If I could, I would fill my house with flowers. Every room. All the time. Perpetual flowers.(Kind of like the tulip explosion that happened at Amanda’s this past Sunday – wink, wink).

I just love flowers. Millie does too. So whenever she says to me, “Mom, can we get some flowers?” the answer is almost always, okay, it is always, “YES!”

When Millie and I were out doing our grocery shopping last week I just couldn’t resist these pale pink tulips. Millie picked the white flowers.

Aren’t the so sweet, and delicate? Don’t you wish your cheeks were this hue.

And whenever we get flowers we always get a little bouquet for Millie’s room.

I think that flowers are a manifestation of God’s profound love for us.  Seriously, I do.  They are with us at our happiest moments – weddings, baby blessings, holiday gatherings — and are equally welcome at the times when we feel our most profound grief – funerals, next to our sick bed etc.

And wonder of wonders, on any ordinary day, we can put them on our kitchen counters or on our little girl’s night stand.

All that beauty, all that creativity, all that goodness – a little handful of heaven for us to enjoy on earth. Now that is what I call LOVE!

And you know what that means, don’t ya?

Those winter layers are being peeled off and out come the very best thing about summer…

BABIES THIGHS!

Seriously, people! Have you seen anything cuter than this?!

Somebody hold me up to keep me from expiring due to a cuteness overload.

As Jan would say, “MERCY!”

Just to warn you – this post might get mushy. I can’t pretend to be neutral or indifferent about his man.

You see, he is my dad – and he also happens to be my hero.

I adore him right down to his socks.

And if you are lucky enough to know him you will know exactly why I am not going to hold back. If this post were a food, you’d think it was oat meal. So let the mushy times roll, says I.

When my dad was in high school he had a nick-name. They called him “Cuteness” because quite frankly, he was DARLING. I would have loved to have known him in those days. I think he would have been a blast to hang out with.

It takes a real man to carry off a nick-name like that and still have the respect of all his peers and teachers. Even though he wore the wrong  jeans, an absolute SIN in high school, my mom couldn’t help but fall in love with him. He had rosy cheeks. You heard me, ROSY cheeks! And I imagine that his goodness beamed out of his bright shiny face punctuated by those rosy cheeks.

That young boy who played the accordion, was the editor of the high school year book, the star of the play, beloved by all (especially an equally DARLING girl named Khali Johnson) grew up to marry said darling girl, Khali Johnson, and in time became my dad. Something that I thank Heavenly Father for on a regular basis.

Let me tell you a little about this wonder, my father, L. Kevin Kelly.

His first name should be Sunshine because the man is always positive. He always sees the best in every situation and always sees the best in people. He is positive at his very core. This makes him quite a pleasant fellow to be around.

He is a worker. The man is constantly in motion. He works like a maniac. He is driven and yet the miracle of it all is that he is calm. We used to joke that the only way you could tell he was mad was because his eyelids would start to flutter. No yelling or carrying on – just a slight fluttering of the eyelids. Since he’s become a professor at the BY he has gotten a little, just a little mind you, cranky. I blame the students.  He loves them but they can drive him a little nuts.

He is devoted to the Lord. And he knows how to pray. Sometimes his evening prayers last for hours and he isn’t even a bishop anymore! He is a tremendously humble and devoted servant of the Lord. When he prays he gets answers – I think it is because he is trustworthy. And you know how I mentioned that he is a worker – he loves to work for the Lord. And he doesn’t complain, ever, about what has do for the Him.

He is talented and smart – but here is the kicker NO EGO. My dad really doesn’t have one. He doesn’t care about Kevin Kelly getting noticed or getting praise, he just wants to do his best. If his best gets chucked on the ground and stomped all over he just shrugs his shoulders and carrys on working. No harm done to his ego, because he ain’t got one.

He is a talker. And he will tell you all about it (whatever it may be) and he wont leave out any details. Somehow he’ll cram every last detail into the story he is telling you.

He loves to help people. He loves connecting people together. Need a job in advertising? Call my dad. He will use whatever connection he has to help you find one. He is always looking for ways to further the good of other people – help them to get ahead in their careers etc. If he has any power he uses it for the benefit of helping those around him.

He is a wonderful singer. Whenever we go to visit my parents in UT  I always want to sit next to my dad at church so that we can sing together. He happens to think I have a swell voice and because of that I think I sing more beautifully when I am next to him. He brings out the best in me. He is also a wonderful composer. And has composed a few awesome dittys on that there accordion. He doesn’t just look good holding it. He can actually play that sucker! Which leads me to another cool thing about my dad – he makes the best of whatever situation he is in. He wishes he could play the piano, but doesn’t let that stop him from composing songs on his accordion. He finds a way. He just burrows and burrows until he makes his way to the top. Where the sun is shinning and the future is bright.

He wants the best for others. He really does. He doesn’t have a jelous or unkind bone in his entire body.

He is FUN! So much fun! He is the best person in the world to travel with because he hardly gets stressed and just enjoys everything. He can also read a map like nobody’s business. (This makes him highly suspicious of my GPS, but that is okay. I can let him off the hook for that.) He is also a wonderful dancer. As a teenager he was always the one I wanted to dance with at the stake dance. Luckily for me he was busy serving the Lord at those stake dances so I got quite a few dances in.

He is also a little nuts. He dances in the living room, runs in the rain, does a mean inpersonation of river dance…you get the picture.

He is the kind of person I CRAVE. I just want to be near him. I want to talk to him and get his perspective.I want to laugh with him. Hear about his projects. I trust him so much and I trust that he has my best interest at heart.

I love you, dad.

Thank you for loving mom. For loving all us kids (including the kids that married your kids and then had kids of their own a.k.a your grandkids). Thank you for providing for all of us and sending us on adventures and missions and to boarding school and for paying for our weddings, our college educations, our socks, underwear and pop-tarts.

Thank you for showing me how to be a kind and loving person by being one yourself. Thank you for your testimony. Thank you for your good heart. Thank you for everything!!!

I have so much happiness in my life and I feel that it is because you chose happiness by choosing to love us and serve us and lead by example. Just like Dicken’s description of the Brothers Cheerible (did I spell that right Allan?) you are surrounded by happiness of your own making.

Happy Birthday to the most wonderful dad in all the land.

1st good deed: Reading to my child. I am reading a book to Millie called “Totto-Chan, The little Girl at the Window”.  A true story of a  Japanese girl who gets thrown out of her school (a mere kindergartner) and her mother finds her this fabulous alternative school with truly enlightened teachers. I wish I could do the same for Millie.

Anyway we were talking about food – b/c in the book the kids have to bring “something from the ocean and something from the hills” every day in their lunch. Totto-chan brings something called denbu which is the flesh of a fish scraped off the bones, then mashed up, and cooked. Sound tasty? You learn something new every day.

2nd good deed: Cooking with my child. We decided that we would make something too. Um, NOT denbu. Instead we made cousin-in-law Lindsay’s sour-cream cherry muffins. (Lindsay, you really are a domestic goddess – these muffins ROCK!) We had a swell time cooking together.  Millie discovered that she loves cherries and not just as a decorative pattern on her apron.

3rd good deed: We decided to take the muffins to our next door neighbors. Millie’s idea!

4th good deed: Here are three clues to what lead to the 4th good deed.

1. April 30th (last day of the month)

2.

this good sister's name came up twice on my caller ID

3. Guilt

Yes, visiting teaching had not been completed for the month of April. But there were still a few hours left in the month of April and it struck me that I could take a few muffins to the ladies I visit.

Whala!

The muffins were placed in lovely little boxes and delivered to my visiting teach-ets.

So shall it be written, so shall it be done!

*RE: 2nd Clue – I want to give a shout out to my girl, Sister Van Uiert. She is the most dilligent VT coordinator I have ever known.  She calls and calls until she gets the data, and that is not a fun and easy task. Even though I have never met her face to face I love her. And by golly, she has got my vote!

Jan’s brother Kai was handsome, intelligent, charming, he loved a good debate, enjoyed acting, mastered a unicycle and lived life to the fullest.

I never knew him. When he was 21 he died in a tragic accident not long after this picture was taken.

A few months ago Jan told Millie all about Kai. She listened very carefully to the story of his life and ever since that moment, when she discovered she had a “new uncle”, some kind of a connection was forged between them.

She talks about him all the time. She wants to know about him. Out of the blue she will say to me, “You know what, Mom? I love Uncle Kai.” When we called her grandma Gitte today she whispered to me, “Mom, can I ask Granny about Kai?”  In February on the anniversary of his death I spoke to her about what a hard time it was for her Granny & Pappa and for her Daddy. She was concerned that they would be sad and wanted to understand why. When I told her it was because they were missing Kai. This is the exchange we had. 

Sunday came. That morning  Jan went over her talk with her. She knew it by heart.

When she stood at the podium she became nervous and she looked at me with a little fear in her eyes. I whispered the story in her ear and she repeated an account of Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. But when the moment came for her to talk about Kai something shifted.

We’d brought a picture of Kai with us so that she could show all her primary buddies her uncle. I handed her his picture and all of the sudden she was completely confident and at ease. She spoke from her heart,  no promptings from mom. Just a heartfelt expression of the love she feels for her uncle Kai. And her testimony that she will see him again.

When she finished several people had tears in their eyes.

I wonder if this is what Robert George meant when he said, “the truth is luminous”.

O sweet spontaneous
earth how often have
the doting
fingers of
prurient philosophers
pinched
and
poked
thee
has the naughty thumb
of science
prodded
thy
beauty

how
often have religions taken
thee upon their scraggy knees
squeezing and
buffeting thee that thou mightest conceive
gods
(but
true
to the incomparable
couch of death
thy rhythmic lover

thou answerest
them only with
spring)

Spring time always makes me want to read E.E. Cummings. So here’s a little Edward Estlin on me, my friends.

This morning when I met my pal Emily to go running she had a few extra things that she had to do in doors, while I was waiting for her I noticed a gorgeous tree in her yard. It was radiating happiness. I walked over to it so that I could enjoy it more fully.  I stood amidst some of it’s low lying branches to feel it’s embrace. The branches were heavy with  white buds that were tipped with pink — just waiting to burst open. I drank  in the spirit of that beautiful tree and told it I thought it was doing a great job. I said a prayer of gratitude for the lovely morning.  My tet a tet with a tree lasted maybe two minutes but it filled me with an ocean worth of happiness. (And if you’re wondering I, like the Native American’s, believe that all living things have spirits – including my friend’s tree – judge me if you feel so inclined, but try it and you’ll see! Those three hugger peeps are on to something!)

Thank you for Spring, Heavenly Father! I do love it!  Oh, and for sending inspiration to the heart of a poet, who in turn, helps give voice to the feelings of wonder in our hearts.

And thank you Jan for capturing it on film. oxoxo!

I should have know, I mean really I should have known that it would shape up to be a two kit-kat* day.

It started innocently.  Millie has a friend named Mia. Mia’s mom just had a baby and I really like Mia’s mom. So first chance that presented itself I had Mia over for a play date and told Margie, Mia’s mom, that I would bring them dinner that very night.

It was going well. I put the dinner together (a summer chicken salad, some brie and filo hors d’ oeuvres** a la Cafe Johnsonia, rolls, and homemade chocolate ice cream- that was originally going to be mousse, but it didn’t quite work out – I mention this just to make clear that I was not taking over a pan of Costco lasagna, I was working my butt off) while simultaneously making lunch for Millie and Mia. Clara, bless her heart, slept.It was tricky, but I was managing.

Then it started to unravel…

Mia had an”accident” and peed on the stairs.

While cleaning up the accident the baby woke up and just wanted to be held.

Millie and Mia had a fight over a penny – which ended sweetly, Millie, still crying told Mia, “I still love you. You can still come to my birthday party.” Ahh!

Then just as we were going to leave and I was packing up their dinner I went up stairs to find that Millie and Mia had taken water and dumped it all over her bed room. On the carpet, on the blankets, everywhere – all in an effort to wash Millie’s elephant, who was also drenched. The room smelled like wet dog. It was stinky. Very stinky.

As I was leaving the house with three little girls in tow I ran to the kitchen, opened the cookie jar and grabbed a kit-kat. Jan came up to see what was going on and caught me with my hand in the cookie jar.

“This is my version of a drink. And I really need one!” I told him.

When I got home from dropping Mia home I went straight to the kitchen for another kit-kat.

No photos for this entry, I’m afraid. I was too busy mopping up pee off the stairs and water from Millie’s room.

(*Not just any kit-kat, and English kit-kat – and those of you who have eaten an English kit-kat know that there are few things in the world as yummy.)

(** how the heck do you spell that?!)

As many of you will know it was Opening Day at the new Yankee Stadium on the 16th of April.

Jan and Ian can tell you all about it.

If you want to know what un-diluted, pure happiness looks like – just check out their faces. (And this was despite the score Indians 10, Yanks 2)

Well here in our quaint town of Madison, NJ we celebrated opening day for our little league.

It was stink’n awesome.

The boys and girls paraded through our main street. It was the only parade I have been to where the people in the parade who throw the candy are also the ones who grab up the candy. Riddle me that one, if you can.

We had great, curb side seats (as in right on the curb) where we cheered on some of Madison’s finest sons, Porter and Braxton Rich. Their lovely mother, Emily, is seated beside me, in her lap is my future son-in-law, Hudson Jack Rich. (He likes the middle name mentioned, thankyouverymuch.)

Afterwords we headed home to play a little ball of our own.

Clara was more of a spectator.

Millie took time out from playing to give the camera some “attitude”

Eno, does this one slay you as much as it does me?! Check out that sisterly affection while wearing the world’s greatest baseball team logo.

Jan doesn’t need any sons to fulfill his baseball needs…

And yes, I was there too

That is my little horn and yes, I am going to “toot” it. So if you want to skip me congratulating myself for being a rock star mom don’t read on.

You’ve been warned.

Every once and awhile I just have to take a step back and say, “Way to go, champ!” And this was one of those times.

Millie was needing a new something to do. I think she’d already taken two baths, watched a show and played with her toys. Invariably the next thing that comes is the question, “what else is there to do mom?”

And then it hit me! Months ago I had bought a book and hid it on top of my wardrobe (a long with a few other goodies that I had forgotten about – hello, can someone say birthday presents!)

It was one of those Klutz books that had these awesome body crayons.

Behold!

In case you are wondering that is a chicken. You’re seeing it now, right?

A classic. Thumb and index finger make the perfect mouth, would you agree?

Here we have Bellybutton lady. I think she’s got attitude.

Millie wanted a piggy on her right knee and a cow on her left.

And it all washed off in the bath tub. No scrubbing required. But something went horribly wrong with Millie’s eyes…

3rd bath is the charm, they say.

P.S.

Jan

said

this

one

was

too

saucy

for our flickr page….

I was in rock star mode after all, and you know how rock stars can be.

wink, wink!

I think the toys might be plotting

And I think that just maybe Tico is the ring leader

Oh, it is Tico alright!