I'm Back. Maybe.

Do you know that joke you make when you see one of your good friends after not seeing them for a few days...something like "I'm Tyla and you arrre..."?  Well, that's how I feel I should begin this post after such a lonnnngggg break from the blogging world.  I'm Tyla.  Nice to meet you.

Fall through winter is such a favorite time of the year for me and I wrote all of 11 times, with NONE in December and January.  What's up with that?

Today's randomness will catch you up on a few things that have gone on with us here at TS&F.  Hopefully, I'll soon be able to regain some of my mojo and bounce back into some sort of regular writing rhythm.

Ren finished with all A's for her first semester of college which landed her on the Dean's List.  And because she entered college with A's in classes she took as part of a "dual enrollment" program, she had enough hours to be placed on the Honor Roll.  She has since received invitations to join the school's honor society and become a Presidential Ambassador.  We have all been thrilled and have done our fair share of humble bragging. What is it that Robbert Herrick wrote, "Gather ye rosebuds while ye may"?  Well, she has a math class this semester so the roses may be scarce.  Therefore, we celebrate while we may.

On the drama front, she is auditioning for a little horror film.  She made it through the first two cuts, I guess you could say, and is working on the third step in the process, where she has been given portions of the script to rehearse and video.  If she gets a role, it is scheduled to be shot over ten days or so this upcoming fall somewhere in the south.  She's keeping her fingers crossed but also not getting her hopes too high, as she knows her chosen field comes with much rejection.  Luckily, she takes rejection and criticism well.  Except when it comes from me, of course.

She also has two plays coming up at her school.  One is for her children's theatre class and will be this Friday night.  She will play a lizard and is looking forward to dressing in a morphsuit.  The other is a part in the Neil Simon play Plaza Suite and will be later this spring.

John-Heath is enjoying third grade quite a lot.  I can't say he loves it - given the choice between going to school or staying home to play on his iPad, he'd choose the life of a gamer - but he is having a good year.

Before Christmas, he invited a little girl to dinner and the movies.  It was the cutest thing.  He said he wanted to take her to see something girls would really like.  We saw Thor. 

Currently, he is on a Star Wars kick and has taken on the persona of Yoda, saying things like "fix me a snack, you must."

My niece Megan moved to Texas in December.  Her husband was offered a job that was really too good to pass up and so she is now a resident of Hallsville, Texas, which is basically in Longview, Texas from what I've been told.  We are looking at this as a positive thing, as it will provide a reason for road trips to the Lone Star State.  We just hope they don't stay too long.

John has kept busy attending a lot of basketball games.  A lot.  It is one of the few drawbacks to being an administrator.  With football, you have ten regular season games plus, hopefully, a few playoff games.  Basketball is a whole other monster.  I know the parents love watching their kids play, but I'm sure it gets very tiresome for them, too.

As for me, I have done nothing exciting since I last wrote.  I did make a new spinach dip for a Christmas get-together that was really good and I read a book that was also very good, but that's it.  Really.  It's quite sad, actually.  Could my life be any more bland?  Is it any wonder that parents begin to live vicariously through their children?

I hope you and yours have been well.  Talk to you again soon.  Hopefully, before another three months passes.