Happy Birthday, CC!

CC is fifteen! I can hardly believe it!

She is growing into quite the lovely lady. She is kind, thoughtful, and eager to help others. She can always be found dancing around the house, singing to her favorite music, or creating some kind of craft with the sewing machine. Her latest talent is nail art -- she can glue tips and paint nails with the best of them. I am impressed enough that I'm about to let her start doing my nails!

CC continues to be devoted to our church community. She is not only eagerly looking forward to her upcoming Confirmation, but still altar serves on a regular basis, volunteers with the elementary schoolers' Faith Formation, and helps make the costumes for the school plays. 

Her favorite subject in school is English. She finds her teacher, Mr O, hilarious, and thoroughly enjoyed her first experience with Shakespeare this year: Romeo and Juliet. It didn't hurt that Mr O rang a bell every time they encountered an inappropriate joke (supposedly to prevent the students from asking him to elaborate, but instead not-so-subtly drawing their attention to all the inappropriate jokes!).

Her favorite food continues to be sushi, although Caesar salad is a recent obsession (hold the anchovies, please). For the second year in a row, she requested a cheesecake for her birthday, and I was happy to oblige. Thank goodness I have Memere's recipe! 

She is looking forward to her first "real" jobs this summer: swim team coach and lifeguard. She will have to manage her time between working and dancing, because she has been selected to start on pointe at her ballet studio, and must train four full weeks over the summer. She will be busy!

Another huge step for her is drivers' ed. Now that she's 15, she can get her drivers' permit and begin driving while supervised by me or MJ. She's already completed the classroom portion of her training and is halfway done with the behind-the-wheel portion. I am confident that she will be a good driver, because she takes it very seriously and is a cautious driver.

We love you, CC! Happy 15th birthday, sweetie. May this be your best year yet!

Spring Break 2026

We headed to the beach for spring break last week, opting to have a more relaxed experience instead of the jam-packed spring trips we've had the last several years.

Unfortunately, as we learned this year, the weather is very unpredictable in the spring, and you don't always get the beachy experience you were expecting. The week prior to our stay was gorgeous and warm, and this week is gorgeous and warm ... but last week? Chilly and windy.

We didn't let it stop us, though. And fortunately it didn't rain, so we could still do outdoor activities. We played mini golf and board games, rode bikes everywhere, ate lots of ice cream, swam in the (chilly) pool, celebrated Easter, took Amber for long walks on the (windy) beach, and watched the Masters. We wrapped up our NCAA bracket challenge (I WON!!) by watching the Final Four and Championship games. And we enjoyed being away from our normal routine, and spending time with each other!

The wind was really good for one thing, though: flying a kite! Sweet Pea and I went out for a while and it was the easiest kite flying I've ever done. The kite sailed up in the sky immediately and never swooped down.

My dad joined us for the first half of the week, and it was so lovely having him there. He's always up for a bike ride, or a walk on the beach, or ice cream!

We played several rounds of mini golf, and Sweet Pea won the second one! MJ is convinced that something went wrong with CC's scorekeeping, but Sweet Pea was positively crowing about it.

The kids created their own version of Uno: a cheating-only version! It requires you to cheat as much as possible to get rid of your cards. I don't think I've ever heard the kids laugh so hard. The girls told me that when Little Man stood up after the game was over, about 100 cards fell out of his pants!

All in all, it was a nice week despite the weather. But I don't think you'll catch the Morrisons at the beach for spring break again. But since we've already gone to the beach this year, I wonder where we'll go this summer?

He is Risen!

Happy Easter from the beach!

Carmina Burana: Cirque Style

I've always loved the music from Carmina Burana, so I was really excited when Sweet Pea's cirque company was asked to participate in an aerial and dance performance to the music, accompanied by the symphony and an opera chorus. It was her first time performing to live music, and the show was amazing! She and her cirque bestie, Joni, both say it's their favorite show ever.

She was in four scenes, and performed a variety of dance, silks, and partner acro. I especially loved that she did duo silks, which she'd never done before. It was so beautiful! Sweet Pea was almost always in the middle of the stage, which made it easy for us to see her and enjoy the show. 

Direct link to video: https://youtu.be/gswjogVn6rQ
(Special thanks to another cirque mom who took these videos!)

Note: this was the first time I've put my new-ish Canon R6 through its paces in a low-light, fast-action environment, and I was really happy with the results! 

CC's Dance

CC had her first high school dance last night! Hers is an arts school, so they don't have any sports teams, hence there was no Homecoming dance last fall. But the school planned a "Cupid Ball" for this month, and CC immediately invited a friend of hers from middle school to attend. She couldn't wait to introduce Vanessa to all her high school friends!

Camry came over to get ready with CC and Vanessa, and they all got along great. I took some pictures, then drove them to the school where they linked up with a lot of other friends.

Afterwards they reported that the dance was "not worth the hype." MJ and I laughed. There was hype for a high school dance?! I told the kids that next time, they could volunteer to be part of the dance committee. And then they could see how hard it is to plan an event, pull it off, and try to make everyone happy!

Despite their complaints, they were all smiles when they came out. They'd taken a ton of pictures, and they happily chatted about how everyone looked and danced. I suspect they secretly had a great time. CC's first high school dance was a success!

Six in Texas

One of Hayden's birthday gifts was tickets to see Six in Fort Worth -- with us! She and my girls were completely surprised -- they had no idea that Susan and I have been planning this for the last few months. And yes, the show was on Valentine's night and Susan's birthday, but she gave up her own celebration so we could have our special night together.

Our flight on Saturday morning was canceled, but fortunately we were re-booked on a flight that arrived just two hours later. On the way home from the airport, we stopped at Altar'd State (CC's favorite store -- so girly!) to get a necklace for Susan, when lo and behold, CC spotted the perfect dress to wear to next week's school dance. And shockingly, Sweet Pea saw a dress she liked! This is the child who lives in leggings and hoodies. I would have been less surprised if Little Man had asked for a dress. I happily shelled out the cash!

Then it was off to the house to change before dinner. Dane and Jon joined us for Tex-Mex at everyone's favorite place: Lupe Tortilla. After eating ourselves silly and toasting to Susan's birthday, the boys headed home and the girls headed to the theater. One of my favorite memories of the weekend is all of us belting out the soundtrack in the car. Everyone was so excited -- Six is one of our favorite musicals!

We'd each dressed in the colors of a different queen: CC was Catherine Howard (pink); Sweet Pea was Anne of Cleves (red); Hayden was Anne Boleyn (green); Susan was Catherine Parr (blue); and I was Catherine of Aragon (gold). No love for Jane Seymour, apparently. 

The theater was gorgeous! Susan and I sat behind the three girls, and we had a great view of the stage. The show was amazing, and our only complaints were that Susan sat next to a very smelly man, and I sat next to a woman who sang along to every song. Grrr.

After dinner, we celebrated Susan's birthday (one day late). She opened her cards and gifts, and just as she was needling Jon about not getting her a birthday cake this year, he magically unveiled a cookie cake from her favorite bakery. Her expression was priceless! 

The rest of the visit was shopping, eating, seeing Hayden swim at a meet, the girls giving themselves facial masks, and watching movies at the house. The girls enlisted Dane in playing their own version of Headbandz, and Susan and I loved hearing their giggles from downstairs.

Don't worry -- Little Man had a great weekend, too! He and MJ played tennis, met Grandpa and Grandma for lunch, and watched tons of Olympic coverage. MJ was supposed to leave Monday morning for a business trip, so Pepere came to town to hang out with Little Man. He took him go-carting and to Barnes & Noble, which Little Man loved. And at the last minute, MJ's trip was canceled, so it's the best of both worlds -- we got Pepere and we keep MJ for the week. Hooray!

Happy Valentine's Day!

We're off in different directions today -- the girls and I on an adventure, while MJ and Little Man have a boys' weekend. "We're probably going to watch a bunch of movies that you wouldn't approve of," Little Man informed me.

Happy Valentine's Day!