where I talk with my inside voice
Because ECF gave them a grant of $10,000 this year, the St. Louis Ballet sent me an invitation to watch their dress rehearsal for The Nutcracker. So Noah and I went to see it tonight. It was a really good show – the dancers were great and the costumes were very festive.
Homecoming has certainly become a bigger deal now that Noah is in college. I headed down to Columbia to hangout with my friend Troy (Carlton was sick or he would have come too) and watch the game against Auburn (which Mizzou just barely managed to win in the last minute of the game). I had never been to a homecoming...
Our firstborn son is now a college student. That day in the St. Luke’s delivery room, holding him in my lap, I sure wasn’t thinking about this day. It has always seemed so far away. But the sand keeps spilling through the hourglass, whether we want it to or not. So today we got our young man moved into his...
I took the kids to the History Museum to see the new and improved exhibit on the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair. They did a great job putting it together and there are a ton of interesting artifacts on display, including a lead crystal punchbowl very similar to my grandmother Ellen’s. This might be our last homeschool “field trip” since...
Team Tappmeyer organized a going-away party for Noah, right before he heads off to Mizzou. It was so nice of them to do that – they are going to miss him, but not as much as we are.
We just got back from an overnight stay in Columbia. Noah was on campus for Summer Welcome. It doesn’t seem like that long ago that I visited with my parents, but it was actually 32 years ago. Where does the time go? I didn’t take many photos this trip, but I did get a few inside the Agriculture building –...
Tonight we went to see Les Miserables at the Muny. Grandma Linda shared a few of her season tickets with us this year because this is their last year going (we might have to buy their seats for next season!). It was a really good show.
We celebrated Noah’s graduation tonight with dinner at Maggiano’s and a cake from Cheesecake Factory. We are very proud of that young man and all he has accomplished. We’re excited for him to head off to Mizzou in a couple of months.
We just got back from our 12-day roadtrip out west – with overnight stops in Colorado Springs, Grand Junction, Bryce Canyon and Flagstaff. We drove over 2,000 miles, ate some great food, and made some great memories. Some photos from the trip are available in my album, and check out the short video below.
Noah bought his first car today. It’s a 2014 Mazda 6 with about 100,000 miles on it. It suffered some damage from a recent hailstorm, but that brought it within his budget, so he’s pretty happy with his new purchase. We’re glad that he’ll have some reliable transportation back and forth to Mizzou.
We took advantage of the nice weather today and went to the Minifig Shop, had lunch at Dewey’s Pizza, and then spent the afternoon at the zoo. I’m not going to have too many more opportunities like this. Have to grab them while I can.
This was a crazy busy year, but maybe I feel that way every year. Noah and Josie had big milestones this year, and we went on two family road trips. I tried to capture the highlights in our annual video above.
The SLSO is temporarily performing out of the Stifel Theater downtown while Powell Hall is being renovated, but we maintained our annual tradition to see their Christmas Concert. This year included a couple of notable pieces – Charleston Christmas (Stephenson) and Tom Lehrer’s Hannukah in Santa Monica!
As per usual, we hosted the family for Thanksgiving, although the crowd wasn’t as big as some years because Laura didn’t come in town, we still had a good time and plenty of Dixie’s great food!
I was happy to see that the kids enjoyed last year’s homecoming enough to repeat the experience this year. They had more of their friends attend this year, so they really had fun. I guess next year we’ll be going to Mizzou’s homecoming. I’m looking forward to that.
Tonight we celebrated Noah earning the rank of Eagle Scout, and (since he’ll age out next week) his entire Scouting career with the retrospective video below. We rented the lodge at Beaumont and had quite a few guests attend, many of whom had great things to say about our young man. Needless to say, we’re very proud of him.
