he was living. We had a nice weekend in Stephenville and Lingleville (where the ranch is located) and even went to Cowboy Church with him on Sunday in Dublin, TX.  

Sunday we drove to Lubbock for a Monday visit to Tech. LONG way out there to be sure. We’d heard about all the wind turbines that are out in that part of the state, but had never seen them. Once you get to Sweetwater, TX there were wind turbines for as far as you can see and they seem to go on forever. It was pretty amazing. Texas Tech is a big place. over 1800 acres of campus. A little too big according to Sam. But it was worth the trip.