A Night With the GIRLS!

BAHAHAHAHA!!! That's all I can say about tonight! A few friends got together to celebrate the "re-marriage" of our besty, Marty. What happened next, only us and the poor waiter will ever know! The stories that were told are still making me chuckle (although chuckle is NOT the word for SOME of those stories - HAHAHA!!) Everyone needs to laugh, and laugh we did!!! Let's do it more often GFs!!

The guest of honor - it's just TOO hard to explain!


Me and Marty :)

Drea & Holly being - well - Drea and Holly!

A few of the MANY Kelly girls!!

MORE Kelly's (and a should be Kelly :)

Ann Marie, Jackie and Me

Alicia and Dana

Momma Suzie was there to "chaperone" - whatever!!!


POOR KYLIE - That's all I can say! Coming to a "my momma's getting married to my daddy, again :)" shower and hearing some of her own grandmother's comments may have very well sent her into YEARS of very pricey therapy.

New Car!!

We have a new car!!!!

Since I'm not at school, I thought I'd drive a mini-bus!!!! Sorry - Stew says a land yacht! Seriously - I LOVE it - room for everyone!! (It's so big the back end isn't even in this picture!) And of course notice the color - Stewart made sure it perfectly matched the crimson red on the Alabama tag. I'm calling it the Saban-mobile!
Did we really MEAN to get a car now - NO!!!! We had a perfectly good Volvo SUV - or so we thought!! That was before we discovered that our cute little white, European, supposed to last forever vehicle was infested with MICE!!!! Yes - go ahead - scream!!

Now imagine driving over the mountain and hearing it, but not seeing it! Imagine driving all the way to the Smokies only for your husband to tell you AFTER you get there that he found evidence that they were so bad they had eaten a hole in the car seats!! Imagine still, a grown man, a service manager at a local car lot screaming like a little girl as he jerked a trap with a RAT still alive out of your vehicle that you had just sat through the car line with your five year old! Now imagine all the technicians at the before mentioned car lot coming out to laugh as the rat drug the trap across the parking lot!!!!!

Alfa to the rescue! Filed a claim, got it fixed and TRADED IT IN!!!! I don't want to turn this into a car bashing session, but if you think you own the same type of vehicle, I'll be glad to pass more details along in a private email.

YIKES!

Happy Easter!!

Here are some pictures from our Easter weekend. Right now I'm trying not to hurt Blogger, so they are in no particular order!! We had a great weekend full of class parties, church activities and egg hunts (complete with a bloody knee mishap for Miss Abby during the mad egg dash!) and Easter Sunday with family. I NEVER seem to get a good family shot on Easter, but I promise - we were all there and with coordinating outfits, thank you very much!!










Easter is everything to a Christian - it defines what we believe, and why we continue to believe in the darkest of hours. A dear friend of ours, Alvie McKenzie, penned a song many years ago that says it all - it's worth 30 seconds for you to read. No one could say it better :)

I wasn't there on that morning when my Lord was crucified.
I wasn't there in the evening when He bowed His head and died.
And though I haven't seen the tomb where they laid Him long ago.
I believe that He arose again and He's living in my soul.

I can feel that holy power. The same that rolled the stone away.
I can feel that precious spirit that gently woke him on that day.
Though the world may not believe it, I know He's still alive today.
For I can feel that holy power, the same that rolled the stone away.

Sometimes Satan comes against me and tries to make me doubt.
Saying this will be the trial, oh you'll never make it out.
But if the spirit that raised Jesus in my heart, it still abides.
There's not a mountain I can't get over for I've got Jesus on my side.

Support TEAM FAITH

OK followers - help me out here!!! The March for Babies is coming up SOON! Check out my badge on the side - see how far behind I am on my donations??? Help me out! $1.00 is appreciated! So many of us have a personal connection to situations that the March of Dimes supports.

Don't let me down!! If you'd still like to join the team, click on the badge on the side. We'd LOVE to have you!!

MORE SOON!

Just When You Think You Know.....

How blessed are you?? I'm sure we would all quickly say VERY BLESSED!!! Read this blog from the beginning and you will have a new, deeper appreciation for blessings!! These are friends of ours and their posts about their adoption journey.

Thank you Lord for your blessings on me!!

We're BAAAACCKKKK........

WHEW! We're back! I mean this on several fronts. Let me explain.

A couple of posts ago, I lamented that our hard drive had crashed. Well, turns out it was the entire motherboard (sounds like a Star Trek reference!). When they tried to replace it, the new one fried too. Thank goodness for tax refund money! Every year we have such plans to pay off things, save, invest in college funds, etc. Every year unexpected expenses pop up right around the time we get our refund. Thank you Lord that you provide it when we need it!! I am now typing on my new MAC that came today!! We made the switch - we are all MAC at our house now! A little scary, I know! For the last month, I've had to share computers with Stewart. Sounds a little spoiled, but he has CONSTANT work to do with his Ed.S. degree he is working on, so my requests to check blogs, read emails, pay bills, etc. seemed trivial in his busy world. I did sneak on some, but not nearly enough!! So, here I sit in front of a GIANT, TV like screen with the tiniest keyboard and "smart" mouse. It's definitely smarter than me!!

We're also back from a Spring Break get-a-way! We ventured out to the new water park resort in Sevierville. If you haven't been and you have kids, you should plan a trip soon! It's a little pricey, but considering it has restaurants, arcades, and more water activities than you can name, you could go and never leave! Taking into consideration all the places you could go and tickets you would buy makes the room price not bad! Check out their website!

I also feel like saying "I'm BACK" in the everyday, I think I can do it, I know what my name is, we all have a supply of clean clothes and underwear waiting, I'm pretty sure we'll make it another day - sense of things!! I've been in a FUNK the last few months! I'm blaming it on transitions (I don't do well with changes in routines!!), too many sick days, and not enough sunshine!! Just the past few days have felt so much more like ME! With Mom's help, I reorganized and repurposed a few areas in the house this weekend. All of you with growing babies know about constantly re-thinking where to play, how to store toys, etc as they grow, develop, and learn to get into new things. We were long overdue making our playroom safe for EK to play in! It had been Abby's palace full of tiny toys easily swallowed for TOO long! We spent too much time running after EK making sure she didn't have anything in her mouth! No more! Abby has a play area in her bedroom now with her "big girl" things, and the playroom is safely shared by both girls! I'm still about 5 loads shy of getting all the laundry caught up, and now I need to switch the closets to spring clothes, but hey, at least I'm moving in the right direction!!

I have MUCH more to say.......but I'm trying not to have a forever long post here! Stay tuned for more ramblings........

Opposite of ARRRGGGGGhh.....

Today has been a GREAT day!! Totally opposite of the "ARRGGGHHHH....." day earlier this week!! Nothing major - Stewart was caught up on his never ending homework associated with his Ed.S. degree he's working on, EK was in a super great mood, Abby is SO excited for it to be spring break, and we went out to eat with friends after church with no fit or eyebrow raising looks from surrounding tables! I'm still trying to work on those moments that the fear of "what's going to happen next?" starts to creep up. Tonight as I rocked EK and snuggled with Abby, I tried my best to be only in THIS moment and not worry about another. I pray the Lord will help me continue to do that!!

Here are a few pictures......EK before church and Abby after :) We're all so excited to be going out of town later this week. We ALL need a get-a-way!
I haven't solved the hard drive issue, but I have found that almost all if not all of the "lost" pictures are spread out among Stewart's, my Mom's and my computer at work. I had also uploaded a lot already to Shutterfly and just hadn't done anything with them yet. I WILL be researching and subscribing to one of those automatic back up programs after this. I think I felt more physically sick over this than any stomach virus!!

Happy Spring Break Week!!