Homemade Bowling, Potty Treats, Online deals and random finds

We went bowling recently which spurred on a homemade daily occurrence at the Michaelis' household.

Plastic cups and a spiderman ball

We either roll, kick, or throw the ball at the cups - whichever gets the job done

Sometimes our efforts throw us off our feet

Even daddy gets in on the action

This is how great pictures are taken - by laying on the uncomfortable wood floors.

Justin is tickling me to get me to smile - he's apparently learned from the best.

And someone has gone doo doo in the potty the last two days! I know this may offend some, but this is a big endeavor in the direction of casual potty training. We got to go get Mac and Doc to add to our ever loving Cars obsession. We have been wearing underwear (Cars, of course) around the house and on the occasional errand, but still in pull ups at naptime and bedtime. Taking it slow - why rush?


On a different note, Children's Place has 25& off the entire site for the next two days. Including the sale items. So get to ordering by using code: S2DSE at checkout.

And GAP has 30% their entire site and in stores until Sunday. Use the online code: L9L226CRGRJL


And a few things I have stumbled upon recently. Look at this cute cowboy shower

And you might be itching to host a back to school party

Or get your child a playtime door hanger

It's raining and Justin is napping, so I think I might go enjoy the rainy day. With the joys of getting older, also come the random stories. My son was asking Shannon to please get him water and Derek to please get him milk the other night at dinner. Where do they get this stuff?

Baby Love

Though the Lord has not blessed me with another baby, he has filled that need through the slew of babies that have been born in the last year. I've had the privilege of taking some photos for their mommies. Some of these are newer than others, and some I took for announcements (but don't worry, I didn't blow the surprise so I chose another photo instead).

Levi Grotti back in January

Hallie Heitzmann back in January

This was Miss Payton Brown back in March.

Riley Thomas back in April

Ainsley Pine back in April

Anna Bethancourt back in June

Master Clark Svoboda a few weeks ago (and only 2 days old!)

Brooks Jurgensen a few weeks ago

Blake Haas this past week

Such cutie patooties! I know my passion is shooting kids, but you just can't beat a smiling bundle of joy!

4th of July

After celebrating my grandmother's 80th, most of the 96 family members drove home (most live in the Houston metroplex) and the rest of the Morby crew stayed for the holiday weekend. It's been a long time since all 25 of us have been in Galveston together. We only have a 3 bedroom house in Pirates Beach, so some of us rented a house off 37th street and the Seawall. Such a great location, a large house, and only 2 blocks from the beach on the Seawall. though we only slept there, it was nice to have 10 people to a room back at our beachhouse.

The morning of the 4th we walked to the Seawall and my dad and Justin tried out the water. My lens was fogging up from coming out of the AC, but it still made for a cool photo.

Ironically, my grandparents and all the younger cousins and spouses were the only ones that stayed at the beachhouse. The night prior some had decorated the new golfcart to participate in the neighborhood parade. I've never really been to it much less participated in it. Let's just say we didn't realize how competitive it was. The rest of our family was on the receiving end of the parade, so cousin Ginger took this photo of me taking a photo of them.

My dad brought his stash of Snicker bars from his Starburst tournament (the big kind), and I've never seen grown adults fight for a candy bar like they did on that day. "Big candy bars!" was heard after we would throw our treats out. You would see dogs spray painted in wagons, and all sorts of riding devices.

Lots of people had a theme, like pirates or "We've been Iked". This one was our fave from the movie Up. See Kevin on top? And the crew inside was dressed like the characters on the show.

I kid you not by saying that there were hundreds of golfcarts present when we drove up. Next year game on from the Morby crew.

Hilary & Kaki did a great job of making ours festive, but we had no idea of the league we were messing with.

Here's the rest of the clan waiting for our cart at the end of the parade.

Then it was off to the beach to enjoy the beautiful weather. Justin and Derek rode the boogey board all morning long catching waves.

And then Justin milked his way around anyone in the water. I think everyone eventually played with him out in the water. Here's cousin Hilary and Joannie.

There were lots of hermit crabs, and Joannie, our animal lover, was showing Justin what they looked like. She even wanted to help one crab get into a bigger shell - he looked cramped, after all.

My dad & Justin. For as long as I can remember my dad and mom would wear these sunglass holders so that the waves wouldn't wash away their glasses.

And everyone played "aggie golf" as we liked to call it.

I found out once I got there that my mom had included in one of her planning emails that we were to wear red, white, and blue for a big family photo on Saturday. I think the month of June into July I truthfully spaced out on most of my emails. I was bummed that I wore my nice red shirt to the reunion, which meant it was all smelly. So I had to wear a blue shirt instead. Those who know me know that I don't love wearing blue. We never get ready at the beach, so it was interesting to having a ton of ladies use hairdryers and such all in a short time frame. I used the CHI on my mom's hair, and my aunt Joannie got the same treatment from her daughter, Hilary. Even Amy got her hair straightened.

Amy & Grandma were singing a hymn together.

Justin and I swinging in the new hammock.

Justin fell asleep on the way back form the beach earlier that afternoon. We threw him in the shower to get the sand off but didn't use soap. So a long nap and sunscreen mixed with sweat later produced a fine mix of hair. Here is a cheese face with Aunt Elise.

And the family photo. It was Ginger's idea for this pose, all of us crowded on a picnic table. The ladies on the second to last row had to sit on their knees. My son was being uncharacteristically camera shy, so I had to hit the timer on my tripod, run and get on my knees, and hold squirm boy up for the photo. This is the best on we had. And after all that stressing it didn't even matter what shirt I wore since you can't even see what I am wearing!

Then we took some family photos. Justin changed tunes and immediately started smiling once he decided to be a part of the Greg Morby bunch. Here they are as the kids are all giving us a hard time for the photo. Hey little man on the picnic table!

Some of the guys had played golf and had just gotten back right before photos. Derek got sick on the course, some type of cold/flu that stuck around for a week until it went on to a sinus infection. So kudos to Derek for giving us a smile even though he didn't feel good at all. In fact he went back to Houston an hour later to go get a good night's rest, only to find out that the electricity in our neighborhood was out for a few hours. Not his night.

Amy with a clothes pin to hide any unwarranted body parts flying out of the dress. You've got to hand it to her for her modesty.

Then Grandpa took out some of the kids with Justin lodge in as well. They said he had a blast. So did mommy in her peacefulness without him.

Then we headed back to the rental house where 2 streets up at the Seawall the huge annual fireworks show for Galveston was taking place at 9pm. Justin was so excited about the fireworks, that somehow I never took the time to explain what they really were!? So as we stood under the war of the world, he was frightened by the whole thing. So my mom took him home while Aaron, Elise, my dad, and I felt the whole thing. I'm not kidding - the ground shook we were so close.

I took my tripod to take some delayed photos, but we were so close that it wasn't dark at all. So I just took them on automatic.

I could barely get the whole thing in my camera since it was so close.

You've gotta love those fireworks.

The big finale.

So thankful for our freedom, or what's left of it these days.

King Reunion

It was my Grandmother's 80th birthday, and her wish for a party was to resurrect our Family Reunion that we used to host in Galveston every other year. My great-grandparents, Leon & Evelyn King, used to be the patriarchs until they died in the last 10 years. But they left a huge legacy of family members behind. Though not all of the extended members could come, we still had 96 people come for the day's festivities. We hosted the day before July 4th, so most people had that day as a holiday.

The Morby beachhouse always has the school flags to represent all the colleges that we went to. We also have an Arkansas flag not represented in the photo. Please notice that we don't promote any "Whoop!".

Valerie had all 6 family lines categorized by color and then Kaki printed off name tags with the corresponding color. it was helpful for me since I had not seen some of these people in 10 years. Though we had not had a reunion in several years, I had missed the last few due to living elsewhere during baseball years.

My aunt Joannie & uncle Tim got photos from the immediate family to put this together of the life of Doris Morby. Some great photos in there, including some of her as a baby.

Lines of cars parked in the vacant lot across the street.

Bubble boy

One of my second cousins (or cousin once removed, however you want to say it) has 4 boys under the age of 5. They all have superhero names - here are Wes, Banner, & Parker.

Though at times there were kids in the pool, a lot of adults decided to cool off in it instead.

Justin insisted he go in the paddleboat. Luckily someone brought a life jacket small enough for him.

Very nervous once he got in.

One of the few smiles Justin gave me during his thoughtful paddleboat ride.

Never had a King reunion without an egg toss.

My dad, Derek, and my mom catching eggs.

Justin was beside himself everytime his daddy caught his egg. Here is his celebration cheer.

Hilary, me, Elise, Ginger, & Valerie.

All the boy cousins were shooting water balloons with a big slingshot at passing boats in the canal.

The big 8-0.

Singing happy birthday to my precious grandmother.

My Grandma is the oldest of 6.

This is all the direct bloodline. So no spouses were present in the photo. Crazy how many of us are running around with King blood in our veins.

Grandma with most of her granddaughters - me, Hilary, Valerie, & Ginger

Sweaty sister-in-laws

I tried to do a herky for this photo - didn't get that much air to attempt it properly.

Cousin Carter and Justin looking at the canal water

I love trying to catch a sunbeam in the sky

Catching a ride from cousin Clay

Justin had an absolute blast with all the fellas. Carter, Grant, Clay, & Dawson were all so great in wrestling with a little boy full of energy.

Dawson & Justin watching Shane hit golfballs in the water.

A great time was had by all in Galveston.