Happy Birthday Grandpa

Saturday the 7th was Grandpas 81st birthday bash. It's so awesome that he is still able to enjoy all the days that go by. He had a pretty good turnout, as A&B, L&T, Mom, dad, T&B&S, B from Arkansas, and all of our kids were able to make it.

All things good must come to an end.... again!

Memorial Day has come and gone... snif-snif. A great beautiful weekend! Yeah, it may have rained every day, but that didn't stop the Fox family from having fun and enjoying all that God has to give.

We had a late celebration for D's 14th birthday. We partied-hardy at the home. Grams, Gramps, Mom & Dad attended, and Chris and Randy made an appearance as well. Our Saturday evening was spent eating some BBQ'd hamburgers and hot dogs. What better way to spend a memorial day weekend! Everyone left stuffed as usual and I had my normal "bload-and-almost-get-sick-becuase-I'm-so-stuffed" party afterwards.

Sunday my outdoor thermometer read 96 degrees! So we decided to go fishing and get sunburned too! It was a lot of fun. Evan had the catch-of-the-day landing a nice size cat. It put up a little 'fight' for him too!

Monday I tried out the Jalapeño recipe that I posted earlier this month. Here are some pictures (as promised) with a condensed recipe.


Get a Jalapeño Corer. (You can find this at Cabellas or on-line)












Stuff some creme cheese into a cake decorator bag. One bar of creme cheese will fill about 12 med to large size Jalapeños.











Cut them tops off.













Fill'er up!














Wrap'em with bacon, stick'em with toothpicks, and lay on a foil sheet.













Grill'em for 30 minutes over indirect heat. Bacon should be crispy. Enjoy.

Happy Tornado, errr... Mothers Day...

It's been a weird start of 2008 as far as the weather is concerned. Missouri only has 50 tornadoes per year on average, and as of today Missouri has seen a total of 108 tornadoes this year! Yikes.

My week was pretty serene. I went to Dallas Wednesday (which took forever due to the airplane dodging all the thunderstorms that were lined up from Texas to Missouri. They even had DFW shut down, so there towards the end, we had to dodge some other airplanes that were circling while we tried to make it into love field.

By the way- the picture to the left is real. This picture was caught in June of 2004 somewhere in Kansas. You can read about it on APOD's web site here.

But today was Mothers day, and that's the important thing here! I'm glad I can look beyond the beatings of the wooden spoon and being grounded for taking that extra soda pop! Life was good growing up, and it's in large part to mom. I still remember like it was yesterday those days mom picking me up from pre-school. We usually would walk, and I can remember the thrill of seeing mom's head come up from around the hill on the side of the street. I remember all the times she would show up to my school functions (and usually bring Grandma with her)! She kept us busy in the summer and always had something fun to do for us. I know I taxed her big time through life though, but it wasn't anything a wooden spoon couldn't take care of! To this day, my bro and I still can't count how many wooden spoons that were (rightfully) broken over our b-hinds!

We did a lot of mothers day stuff today. We started out by celebrating Dana's motherly being, and then followed up by seeing Dana's mom. We then went over to moms for a bit and also gave mom and dad their anniversary card. It will be their 35th this coming Tuesday! We even made it back out to see them this evening and shared a few laughs with them. Grandma and Grandpa were there as well! It was a swell day!

No MOre Trash weekend

Today was our first No MOre Trash pickup day. Doing something like this makes you more 'trash-wise', as D found out; that just because the bottle says Pepsi on it,... doesn't necessarily mean that's what's in the bottle! Pepsi is usually darker and not the pee color as shown in his photograph above! I won't tell you if he actually smelled it or not to be certain! He was also the lucky finder of a dollar bill. We (M, D, A, D, J, E) picked up mostly beer cans and plastic bottles. It took us around 3 hours to clean a 2 mile stretch. That included 16 trash bags, 2 buckets, and a street sign in our inventory for the day. We ended up by Kaity's Pizza, and the owner asked us what we were doing, and we explained. He was very gracious and ended up giving us our lunch for free! That was great, and I think the kids got a better feeling for why we were volunteering our time and what it means to volunteer!

We spent the rest of the evening over at D's mom's house. Her Grandma was in town from Marble Falls, TX. It was good to see them. I met them for the first time last year when I had a conference in San Antonio. D and I both went, and were able to spend a day with them. Tom is married to her Grandma, and he is retired and works for a ranch. Her Grandma is a postal delivery driver.

Now, I'm about ready to collapse! It was a great weekend; but I'm darn tired! Till next time.

A great weekend

No no no no!!! Another great weekend is coming to an end! D and I were kidless this weekend. Saturday we worked on the boat. Dad came over to help and we were able to get the main portion of the floor riveted on.

Saturday we took a ride across 58-Hwy all the way to Kingsville, MO, home of the great Stahl Foundry. It's one of the largest permanent mold aluminum foundries in the country.

We then went back through Harrisonville and we stopped by a cemetery that is of all placed, right off of 291 North, just about 1 mile north of Harrisonville. I've seen it there many times, but it's hard to see. If you blink you will miss it.

View Larger Map

And when I say it's right off the road, I'm mean it's right there! I'm surprised a car hasn't veered off the road plowing down the only two tombstones that stand!

Mr Harris and his wife are here. I figured he was the founder of Harrisonville or something, but after a quick Google, I found out he was appointed as town commissioner on April 8, 1837. That's all it says about him.

After picking up the kids, we ate, and then went to the Park. A and I walked the dogs, and D and J played catch and ball.

Hopefully the weather cooperates through next weekend. We have a road cleanup / trash pickup scheduled for next weekend. Our FIRST ONE!

Land of Delmar... reighn doth he...

The mighty Delmaro stand guard over his land and sea. Free to roam and free to be. He showth no sign of backing though backward.

Anyway, it was an awesome weekend! D and I spent Saturday at Truman Lake.

I was able to mow the lawn as well, as the grass in the back was quite tall. I'm pretty sure that old-man-winter is gone until next season. I just hope that we get a little time to enjoy the weather without using the heater or air conditioner too much. My thermometer showed 70 degrees today (although it was in direct sunlight). I think it was more like 65 or so.

I was able to work a little bit on the boat as well. Truman lake must of had over 100 fishing boats on it this week. Here are a few more pictures taken on the other side of Truman dam.