Ian Snell

Quick! Tell me everything you know about Ian Snell.

Oh, you've never heard of him either?

Charlie has. We were watching a baseball game the other day. Cardinals v. Mariners. (Because that's what the boys do. They watch sports. All. Day. Long.) Albert Pujols got hit by a ball as he was running home. We were talking about Pujols. Of course the boys know who Pujols is. I know who Pujols is.

Suddenly, Charlie stopped and said, mostly to himself, "Is that Ian Snell?" He looked closer at the Mariners pitcher. "Yes. It is. Huh. Ian Snell." The thing is, I swear the shot on TV was of the guy's face. You couldn't even see the name on the back of his jersey.

Cort looked at Charlie and asked, "Who's Ian Snell?" My 39-year-old rabid-sports-fan husband is asking his 6-year-old son about baseball players.

"He's the pitcher. He used to play for the Pirates. He pitched against the Astros last year when we played the Pirates."

Sure enough. Confirmed via the internet. Ian Snell did, indeed, play for the Pirates last year. And he pitched against the Astros on June 7. Over a year ago. And now you know.

Imagine

Charlie and Joseph are unlike most other kids, or me when I was a kid. I loved imaginative play. I could make up anything. Charlie and Joe, on the other hand, tend to focus on the real, here, and now.

This was apparent at the Mad Hatter Arts Camp they attended. They loved it, and they came home with some really neat artwork.

But one of the exercises was interesting to me. The kids were to create their own planet. It could be anything they wanted--whatever their mind could come up with. The sky was the limit on what they could create.

Both of my boys created Pluto. Because, you know, it's not a planet anymore. So they made it one.

Charlie's (and Joseph's and Will's and Helen's) Dad

Happy Father's Day to the best dad in the whole world!

It's no secret that both the kids and I think that Cort is an amazing father. This Father's Day, I wanted the world (well, more like our limited blog readership) know that others recognize this too.

This is an email that Charlie's teacher, Ms. Nelson, wrote to Cort after he chaperoned a class field trip:


From: "Nelson, Melanie J"
Date: April 2, 2010 4:27:29 PM CDT
To: "'cmaddux@**********
Subject: "Charlie's dad"

Hi!

I just want to write and personally tell you what an honor it was to be in your presence on our field trip Wednesday. I talked with Amy after school that day and shared a few thoughts about our day, and my gratitude, and have since realized that I must personally tell you my same "thinkings".

I sat with Charlie and Kody for some of the way back to school. Charlie was crying because he was missing you. At first I tried to talk with him about his tears, and after a few exchanges of words and thoughts, I decided that I couldn't help him feel better. He missed you and needed to cry, so I let him.

I know why Charlie was crying. I know why he missed you. You are an amazing dad. You share respect, and thoughtfulness, and energy, and fun, and honor age-appropriate expectations of children by holding them accountable for what they are capable of doing. You are an organizer, a caregiver, and every teacher's dream of "a dad" for a field trip!

When I looked at Charlie in his "window seat" on the bus on Wednesday afternoon I thought about the dad that he will be when he grows up. He will be so much of you, and for that I am thankful.

Melanie

We are thankful too. Happy Father's Day!

How We Do It

"How do you do it?" I get this question a lot when people hear we have two sets of twins.

Some people do it with the help of family nearby. Some people have a nanny. Some quit their jobs to become stay-at-home moms.

The following pictures describe how we do it.

This is the back yard. Those are weeds, not shrubbery.


These are the shoes that Charlie and Joseph gathered to donate to Haiti. For their birthday. Three months ago. They have been sitting in our dining room all this time. [Update: We finally shipped the shoes off a couple of weeks ago.]

This is my bedside table. Off to the right is our bed, which we have not made in years.

This is a corner of our bedroom. I'm not sure of it's purpose, other than it used to be an open space, so it got filled with stuff. There are several backpacks (why do we have several backpacks?), a posterboard with Joseph's school project (are we keeping it? I don't know), and miscellaneous other things (although I have no idea, really, what things).

These are all of Charlie and Joseph's book. We removed them from their room last September because they were reading instead of sleeping during the night. And we threw them all into this huge, bulging box. Where they have remained ever since. We only read the ones on top now.

This is our old mattress and box springs standing up against the wall in our bedroom. As of last month, it is actually gone. But it was there for eleven months before we got rid of it.

This is a little settee in our bedroom, piled high with clothes we need to donate, and probably some other stuff. None of it -- not even the settee -- belongs in our bedroom.

A few months ago, I started a project to clean out my closet. I put the clothes I intended to get rid of on the ground next to the bathtub. I never finished the project, and the clothes are still there. If I take a bath, I just use them as a bath mat.

This is the duffel bag with all of our ski stuff. It is sitting in the hallway. We went skiing in March. I haven't unpacked yet.

This is our wall in the entry way. We used to have a decorative shelf there. Sometime before Christmas, the shelf fell down, leaving these huge holes. They are one of the first things that people see when they walk into our house. Since I took this picture, we have added a larger hole, courtesy of the door handle and the lack of a door stop.

We do it by completely neglecting every other aspect of our lives.

B-ball with Budinger

Being 6-year-old sports fanatics with a sports-crazed father has its advantages. Especially when Dad has, loosely, "connections" and doesn't mind spending a little dough.

Our friend Derek works for Rusty Hardin, who has floor seat season tickets to the Rockets. Because of those premiere season tickets, Rusty gets invited to things like Shane Battier's charity auction. Because Derek works for Rusty, he gets handed the tickets to events like these. Because Cort loves sports so much, he is the first person that Derek (and many of our other friends) think of when they have extra tickets to sports-related events. And that is the long story of how Cort got to Shane Battier's charity auction, where he was in hog heaven meeting and hanging out with Rockets, Astros, and Texans players.

Cort also has a certain weakness for silent auctions. And that is the short story of how he ended up bidding on, and winning, a visit from Rockets rookie Chase Budinger, who came over last month to play a little hoops with our boys. And Derek's two kids, and an extra friend of the boys that we invited over because he loves sports too.

Chase was somewhat quiet but very nice, and the kids had a lot of fun. Almost as much fun as the dads did watching them. He played a little game against the kids - 5 on 1 (on a 6-foot goal) - and also did a few alley oops with them and showed off his dunking skills (with the goal raised back to 10 feet). It was a fun afternoon, and our boys loved it.

Chase posing with the kiddos


De-fense!


Clearing the court!


A shot from Charlie


A shot from Joe


Man to man


Slam dunk!



Alley oop!


Assisted dunk


Helen getting in on the action

Wordless Wednesday

Guys and Gals

Memorial Day weekend, Cort took Charlie and Joseph to Oklahoma for a stay with Gramma. At the last minute when he was booking the plane tickets, he decided to bring Will along for the ride. A boys' weekend.

That left just me and Helen at home. A girls' weekend. (It was also the very first time, in the 6+ years since I have become a parent, that I have had only one child.)

Everyone had a lot of fun. The boys started their weekend off right with lunch at Robert's in El Reno on their way from the airport to Gramma's house. (I have been to Robert's. Yum!) They also had a lot of fun playing at Gramma's, Charlie and Joseph got to hang out on the farm with Cort and his good friend Justin and family, and they all got to see a lot of Oklahoma relatives. And can you believe it, the Big XII baseball championship, which just happened to be between A&M and Baylor, was in Oklahoma City. Of course, Dad got tickets for his boys, and everyone had a great time. (Gig 'Em!)

Burgers at Roberts


One of many fun toys at Gramma's house - some sort of magnetic mosaic thing that they loved


Some of the fun at the farm

Meanwhile, I asked Helen what she wanted to do for our girls' weekend, and she said, "Go to Target!" That's my girl! So we did - twice. We also had a little girls' lunch. And, of course, we painted our nails. Pinkalicious toes and sparkly fingers. For both of us. We also played LOTS of games - Candyland, Memory, Bingo, and Dominoes. She's started to get games, and it looks like she's going to love them as much as her big brothers!

We had a really nice time together, but she was very glad to see Daddy and Will come home on Monday.

Helping at Target


Lunch with Mom at Pie in the Sky


Pretty toes!


Playing Candyland

Charlie and Joseph stayed in Oklahoma with Gramma for another week and had a WONDERFUL time. They were busy, busy, busy. Swimming, miniature golf, and a trip to a really cool place called Leonardo's Discovery Warehouse, to name just a few things they did.

The next weekend, Gramma flew home with Charlie and Joseph and everyone was finally back home together. Cort and I sat in our house on that Sunday with four kids running around crazy and screaming at the top of their lungs. It was complete chaos. And we were so glad to have that back.

The boy loves his sports

Here's something else I found while cleaning out stuff the other day. This one is Charlie's. Most of Charlie's "artwork" consists of pictures of baseball diamonds, football fields, or basketball courts. This is none of those, so it took me a little while to figure it out. Then I remembered. This is a picture from February. During the Olympics. Can you guess what it is?

Curling.

The boy does love his sports.

Countrys

I found this while cleaning out a bunch of stuff the other day. This is Joe's handwriting. I had to count the number of countries he named.

1. Austaia [Australia]
2. United States of America
3. New Z [New Zealand]
4. Brisil [Brazil]
5. Canada
6. Finland
7. Norway
8. Avganaskanastan [Afghanistan]
9. Beros [Belarus, I think]
10. Netherlands
11. Astuia [Austria]
12. Corea [Korea]
13. Italy
14. Rusa [Russia]
15. Franse [France]
16. China
17. Jappan [Japan]
18. Greenland
19. Spane [Spain]
20. Porcible [Portugal, I think]
21. Belgum [Belgium]
22. Swedden [Sweden]
23. Switerland [Switzerland]
24. Irand [Iran]
25. Chek Rebalik [Czech Republic]
26. Bosnahereyervia [Bosnia-Herzegovina]
27. Sevia [Serbia, I think]
28. Iceland
29. Libra [Libya]
30. Great Briten [Great Britain]
31. Veniswaly [Venezuela]
32. Colambia [Colombia]
33. Coet [never did figure this one out - any guesses?]
34. Argentina
35. Cile [Chile]
36. Mexi [obviously Mexico, guess he was getting lazy]
37. Camenen Ilends [Cayman Islands]
38. Satia Radia [Saudi Arabia]
39. Indea [India]
40. Tyland [Thailand]
41. Irek [Iraq]

I'm pretty sure he didn't just copy these down from somewhere. If he had, he would have spelled more of them correctly. He just knows these. Notice how many of them are also grouped geographically. Wow.

All Stars!

T-ball season has ended, but goodness we had soooo much fun!

Both of the boys did GREAT! Their team, the Timber Rattlers, finished just ahead of the middle of the pack. That turned out well, because they were good enough to win several games (and, of course, winning is always more fun), but not so good that everything got too competitive. The boys were two of the better players on the team and loved every minute of it. They were even selected for the All Star team and played in two All Star games on the last day of the season. We were so proud of our All Stars!! (In fact, Charlie had a catch in the first All Star game that was the best catch I saw all season!)

The baseball bug has hit hard in the Maddux family. The boys are attending a baseball camp this summer, and they've ganged up with their dad to convince me that they should play baseball again in the fall, too. (Along with soccer, whew!) I have to admit, though, that I love baseball, too. And I love seeing my boys play it. Helen and Will can't wait to be next. Although they've got a couple of years, they attended every game, sometimes wearing their baseball gloves, and loved to run the bases after the game was over.

Here are some pictures from the season:

Charlie warming up


Joe warming up


Joe's got interesting form


Charlie in the field


Joe ready


Our lefty at bat


A big hit!


Ready to run


One run in!


A hit for Joe!


Eyeing home plate


Score!


Rattlers' team meeting after the game (Will and Helen always insisted on being a part of this)


Joseph, with his coach and assistant coach Dad, getting his trophy


Charlie with coaches getting his trophy



The 2010 Timbergrove Timber Rattlers!

Guess what?

Joseph has a way of telling stories these days that is cute, but also a little exhausting. It requires a little too much participation. It goes something like this.

Hey Mom. Guess what.
What?
When we were at Gramma's, guess what.
What?
She took us to play putt putt. And guess what.
What?
There was something really cool on hole 9. Guess what it was.
What?
There was this thing, and you had to hit the ball over it, and guess
what.
What?
When you hit the ball over it, there was a hole on the other side.
And guess what.
What?
I the ball three times trying to get the ball over the thing. And
then I finally got it over the thing. And then, guess what.
What?
Then it went into the hole. And it was a par 2.

Barbell guy

Thought I should feature one of Joseph's school projects too. This is . . .

Barbell guy. Made with recycled materials. He loved doing this, and was quite proud.

Aerodynamics

This afternoon the boys played a football game with Claire, their babysitter. During halftime they went into the "locker room" and told her they were working on their strategy so she couldn't come in. Whereupon they cut off a bunch of their hair so they could run faster.