Who’s got two thumbs & was excited to be commended for his on-field hustle? This guuuuuuy. 🙂
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Author: The Nack Daddy
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Visiting Uncle John
We’ve been awfully sad that our beloved Uncle John Murray has been in poor health lately. It’s hard living so far away from our great—and great big—extended family, and I wish the boys could spend more time getting to know everyone. I felt grateful that Finn & I were able to make an impromptu trip to Chi-town last weekend to see Uncle John & spend time with much of the Murray clan, especially as Saturday happened to be my cousin Liz’s son Patrick’s First Communion.
Here’s a gallery (slideshow) of some photos I captured during the reception, and later in the park by the Murrays’ house (where Patrick, Mary, and Jimmy patiently gave Finn an intro to lacrosse). “We have a really nice family,” he told me later. I’m inclined to agree. <:-)
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KOBIs ride again!
We’ve had another rather epic Sunday with the lads. While Mom-O and our friend Jolene toured the de Young Museum, Team KOBI (i.e. King/Kids Of Bad Ideas—newly augmented with our equally mischievous friend Justin) rented a four-man bike & toured Golden Gate Park. We even crashed this year’s Bay to Breakers race, briefly carrying various weird characters who hopped aboard, until a cop kicked us out.
Justin also had the inspired idea of sneaking up “James Bond-style” on a group of unsuspecting musicians who were practicing in the park’s band shell. I love that their music swelled up to provide a dramatic score to our hijinx. 😀
The guys were champs at this year’s Willow Glen 5k, cranking through the 3-mile walk en route to some fun carnival games back in Tiger Park (behind their school). Check out a few little glimpses I grabbed along the way:
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Pulling the pin on adventure
Henry Nack, behold the trebuchet. (I’m sure there’s no way this meeting can end in mischief. 😉 )
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“A Beter Life” awaits
In the dystopian classic Blade Runner, where neon signs wink through the ever-present rain, the voice in a disembodied advertisement promises, “A new life awaits you in the off-world colonies!” I chuckled thinking of this when I found the sign below propped up at the entrance to Finn’s room. I guess we’d better stay out for a while. 🙂
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Enter Sandmen
This? Oh, no biggie: it’s just what happens when Henry playfully forces his (fully cooperative & laughing) brother’s face into the sand. :-p
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El Presidente Con Influenza
Finn’s flu-induced fever, combined with his fascination with the name of Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, topped with a sleepy lion hat, results in the following. Also known as: A typical Monday afternoon with Finn.
We enjoyed quite the day out last Sunday. First we hit Marina State Beach near Monterey for some baseball tossing (40 catches in a row with Finn!), sand castling, and taunting of waves (which sometimes won!). On the drive north we pulled a spontaneous pit stop to kayak with sea otters, after which we “cooled off” (as the boys love to say) at Marianne’s Ice Cream in Santa Cruz. Here’s a gallery plus a salty vid from our day out:
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Finnster-bombed
What happens when some ladies come over as our goofballs are winding down the evening? Hint: It involves relentless photobombing by Finn. :-p
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Epic Romance
Long ago the dudes decided that all of Finn’s lions were boys & all of Henry’s owls were girls. That way they could get married & have kids (i.e. the many little lions & owls in our pride/parliament). We were thus delighted & unsurprised when Finn noted at the breakfast table the other day, “Look, Leo & Ollie are having an epic romance!” 🙂
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Saturday in the Park with Hen
Flower-lover Henry stops to smell the actual roses. 🙂
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A wonderful welcome home
Even before I’d landed back in the US, I got to see (thanks to Mom-O’s texting) a pair of little homecoming drawings that the guys whipped up for me. I love the prayer flags that Henry drew (which he says he remembered from the “Himalayan Megaquake” documentary we watched) and “you, a.k.a. Dad” caption Finn added. Are these guys great or what? 🙂 You can click each image to view it larger if you’d like.
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Play Ball!
After too many weeks of getting rained out, the lads were able to take to the field with their team yesterday. Both scored a few solid hits & showed good hustle in the field. Henry was able to walk off having taken a shot to the midsection. :-p Check out little gallery of the game.
The Young Man & The Fort. 🙂
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Happy St. Pat’s!
On Saturday we journeyed to San Francisco to show the boys the local St. Patrick’s Day parade. The cloudy skies & bluster made things feel like a bit of the Old Sod. A few highlights:
- It being the 100th anniversary of the Easter Rising, we got to teach the boys a bit of Irish history.
- The guys were of course obsessed with catching candy & little toys thrown from the floats, at one point enlisting a fellow bystander’s umbrella to claw at some distant Tootsie Rolls. Henry was proud to walk off with a small plastic velociraptor he promptly named “Sean” (as, I guess, an Irish dinosaur might well be named).
- Noticing a car carrying state rep. Phil Ting, we couldn’t resist having fun putting on an Irish accent: “Ah boys, I tell ya, if it’s not one Ting it’s anudder.” :-p
Check out our little gallery from the day, as well as a quick video below and even some 360-degree panoramas (click each one & then drag it).
Man, we’ve been having a heck of a time getting baseball season underway. The guys are really pumped to get onto the field, but thanks to some much-needed gifts from El Niño, we’ve been washed out of both practice & games for the past couple of weeks. While we wait for the skies to clear, here’s a micro gallery of the lads & their teammates getting into uniform for team photos. Hopefully pics from the field will soon follow!
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Finn Emberley
Finn’s a big fan of both Ed Emberley drawing books & the iPad app Adobe Sketch. I kinda dig how he combined the two here. 🙂
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Henry Nack, cake enthusiast
Area ham approves of carbs. 🙂
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It’s Great to be Eight!
Our big guy had a blast all day long. In this little gallery you can see him enjoying a cake topped with his Lego doppelgänger; getting The Dangerous Book for Boys from Grandpa Liggett; blasting Mom-O with a “High Eight”; and getting Captain Underpants from Grandma & Grandpa Nack.
