A Sighting????

Could this be our friend? I'm not sure... I haven't met him yet, but the resemblence is uncanny. Looks like he may have fallen into some bad company after his side trip to mexico, and is now hanging out in bars. That's just not right! Monkey, if you are going to go to a bar, you need to take one of us with you as a chaperone!

Come back soon, Monkey!


**UPDATE** I think perhaps this must just be a doppelganger. No way could it be OUR monkey! But I will continue to keep my eyes open for any monkeys, and/or monkey business!

Second Movement

For today's song, we go to the elementary general music classroom. Sung to the tune of "Paw Paw Patch"...

Where, oh where is our little Monkey?
Where, oh where is our little Monkey?
Where, oh where is our little Monkey?
Way down yonder and he won't come home.

Pickin' up monkey, put him on an airplane.
Pickin' up monkey, put on a freight train.
Pickin' up monkey, put him on a cruise ship.
Oh where could Monkey be?

We all sure do miss our little Monkey.
Lisagh's 'bout ready to call in the Mounties.
Please send him home and we'll stop complainin'
Please send Monkey home!

Pickin' up monkey, put him on an airplane.
Pickin' up monkey, put on a freight train.
Pickin' up monkey, put him on a cruise ship.
Please just get him home!

Monkey Hypothetical

If Monkey had ever made it to Dallas, here is what we would have done...

First, we would go for a bike ride around White Rock Lake. When I lived closer to the lake, I would usually bike around it a couple times a week.

After our morning exercise, we would grab a bite to eat at Cafe Brazil. I will let Monkey eat the bananas off of my french toast.

While it is still semi-cool outside, we would then head over to The Nasher Sculpture Garden. This is one of the best museums in Dallas - it is an indoor/outdoor sculpture center.

And then we would go shopping! Dallas has some great malls, one of my favorites being North Park Center. We would have to stop at Neiman Marcus - no shopping visit to Dallas is complete without a trip there. The items there may be a little out of his budget, but it is still fun to look.

Then it would be time for some margaritas and mexican food! Chuy's is great -- Monkey and I would split the chili relleno.

And to finish the day, we would go to a Cowboys football game or a Mavericks basketball game! Monkey would cheer either team to victory.

South of the Border perhaps?

Perhaps he is taking a side trip.... A girlfriend of mine was in Puerto Vallarta last week, and emailed me this picture:




I'm not sure it's him. It's hard to tell, because this monkey has a tan.

A Song

With apologies to King Curtis, Louis Armstrong, and anyone else who made "Won't You Come Home Bill Bailey" famous...

Won't you come home, Sweet Monkey, won't you come home?
We've moaned the whole night long
We'll do the cookin', honey,
We'll buy the drinks.
Who could've done you wrong?

We can't imagine anyone's thrown you out....without even a ticket home!
Don't care who's to blame, now... ain't it a shame
Sweet Monkey, won't you please come home!

A Monkey Interlude

Our Monkey is probably up to something like this...

Fraught With Worry...

I told Carolina that Monkey's Mommy is on strike in an effort to find him.

MIA?? What's that, she wanted to know. Missing in Action, I told her.

She is pretty distraught about her cousin from Canada. Perhaps he is here and we didn't know it! She checked the mailbox, though I told her Monkey wouldn't fit. Alas, no Monkey.

No Monkey at the front door, either. He will turn up soon, I assure her.

Until then, we wait.

Hellooooo?

We seem to have a missing Monkey again... hello? hello?

Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

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Monkey's time in Annapolis... finally!

I am so sorry it has taken me so long to post our pictures of Monkey's visit to Annapolis, Maryland. The day after Monkey left we left town too and we didn't get home until late last night. Without further ado...

Last Wednesday Lilly and Michael and I took Monkey down town Annapolis to see the sites. We started at the Alex Haley Memorial. Monkey was being a monkey when he sat on one of the child statues! The kids thought it would be a fun photo. I had to stop Michael from also sitting on the statue's head encouraging him to sit with Monkey and his sister next to the statue of Alex Haley.

After we visited the memorial we strolled down Ego Alley...

At the end of the dock we tried to get a few photos of Monkey with the sail boats but as you can see the weather was not cooperating and the sail boats were few and far between for some reason this night. If only the weather had been nicer... we could have gone out on our boat and really had a blast.

We discovered the National Sailing Hall of Fame... something we did not even know existed in Annapolis!

We considered Storm Brothers ice cream for dessert after dinner but decided to go for the good stuff at Aromi d'Italia. A good gelato was just what Monkey wanted...

...but he had a hard time deciding what flavor to get.

First, we ate dinner (also at Aromi d'Italia). Milk for Monkey and the kids... water for me.

Don't tell anyone but I think Monkey had a crush on Lilly - he loved sitting with her.

After dinner we wanted to walk around more but it started to rain. It's a good thing we remembered to bring the rain hat and coat I bought for Monkey!

Thankfully the rain didn't last long so we headed over to the Naval Academy.

After the Naval Academy we decided to go to the World War II Memorial. Our first visit to the Memorial and it's just 5 minutes from our home.

And then the weather really started to get bad so we packed it in for the night and headed on home. Not before one last picture - the view from the Memorial. The building you see is the Naval Academy and you can see the capital building in the background too.

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Lilly wanted to read with Monkey in her room before bed so I let them. Monkey's hoping "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People" will help him make the most of his future travels.

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Michael was not buying into the self help book though so he decided to teach Monkey how to play Nintendo. I think Monkey liked "hanging out" with another boy after his girl time with Lilly.

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And then we had a great idea! We decided to introduce Monkey to Holly Golightly (our dog). We knew Monkey was afraid of big blond dogs but we were pretty sure he would LOVE our puppy who happens to be small and black. Monkey loved Holly and wouldn't stop kissing her!! Holly was indifferent at first but then she was loving on Monkey as much as we were.

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The next morning the kids helped me pack Monkey for his travels back to Virginia. We were sad as sad can be to see him go.

Farewell Monkey... thanks for a great time!
Come back soon and next time bring your Momma!

Love,
Kevin, Kerry, Lilly & Michael

P.S. Thanks Momma Lisagh for letting us have Monkey for a few days!