Justin's Family Email- 9/28/07 (New Car, Wynton Marsalis)

We bought a second car last Saturday, an ’06 Toyota Corolla. Not too exciting, but practical, and just what we need (reliable, affordable, good mileage). I still hope to ride the train a couple of times a week, depending on what time I leave in the morning. The problem is, it saves me time in the morning but costs me time in the evening. I don’t leave until after traffic dies down, so it only takes me 30 minutes to get home. I’m sure you’re all very interested.

Last Thursday I saw in the paper the Wynton Marsalis was playing that night at the symphony hall in Dallas. He is probably the most famous jazz musician alive today, and Kelsey really likes him. So I got us some tickets and surprised her. The cheapest seats in the house were in the choir box right on the stage. We had to look at the back of the bands heads throughout the performance, but the sound was great. It was a lot of fun, and the band was really, really good.

Friday night we went to the Plano Hot Air Balloon Festival. It was cool to go at night, because you get to see the balloons light up, but they don’t lift off the ground. Dallan and Bethany, Emily and Christian, and Audrey (who is visiting) all went to the festival at 7am on Saturday, and got to see 80 balloons take off. I think we’ll do it that way next year. Afterwards they all came over to our house for breakfast. Kelsey’s friend Sybil came too.

Wednesday this week Spencer and Donna flew in for a conference Spencer had for work. They are staying through this weekend to help repaint the bathroom. I feel bad that I am at work while they’re painting. They are good workers and know a lot more about it than we do. We’re grateful for their help. We were going to do something fun with them (the art museums are free on Thursday nights, and the state fair started today and there was a parade) but they have been so busy with the bathroom that we haven’t done anything.

I did end up going to the parade and getting a slice of pizza with Dallan. It's fun having him work just two blocks away. We commiserate when work gets boring, and when it gets really boring we skip out on work and meet outside for an ice cream cone- not much has changed since we were kids.

Joys of Motherhood

Today, I got the sweetest most thoughtful present that a 4 year old could hope to give. I'm sitting there talking to Sarah M on the phone and Eden, who I can tell has been up to something from the goings on in the background, come up and hands me this thing. I look at it and say, "Gross what is that." It turns out that Eden had cut off a gob of hair and, with the help of copious amount of glue, had stuck it to a piece of paper. She replies, "I wanted to give it to you." For those of you who know my feelings on hair after it has left the head, you know I was curbing my reaction to vomit. It went promptly in the trash, so alas there is no picture. But rest assured, I will treasure it always.

Justin's Family Email- 9/19/07

Dear Family,

This weekend we drove up to Oklahoma City for the Flake cousins BYU-Tulsa party. Kelsey took the kids and met up with Dallan, Emily and a whole bunch of cousins on Friday afternoon, and I drove up after work. It took about 3 hours to get there. 28 cousins showed up including a bunch of Christensens (we stayed at their houses), a bunch of Lawrence Flakes, all of us from Dallas, and Joel, Heather and Austin. The reunion fund kicked in some money for food, and it was fun to sit and eat and talk.

The next morning we played glorious football for 2 or 3 hours and then met up with our wives at a bar in a tiny town in the middle of nowhere in OK to eat famous fried chicken and fried okra. There is only one thing on the menu- delicious chicken, you can’t even get fries or cole slaw. It comes with white bread, onions and pickles. We ate ourselves sick.

After lunch we played volleyball at Aaron’s nice big house out in the country, and then the Joel Flakes and Forest Flakes drove to our hotel in Tulsa. That afternoon we swam, napped and watched football on TV. We grabbed some dinner, and then headed over to the game, which didn’t start until 8. The game was fun, even though we lost. It was an old WAC-style shootout. I can’t believe we played so poorly and still scored 47 points.

Kelsey brought the kids to the game until halftime. Eden had a blast, and picked up on all of the cheers quickly and even joined in. She screamed “B-Y-U” at the top of her lungs for 5 minutes straight. It was her first football game. After the game (at midnight) Joel, Dallan, Jordan, Audrey and I went to IHOP, which was packed full of the type of people you would expect at that hour. We laughed ourselves sick and drowned our sorrows in maple syrup. Then we went back to the hotel and went hottubbing. None of us got to bed before 3am, and we all felt it the next day.

Sunday morning we drove home with Joel, Heather, Austin, and Jordan. We had really good talks for 4 hours. Joel and Jordan flew out of Dallas that afternoon, but Heather and Austin stayed for a few days to take in the sights. They saw where JFK was shot, went to the aquarium, rode to the top of reunion tower and we went to lunch and I showed them my office. They were pretty impressed. It was a fun trip, and we are just now catching up on all the sleep we lost this weekend.

Justin

Book for Kelsey

I haven't found any friends yet, so I'm loking for a non inflatable replacement. I'm looking for a good book to read. No other criteria, just good. Anybody got any suggestions?

Justin's Family Email- 9/12/07

Dear Family,

My first week of work was certainly a trial by fire (yes, TRIAL, he he). I started last Tue and after some training I received my first little assignment that afternoon. The next morning I was put on a big case and really started working. Our client builds yachts and is being sued over a 17 million dollar yacht that cost him 30 million to build. It’s the real deal, 4 floors, hot tub, an elevator, the works. Pretty interesting.
Thursday and Friday were more of the same. I don’t ever show up until just before 10, but I always end up staying past 7. On Friday night Kelsey picked me up and we headed over to Trader’s Village, the largest flea market in Texas, to see the national Pow-Wow Indian Dancing competition. They started an hour late, so we only got to see a few of the categories (kids dances mostly) but it was still fun. I kept telling Kelsey I should have been out there, representing my Cado blood.

On Saturday we had a MILLION things to get done (still moving in, etc). I bought a lawn mower and started mowing the lawn and then the phone rang. It was work, they needed some help on a case that is going to trial this week. So I worked all day Saturday until 7, and missed the first half of the BYU game. I drove home and got Kelsey and the kids and we headed over to Dallan’s. We stayed for a while afterwards to hang out with Dallan, Bethany, Christian and Emily. Eden has made fast friends with Emily’s kids. She and Morgan (Emily’s 4 year old girl) have a lot of fun together.

Sunday was Stake Conference. Our stake is so big we have two sessions- we don’t fit in the stake center otherwise. It was fine. After church, you guessed it, I went in to work to help get ready for trial. I was there from 3pm until 3am, and that’s not even bad compared to the partner running the case, he hasn’t slept more than 3 or 4 hours a night in weeks. Why would anyone ever want to work that much?

Monday I had to get up at 8 and start all over again. Tuesday the trial started, so things slowed down a bit. I went home at 7. But I got a call at 12:30 at night from the partner, asking me to do some more research for the case in the morning. Luckily I did it from our computer at home, but I was up until 3 again working on it.

The good news is things are rarely this bad. I will have to work long hours, but I’ll get home at a reasonable hour at least a couple times a week. Plus I don’t have to get to work early. And the cases are endlessly interesting. All of them are close cases, involve a lot of thinking and preparation, and a lot of money. There are nice perks, too. They took us to lunch at the Ritz Carlton last week for lunch. I had a piece of salmon that changed my life.

Kelsey brought the kids downtown and met me for lunch yesterday. It was nice to see them during the day, a lot of times I get home and they are already asleep. We went to the Dallas Farmer’s Market and tasted all the fruit, and then ate at a little Mexican restaurant. I think we’ll probably have lunch like that once a week. I also plan on meeting Dallan for lunch once a week. He works 2 blocks away. We grabbed a slice of pizza today, and had a nice long talk about lawyering.

In other news: Eden started preschool. She really likes it and has made some friends in her class. It is a nice break for Kelsey, too, (three mornings a week) and lets her get some things done. Last night Kelsey’s friend from high school, Syble, came over for dinner. She lives here in Dallas, and has a daughter Eden’s age. It was fun. I drove to work one day, and it took me more than an hour (coming home Sunday at 3am took 26 minutes). So I ride the train, it takes about half the time. The only problem is the train station is 3 miles from our house, and Kelsey has to drop me off, and pick me up. Sometimes its after the kids are asleep- so she rips them out of bed and puts them in the car. We desperately need a second car, but haven’t had time to look for one.

I’m sure this is more than you wanted to know, but oh well. We like how things are playing out so far, except for the long hours of course. We’re excited to see tons of the cousins this weekend, and have Joel and Heather and Austin here for a while. Talk to you later.

Justin

Kitchen Before and After

House Improvements

Goings on

Well we have been doing alot. Justin started work at his new firm. Eden started her new preschool and we have been woking on our house in every spare moment. Still much is needed, but her are some pics. The before ones are from when we were moving in so our hud is everywhere.

Beautiful Birthday

Here's a picture of the cake Kelsey built for Eden's birthday (with a little help from me- I made the rainbow slide).