Spring Break

Looking back I was so ready for a break. It was getting that time when I needed to be have some relaxation. Now what nine days later and I have no idea where all the time has gone. Fortunately, I do also have the day off tomorrow because of an unused weather day..YAY!! I will probably be working at school on fundraiser stuff for the walk, but that is not really working. Please don;t mistake me I LOVE my job, but it's nice to get a break every once in a while. I am sure all you non educators are thinking, how lame is that that teachers think they always need vacations. We can job swap anytime.

Okay back to spring break. Things got started off with a successful Swamp John's fundraiser..thanks to all who came out. Sunday was of course Easter. That of course meant a trip to Hamilton. I got lucky my mom didn't feel well, so the day was short. I will be honest it was a pretty good day. Good food and a nice game of mini golf. I don't mean putt putt I mean golf with miniature clubs. The first of the week is kind of a blur, but I do remember quite a bit of cleaning involved. Mid-week was definitely the highlight. My parents offered to treat me to a Braves game for my birthday. Little did they know when I bought the tickets I would get us seats behind the dug out. My dad quickly decided it was well worth the price...we had a server who took our orders and brought our food. The Braves did lose, but it was such a beautiful day..even got some sun!! The end of my week continued with more cleaning. I id have the house to myself for a few days, so that was pretty nice. Now I am finished with all the chores and the rain is puring down. I think I am going to tun in early. Enjoy the pics!

We always have to take our yearly family hotos. I did luck out and only had to be in a few shots this year. It was a little windy.

Little Boys

I have to say if I am ever to have children I hope I have little boys. Now do not get me wrong I love little girls, but boys are so much fun. I am so blessed to have two close friends who each have two wonderful boys each. On Saturday I had such a great time playing soccer and Mario Kart with Grant and Benjamin. Today I was able to send the morning with Sam and Eli, then Sam came over and spent the day with me. We had a great time playing, doing the "Hot Dog" dance and hunting Easter eggs. I was even okay with him pelting me in the face with a tennis ball. I would love a little girl, but I would have so much fun with little boys.

Sam was trying to make the face like the SpiderMan egg.

Sam thought it was so funny to throw the tennis ball and try t hit me in the face...it was funny!!!

Playhouse Disney

I really did have an exciting week, but I have had a busy weekend. On Thursday night I went to Hamilton for a funeral visitation. It was nice to see people, but of course a sad occasion. On Friday I took off early and went with Flori, Sam and Eli to Huntsville. We had lunch at Atlanta bread company then went to the VBC to see Disney Playhouse Live. We got to see Mickey and friends, Pooh, Little Einstein's and Handy Manny. Sam really enjoyed it..well until the end when he wasn't happy about leaving without all the toys. Eli had a nice time and of course I think Flori and I had fun too. Here are a few pictures to highlight our trip (may put up more later)
Oaky so I stole this picture from the Clark's, but I am sure they will not mind:)

I got Sam a Handy Manny hat, but he insisted on wearing it backwards. I think he will enjoy the hat more after the show's excitement wears off and he has his tools with him.

Eli seemed to like the Mickey hat. My mom says it looks like Baby Mario's hat on Mario Kart.

On Saturday I enjoyed spending the day with Tracy, Grant and Benjamin I do think i have realized my age after playing on the playground for a couple of hours. It was fun doing flips and playing on the equipment at the time, but today I am a little sore. It had been a while since we all spent the day hanging out, so I really enjoyed playing with the boys.

I think I am going to be one tired chic come Monday morning. I will have to get some rest before Fridays' Kid's Night Out. I am truly blessed to be able to have such wonderful friends who I get to spend time with and especially the chance to spend time with their children.

Spring!!

I can remember in college how much I loved it when Spring finally arrived. It meant having classes in the commons, smelling the fish gut smell from the Bradford pear trees outside my dorm room, or even taking long bike rides. Over the years I guess I have not paid as much attention to the start of spring...well I still pass a Bradford pear and smell the fish, but really Spring has meant very little. Maybe it was because I had always loved the feelings of excitement and anticipation of new beginnings and over the last few years it has been disappointment for the lack of change in my life that has actually occurred. I have to say finally this year I have been able to enjoy the possibility of spring. Please do not misinterpret..nothing is going on in my life I have finally just realized that I should be happy with the life that I have.
I think a lot of people have been able to enjoy this first week of spring out of school, but I will not have the luxury f sprig break for a few more weeks. I have to admit though I have had a nice week. We did quite well with out parent v. teacher basketball game. I think everyone had a great time. I really enjoyed Flori getting to come out and play. I did not so much enjoy getting hit in the head with the basketball, but I know that is what I get for laughing at another player while he was trying to make a shot. I at least think we raised more money than I thought we were going to. I am thankful to everyone who played or came to watch.
I did at least get to have Friday..the actual first day of spring off. You would think I would have gone outside and enjoyed the day...no, I did my taxes. I knew I had to get them done or else I was going to be in trouble. I think I am overall pleased with the outcome of the situation, but they are still a pain to do. After that I treated myself to a two hour nap. I did enjoy the Friday night Grey's Anatomy catch up marathon with Missie.
I guess the highlight of my weekend was Saturday. Tracy picked me up that afternoon and we enjoyed some time together before I had dinner with the whole family for Benjamin's birthday. I can hardly believe he is seven. I did enjoy getting to spend time with Tracy because it seems we have been so busy lately to hang out. I also truly value the time I get to spend playing with the boys, so was glad to get that chance yesterday. They are a huge part of my life and I have hated that we have let our schedules get in the way of our fun times.
Today was a great day too! I do always enjoy my Sundays. Right now I am helping my mom in her cradle roll bible class, so I get the thrill of holding all the new babies. I so love getting to be around all those little ones. Of course I also enjoy my Sam time on Sunday. I have to say the highlight of the evening was hanging out at St. Florian park with the Garrett's and Wear's. Mona knocking my dad down with the kickball was...priceless.
This weekend was really nothing out of the ordinary, these are the people that are in my life all the time, but I sometimes forget to appreciate the times I have with them. It may be that I see Charlotte's situation right now and know that I want to take that advice and live each day to the fullest. I do not want to regret the little moments or definitely not sweat the small stuff. I have preached thoughts from that book for years and now I know I need to live by it. I now my life is not what I set out for it to e ten years ago, but I also know I am not in charge. I am truly a blessed person and I should start acting like it. I do not want my life to happen while I am sitting around waiting for the right person or the right moment. I hope we all will live like there is n tomorrow.

Goin' Out for a Walk

I am really irritated with myself that I am just now getting around to writing about this my blog, but here goes. In October of this year I along with 10 other women will be walking the the #Day Breast Cancer Walk in Atlanta, GA. We decided shortly after the beginning of the year to form a team. I am so excited because this is something that I have wanted to do for a very long time. At first, our group consisted of nine women who work at Forest Hills Elementary School, but then we added one lady form Florence Middle School and another from Florence Christian Academy. we refer to ourselves as the Fighting Falcons. These 11 women include: me, Nichole Campbell, Pam Kirkland, Donna Lamprecht, Melanie Mabry, Juanita Sheffield, Leah Smith, Megan Smith, Jan Stone, Leslie Thorn and Jessica Wallace.
For those of you who do not know what the 3 Day is about I will try to explain. During a period of three days we will walk 20 miles a day for three days to equal a total of 60 miles. The walk is around downtown Atlanta. There are actually many walks around the country, but this is the closest one to us, so we chose to participate at it. All the money raised for the event goes to the Susan G. Kohmen Foundation. Each team memeber must raise a minimum of $2300 . We all walk together during the day and sleep in our pink tents at night. Most teams have some creative theme. IF you would like information on the walk go to http://www.the3day.org/ or there are some really good videos on YouTube.
We are all very excited we have been fundraising quite a it lately. We have a T-shirt sale that is on going. ( I will post a picture of the shirt below, so if anyone is interested they are $10 and you can get in touch with me to order one.) We have raised quite a bit of money form it. We are thankful to Goodman's for making our shirts. This past Friday night we had our first Kid's Night Out. It was a huge success. I just hope the kids had as much fun as we did. We are hoping to have another one real soon with even more new activities planned. This week we will be hosting basketball games at Forest Hills to raise money. It is parents v teachers (or anyone who knows someone at Forest Hills). The cost is $5 to play and $1 to watch. On Tuesday it will be K-2 grades and then on Wednesday the 304 grades will play. Our half time performances will be twirlers who take classes from Connie gilley. This is always a fun activity for our ids to come and watch. Our other bug event coming up is Swamp John's. It is April 11 from 4-7 at Forest Hills. we will be selling tickets for $9. If you would like to purchase some, contact a team member. Also that evening in the lunchroom will be having an auction for some artwork donating by Jerry Foster.
We have several other thing going on that I will talk about from time to time. I also hope to get some pictures up of some events. If you would like to help with an event please let me know or if you would lie to make a donation to me or our team we would greatly appreciate it.
I am not really in training mode yet, but am sure once I get there that will be a topic of discussion on here as well

Snow Day

Who knew on March 1 we would have almost 3-4 inches of snow. I would have loved to gone out and played, but I have not been feeling too well, so I went out and at least took a few pictures. Their quality is not that great because it was 5 in the morning and snow was still coming down. I hope some of you got to go out and enjoy it!

Stuart does not really get into the snow. I guess I would not either if it stuck to my hair. He walked around the driveway until finally decided he could not hold it any longer. Shortly after this he began walking around on the road sniffing the snow, but he has not been out since.

Maywood

In my pursuit to write a month's worth of random things, I almost forgot one of mine from my facebook list. Many people grow up going to summer camps. They could be all kins of camps, but a think a lot of us attended some kind of church camp. For me, I got lucky the summer camp I attended was in my hometown on land that part of family donated. I spent 20 summers and my life was forever changed by Maywood Christian Camp.
At the age of four I began spending a couple of nights at a time with my aunts Teena and Toni. I would then stay with Toni while she was a counselor. Then for over a decade I was there every year for Hamilton's week. I went from being a camper, worker then counselor. As I grew up it was a social thing with all my friends around town then by the end it was a group of people I went to college with. I made a number of connections through Maywood and some friendships that I still have today.
I always spent my week at camp, but never even thought about the fact that camp went on all summer. I guess it was around the fifth grade that a group of my friends started going out to camp for church on Sunday and Wednesday nights. We began to make friends and some weeks we were out there every night. It took a couple of years before I stated going to a second week of camp. We had been going out at night and met some great people during Birmingham's week. .(That is when I met Emily Glass). It is kind of funny because our week was laid back and all about practical jokes, but this week was so different. I became to love it all the same. I kept going that week all through high school. Later when Lindsey became the lifeguard out there we went almost every day...well unless it was Florence week which kind of kicked us out because we took away campers, thanks Jeremy.
I loved being a camper pulling jokes, but some of my greatest memories came while all of us were kitchen and canteen workers. In college I started being a counselor. Those were fun times too, but I also became the responsible one. It was fitting my last year of camp came with Lindsey and I being counselors and Katie coming out to help us. I think everything cam efull circle. I have not been out there in years since I rarely even go to Hamilton. My family still goes the same week and it is lie a new generation. I have so many wonderful memories. I could spend a whole month telling just Maywood memories. I came in contact with so many wonderful people that I will hold in my heart. I know that I will see all those people again one day and we can reminisce and tell our stories all over again.