Ash Bash 2008!

Our friend, Ash, is leaving us for a better place. Well, maybe. He's moving to Texarkana, but he does have a full time teaching position at a college down there, which is a better place than the world of grad school debt.

This is my first official time on the grill. Everything I grilled, I burned including the veggie burger. And the hotdogs? They split down the center, which, as luck would have it, is a great place for the condiments! Here are Ash, Allison and Hubby gathered in the kitchen.

Hubby started a game of croquet with Max and Annabeth (Ash's kids) and Ravi, Geoff and Padma's son. They are in the background. Heffernan and Geoff, both poets and faculty members at U of A, talk with Mary about...well...only she knows. Hef strikes a mean pose.
Backyard shot of Padma and baby, Ash in white shirt, Ann (Hef's wife), Alex and Keely. Keely is a fiction writer in her fourth year here at the U of A and she and Alex are newlyweds!

Close up of Mary, Keely and Padma. I always wait for the most opportune time to take the shot.
The spread! We had hubby's famous sangria, chips and salsa, lemonade, chips and pretzels, Twizzlers and chocolate, hot-dogs and hamburgers and all the fixins! Oh, and some chocolate-chip banana muffins!
Brock (Geoff) and baby fill their plates.

The man, the legend!

Oh, Ash, how hubby and I will miss you!