We had a great Memorial Day Weekend. It started a bit rough on Friday night, as a Jonathan meltdown cost him his movie night. But Mikaela and I enjoyed ourselves with what has become our regular Friday night hangout at Take Five Coffee + Bar.

On Saturday, we headed back out to World’s of Fun (we’re doing our best to get our money’s worth out of these season passes – at this rate, they’re going to amortize down to about $5 each per visit). As usual, Jonathan and Miriam hung out in Planet Snoopy, while Mikaela and I hit the thrill rides. Jonathan is really loving the new Peanuts Playhouse and the Wacky Worm kiddie coaster. Meanwhile, Mikaela found a new favorite in the super-spinny Finnish Fling. It spins around until it generates enough centrifugal force that when the floor drops out, riders stick to the wall. I drew the line at two consecutive rides, but she insisted on coming back for a third ride (after our usual diet of roller coasters and other spinny rides). And for the second visit in a row, we left around 1 p.m. and the rain started just after we got into our car. Saturday night we dropped the kids with Grandma Marcia so that Miriam and I could go out for our week-delayed anniversary dinner at the always-excellentGaslight Grill.

Sunday bought the annual Memorial Day Weekend Pool Party at the Rooks’. Good food, good friends, and the kids swam themselves to exhaustion. The plan had been to take it easy on Monday until dinner at Aunt Judy & Uncle Lloyd’s, but the kids were getting restless and the weather was gorgeous. So we headed down to walk around the Plaza. As I pulled the car out of the garage, it dawned on me — this was our first family trip to to the Plaza in 8 1/2 years that DIDN’T include a stroller! We walked around a bit, ate some lunch, and walked around a bit more. We checked out a couple of new (or at least new to us) stores – Sur La Table cooking supplies store and Zoom toy store. The kids both really enjoyed checking out the big puppets at Zoom.

We wrapped up our Memorial Day Weekend fun with dinner at Aunt Judy and Uncle Lloyd’s. The kids had a blast with Rick and Margo, playing T-Ball. Neither Mikaela nor Jon had hit off of a tee before, and both did quite well for their first time. They also both were able to make contact with a ball that was hand-tossed. Mikaela had the hit of the night, smacking one all the way across the street (much to her own surprise). She also showed good catching and throwing skills. Jon showed a pretty good arm himself, when he wasn’t trying to shoot the ball with lasers.

The Fourth of July Weekend celebrating started with Saturday at Crown Center. Grandma Marcia, Zaydie Larry and Samantha met Miriam, Mikaela, Jonathan and me for a day of Clifford the Big Red Dog and playing in the fountain. Samantha was really the only one who was excited to see Clifford. Mikaela reluctantly agreed to be photographed with him, but Jonathan wouldn’t get within 10 feet of him. After the photo-op, the kids spent a while playing in the “Clifford World” that was set up in Crown Center, before moving on to the fountain.

All of the kids had fun in the fountain. Mostly, Mikaela and Samantha played together and Jonathan prowled on his own. Once they all got the hang of the way the jets worked, they had a blast. The wind picked up, and despite the sun, it started getting chilly. So we got everyone dried off, picked up treats from Chip’s Chocolate Factory, and headed for home.

With Bubbie’s unveiling scheduled for Sunday, June 13, Martie and Bob Kramer and their granddaughter Rylei were in town for a few days. Mikaela, Samantha, Jonathan (and even Ella) enjoyed the chance to catch up with their cousin. The fun came first – dinner out together at Martie & Bob’s old favorite, Waid’s.

Then, on Saturday, playing at Monkey Bizness (the rain interfered with plans for the Zoo). Saturday evening Rylei came over and the kids made and decorated cookies.

With Rabbi Levin unavailable due to his back injury and Rabbi Harris also unavailable, I conducted the unveiling ceremony at Bubbie’s graveside on Sunday morning. I edited the ceremony on the fly, as I watched the storm clouds approaching. The raindrops started falling just as we said they last Amen, and by the time we were pulling onto the highway the rain was falling in sheets. After the ceremony, we all (plus many more extended family members) gathered back and Marcia and Larry’s for brunch. The kids got more time to play together, the adults got to catch up, and we all ate waaayyyy too much.

Our Passover season started with Jonathan’s CDC model seder. We enjoyed the usual mix of cute Passover songs about working for Pharaoh and a plague of frogs and opportunities for the kids to sample seder plate foods (Jon liked the hard-boiled egg, the matzah, and the celery dipped in salt water. The horseradish? Not so much). First Seder was our usual Seder at Aunt Judy and Uncle Lloyd’s house, made notable by Mikaela leading the Four Questions (in English) for the first time.

We hosted our usual small second Seder here at our house – just us, Grandma Marcia and Zaydie Larry (Grandma Sali helped us prepare while she was in town, but had to head back to be with Paca Steve for Passover), Uncle Matt, Aunt Sarah and cousins Ella and Samantha. The kids were great, considering they were being asked to sit through a much longer than usual dinner for the second night in a row. Mikaela took a regular turn reading parts of the Seder and led the younger kids to open the door for Elijah.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. We had the largest Thanksgiving Feast yet at Grandma Marcia and Zaydie Larry’s house – I believe the final count was 28. We were served by the biggest turkey yet too – a full 30 pounds of Thanksgiving bird. It was great that so many out-of-town-based relatives were able to join us – Grandma Sali and Grandpa Steve from Montana, Corey, Monique and Annie from Chicago, Steph from Springfield, and Jeff and Brandi from Houston. Both the food and the company were great!

Now, if the Jayhawks can just pull off a victory over the Tiggers this afternoon . . .

We buried Bubbie today. It’s been an incredibly emotional few days. The words and notes of support from family and friends have been wonderful. Jonathan doesn’t really understand what’s going on – just lots of people around and disruptions in his schedule (though getting to spend some fun time with Aunt Mo this afternoon was a treat). But Mikaela is struggling with all of this. At first, she just tried to ignore that Bubbie had died. She wanted to pretend that nothing different had happened, she even wanted to go to Sunday School on Sunday. But she left Sunday school about 15 minutes early, as the reality of it all hit her, at which point she also decided that she wanted to come to the funeral. After the funeral, Mikaela turned to Miriam and said, “I just want to go home and go over to Cannon’s house to play and forget all of this.”

All of the grandkids spoke at the funeral. Corey and Matt and Greg all spoke beautifully. I had an unusually difficult time figuring out what to say. You can read the full text of what I wrote after the jump.

It’s rare that I find myself at a loss for words. But as I sat down to write the words I would say now, I was overwhelmed with such a flood of memories of Bubbie that it was impossible to pick out individual stories or find a coherent narrative. I’m left with sense impressions – flashes of images, snippets of sound, whiffs of smells.

Some of the images that keep hitting me seem so inconsequential – a plaque that hung on the wall in the house on Oak that said, “Don’t criticize the coffee, you may be old and weak yourself some day,” but hints at Bubbie’s sense of humor. And then the sound of Bubbie’s bubbling laugh fills my head.

I heard the sounds last night of Bubbie’s great-grandchildren playing together, and was taken back to Sunday afternoons at Bubbie’s house. Images of playing games with my brothers – all of the games that were for us to play with, arranged together on the bottom shelf of the bookcase in the hall; followed by the sound of Bubbie reminding us that the game wasn’t over until all of the pieces had been put away properly.

I emptied the dishwasher, and put away the longest knife in the drawer. It’s truly an amazing knife – long and straight and amazingly sharp. It was Bubbie’s brisket knife. Bubbie gave it to Miriam when Miriam was helping her clean out her kitchen for the move to Village Shalom. I can’t see that knife without smelling Bubbie’s barbeque brisket.

I caught up on my online newsfeeds this morning, and missed the sound and smell of newsprint. I learned to read the newspaper cover to cover from watching Bubbie do it (Dad tends to get short-stopped by the crossword puzzle). Thanks to Bubbie, I think I was the only fourth-grader in my class who regularly read the Metro section of the Kansas City Star.

Bubbie was watching the news on TV when I brought Mikaela and Jonathan over to visit for what turned out to be the last time. She turned it off to turn her attention to the kids. Jonathan gave her one of his patented linebacker-tackle hugs, and Bubbie just giggled about it. Mikaela gave her a hug and a kiss, and then led Jonathan in singing “You Are My Sunshine” for Bubbie. And the smile Bubbie had on her face as they finished, I think that’s the image I’m going to treasure most of all.

Corey was in town for the Kansas City Improv Festival, so we got together after Sunday School for lunch at Mom & Dad’s house. Amid the usual good food (BBQ, of course) and family fun, Mom dug out Grandpa Sam’s old saxophone. Mikaela tried it first, and managed to get sound out of it pretty much right away. Then it was Jonathan’s turn – and it was love at first blat. The sax was as big as he was, but he insisted on trying to carry it around with him. The easiest place for him to play it was sitting on the hearth. He actually managed to get sound out of it pretty consistently – though I’m not sure most would have recognized the tones as a saxophone.

When it came time to leave, Jonathan did NOT want to give up the sax. When Grandma Marcia told him it was time to put it away, he responded by hugging the saxophone and saying, “But I loooooove it.” After finally being convinced to give it up, Jon laid down on the floor and cried over his separation from the sax. Overall, Jonathan has become completely music crazed. He watches Sesame Street Peter and the Wolf every chance he gets. When we only have time for something shorter, he asks for an episode of Jack’s Big Music Show called “Jack’s Big Orchestra” (one Friday night, while Mikaela and I were having a “campout” in the basement, Miriam and Jonathan watched “Jack’s Big Orchestra” six times in a row). He walks around the house with a plastic guitar slung over his shoulder constantly, and he’s recently taken to prentending the plastic hangers are various wind/brass instruments (sometimes it’s a French Horn, sometimes a saxophone, sometimes a trombone, sometimes a bassoon or clarinet).

We had a fun Labor Day brunch at Aunt Judy and Uncle Lloyd’s house. The weather was beautiful, and it was wonderful that Bubbie was feeling better and was able to be there with us. The kids had a great time – Uncle Lloyd showed Jonathan how to use a telescope (well, he tried – Jonathan couldn’t quite manage closing one eye and keeping the other one open). Mikaela, Margo and Teresa harvested apples from the apple tree out back. It was a perfect holiday celebration – good weather, food, family, and fun

September started with birthday dinner for Grandma Marcia at our house. I’m not sure how the math works out on this (math has never been my strong suit) but I’m told that she was celebrating her 29th birthday (or at least the anniversary thereof ). Mikaela decorated the cake (using an entire tube of gold dust in the process), and all of the grandkids helped to blow out the birthday candles. Grandma Marcia was treated to a birthday show in the playroom presented by the grandkids after dinner, with Jonathan on violin, Mikaela singing, and Samantha dancing.

We got a nice treat when Annie came to town for her high school reunion. We had a fun, casual dinner at Aunt Judy and Uncle Lloyd’s. Matt and Uncle Lloyd talked car repair. Mikaela gave Annie a refresher course in slapjack. And Mikaela and Jonathan provided some extra entertainment when they found Annie’s old twelve-string guitar. They’re pictured here leading us in a rousing (if slightly off-key) rendition of “Not By Might.”