Author: Abe Darais

Jazz Game and Nails

Today I woke up early to play basketball, and then stumbled through my work day (I didn’t sleep very much). After work, I took all the kids to the Arches Gala while Lily got her nails done for the trip. Here are some fun scenes from the part of the Gala where we walked through the school learning about what the kids have been up to and the things they had created. Ammon was very excited as he walked around telling us about everything.

Then we had dinner at the Gala and Lily joined us. We were hoping the singing would be earlier so Ammon and Clarissa could participate, but they were running late, so we left before the kids sang because I had tickets to a Jazz game (extra tickets from Nick Apeland, my boss’s boss), and Lily had nail appointments for Mary, Lydia and Clarissa. Lydia and Mary never get their nails done because fancy nails don’t work with their instruments, but since they will be gone for a month with no music practice, this is their chance!

I had an awesome time at the Jazz game with Ammon. He has never been to one before and he was so cute how excited he was. He said, “Thank you, thank you dad!” as we were walking up to the stadium. He was also very excited about the vision of junk food that I painted for him. Right after we sat down, he turned to me and said, “OK, can we get junk food now?”. I made him wait until after the 1st quarter, but he definitely had his fill of ice cream and popcorn:

The Jazz got their clocks cleaned by the Clippers (who had Paul George, Russel Westbrook, Kuai Leonard and James Hardin), but I had so much fun paling around with my son and chatting with Steve who also got tickets and sat with me. Ammon got really tired at the end. It was very late, and I guess it was a lot of excitement for him! On the way out though he was still very happy.

Also here is a castle he built in the morning:

I love you Ammon!

Also, while Ammon and I were having fun, the daughters were all getting their nails done. I think they had fun!

What a fun day!

In Raleigh with Lily, and Thank you Baps and Bapa!

Lily and I have known for 6 months that there is a chance we move to Raleigh, for two months that there is a sizable chance that we will move to Raleigh, for a week that we are almost certainly moving to Raleigh and for a few days that we are definitely moving to Raleigh. Now that everything is official and I’m permitted to share with my work collegues, the cat is out of the bag, we are moving!

One of my favorite things about Lily is how fast she moves. I get overwhelmed easily, and upon learning that we were moving, I thought Spring might be a nice time, mostly because I was scared of the headache and wanted to take our time. Lily decided we should move right away, scheduled tickets to fly out (even before everything was official), flew out with me to view homes, orchestrated all the house viewings with an agent, organized a property manager to rent our home, found a photographer (who took photos), called multiple care facilities for her mother, and multiple other things all in one week (all while her Europe trip was only a week away!

I’m writing this entry on December 10. I signed my offer letter on November 30, 10 days ago. Now we are already under contract for a home, and about to list our home for a rental. We are only in this position because of Lily!

But this entry is about our visit to Raleigh. It felt like a date with a mission. Lily and I got to be with each other every day and look at homes together. We saw big homes, small homes, old homes, new homes, homes with a pool, homes near my work etc etc. Lily was so thoughtful about the decision, and we drove routes to homes to see what my commute would be like. We ended up choosing 3604 Lubbuck Street, right in Raleigh, only 10 minutes from the office. We fell in love with the charm of the house. It’s smaller than our current home, however, it has the space we need, is very well built and designed, and is incredibly charming. We fell in love with it, and being close to the office will really help me be successful. We also loved how warm, and friendly the people we met were (especially our realtors), and we also loved hearing all the people with their North Carolina drawl.

One evening as we were driving around, we bumped into a private property that put on a huge display of Christmas lights and allowed people to drive through for a fee. Lily and I drove through and enjoyed it. It was nostalgic because one of the first things we did together when we first started spending more time together was drive through a neighborhood in Itasca looking at Christmas lights together. Here is a video we took:

None of this would have been possible without my dad and Suzanne staying with us to take care of the kids the whole time we were gone, and on short notice. The kids had so much fun with them, and we are profoundly grateful for the way in which they enabled this important weekend for us!

Dinner with Morgan and Jessie

I received some great news today, and Lily and I celebrated by having dinner with our great friends the Vandagriffs. Morgan was so nice that he even got me a fiesta balloon to celebrate!

We had food from Kohinoor, and I took this picture. I was amuzed because “butter chicken” is a nickname that Lily has for Mary.

Ammon Practicing Voices

Our family has really been enjoying this YouTube person who sings Adelle’s “Hello From the Other Side” in the voices of various Disney characters. Here is the YouTube Video of Him: https://youtu.be/q5wgbIz2aLQ?feature=shared

Tonight, Lily and I rested on the couch as we listened to Ammon practicing those voices to Adelle’s song while he was in his bed. It was adorable. I’m sure he was going strong for 20 minutes or more!

Goodbye Clark, Swathi, Soren, Meera. We Love You!

Today was another nice and low-key day. I’ve been sleeping in which is nice. I also played Legos with Soren and Ammon and took this picture of some of Ammon’s legos.

At 1:00 Clark, Swathi, Lily and I played pickleball. Couples were very well matched, and the playing was so fun! We all had a blast.

Then Clark and Swathi got everything ready to go, we ate Cafe Rio together and then we said our goodbyes. We miss you already, we had the best time with you all!!

Picking out a Christmas Tree

Today was another low-key day. Liy and Swathi went on a nice walk at the Utah Lake together and, and in the afternoon, Clark, Swathi, Soren and Meera went to a birthday party of a friend of their that lives nearby. While they were at the party, we bought a new oven (our old one broke) and we went and picked out a Christmas tree. We love the one we picked out. We all arrived home at about the same time, and we all decorated the tree and the house together while Clark took Georgia’s old laptop to Best-buy for repair. He has been doing a lot of helping her with her technology and storage needs on this trip. The tree looks great, and I’ll have to get a picture of it for a later blog post.

We ended the day with two games of Wingspan, both of which Clark won. He entered our home 10 days ago as somewhat of a Wingspan novice (he hadn’t even played with nectar!). Now the student has become the master. He he demolished me and Lily. It was so fun!

Lydia’s new iphone and Yamato

Today was a relaxing day after Thanksgiving. It snowed and so the kids had a ton of fun playing in the snow while the grown-ups mostly took it easy.

Lily, Lydia and I did go to the T-mobile store and we got Lily a new iphone with more storage, and we gave her old one to Lydia, with a new case and screen protector (so it seems new!). Lydia chose such a stylish case for it and she was so so happy to get it. She has long awaited this day, and we feel she has more than earned it with her grades, responsible behavior and help with siblings. We love and trust you Lydia! We also are aware of the dangers, and Lily sat Lydia down before we gave it to her to have, “their last ever face-to-face conversation.” LOL. I’m sure that is not the case, but Lily is right to be concerned, and we do have a number of controls and rules that hopefully help our perfect daughter develop good technology habits.

For dinner, we went to our new favorite restaurant, Yamato. They have great sushi, at a good price, and the best part is they have a private room that works so perfectly for our family. It felt so connective all being around a large table together. We had so much fun with Clark, Meera and Soren a week ago, that we wanted to come again with Swathi too! Sushi is also Soren’s favorite food, so he was also very happy. Lily gets annoyed at how many pictures I take of us eating, lol. That only makes the mischevious part of me want to take more. Sorry Lily!