Huh?

It says "do not fork."
I don't get it...

Happy Birthday, Kristen!!!!

Today is the birthday of my DEAREST FRIEND. We lived across the street from each other in Pennsylvania for two years. TWO YEARS! And when I went looking for pictures of her for this post-I have NADA. I have never known someone who liked to have her picture made less than Kristen! Seriously, these are the only two I could find. Well, there was another one of us in our bathing suits tubing down the Delaware, but she is a dear FRIEND, not a dear enemy, so I would never post that one...

Happy Birthday, Kris!
39 Reasons Why I Love You...

1. You have great hair.

2. Your husband cracks me up.

3. Your love of PINK!

4. Your willingness to go along with any hair-brained scheme I come up with. (Hey, you want to drive an hour to go eat lunch at Popeye's?)

5. You gave me your salsa recipe. (I'm sure you don't mind, I pass it off as my own now!)

6. You always know what the names of all the flowers are.

7. Someday, you are going to show me around Seattle.

8. You give great advice.

9. You convinced me to join the gym.

10. You always made me do the elliptical. No wait. I don't think I love you for that.

11. How you roll your eyes at me when I call you a left-coast tree hugger.

12. Lucy and Ethel...which one am I again?

13. Road trip QUEENS!

14. How you could always get us where we wanted to go on Route 1...NOT!

15. Sledding with you at Kids' Castle.

16. Going to the bagel place. No wait, I need to save that one for Karla!

17. Our trip to Vermont to go Maple Sugaring...without you, it would have been the fun weekend that wasn't!

18. Your blue checked shirt that perfectly matched your eyes.

19. That you can type in your credit card number from memory.

20. That you were a great bus stop mom.

21. The calculator in your head that is faster than the calculator in my hand!

22. Seeing the Statue of Liberty for the first time with you.

23. You taught me how to cook asparagus...except that mine is never as good as yours is.

24. You informed me of the evils of margarine and hooked me onto butter.

25. You share room mom ideas with me (hot chocolate bar- great idea, by the way!)

26. You flew all the way from Seattle to spend my birthday with me...wish I was returning the favor today!
27.Getting soaked on the Maid of the Mist with you!

28. Carving pumpkins on your deck.

29. How you always showed up early and stayed late to help.

30. Pizza at Pena's. (Or was it Vagena's?)

31. The shortbread cookies you make from your grandmother's recipe.

32. How you would always watch the kids for me when I needed it...even when yours were at school.

33. Funnel cakes and Frito chili pies, baby!

34. Your laugh.

35. That Velveeta grosses you out.

36. Your phenomenal knitting! (LOVE my purse, you know.)

37. How much you love to stay up to the wee hours of the morning and then sleep in.

38. Shoveling the driveways together when the men were gone.
39. You know all my "crazy" and you love me anyway.

Wish I was there. Have fun! Miss ya, baby!

This picture says "summer" to me!
It is from the summer of 2005. Carolyn is 2 and Coleman is 5. We were in Pennsylvania and the kids lived in the pool that summer! It was WAY too cold for me-our backyard was in the shade and I don't think the temperature in that pool EVER got above 78 degrees. Carolyn loved this orange bathing suit. It had sequins all over the front of it that sparkled when the sun caught them. Of course, she wore it until almost all of the sequins had worn off.

Yay, cupcakes!

Today was our first Take Off Trip of the summer!  We went to Watkinsville, GA to see the sites...both of them.

We started with lunch at a little Italian restaurant (because Kim and I, we are ALL about the eats!)

Next we visited the Eagle Tavern Museum.  The Eagle Tavern began life as a fort around 1750,  making it, at the time, the farthest west any settlers had pushed from any of the 13 colonies.  It  was later a stagecoach stop on a route carrying students to the University of Georgia (and apparently, gained something of a reputation!)  It was spared the torch on Sherman's March to the Sea during the Civil War (or the War of Northern Aggression, as it's known locally!)

The kids always LOVE getting their picture made...

Next we visited Elder's Mill Covered Bridge, built in 1897 and moved to its current location over Rose Creek in 1924.  It is one of the few covered bridges in Georgia that still carry traffic.

There is a path off to the side of the bridge leading down to Rose Creek.  Which the kids HAD to ford!
 

And what road trip would be complete without a stop at the ice cream parlor? 

 This one even had checkers tables as lagniappe (that's a "little something extra" for all you non-Louisiana folk!)

The kids were excited to start our Take Off Tuesdays again...even if this one was on a Thursday!

Pizza-It's What's For Dinner!

One of my kids' favorite dinners.  Yes, you have to think about dinner ahead of time, but I always have all of the ingredients!

Homemade Pizza Hut Pizza Crust

(for the bread maker)

1 1/3 cups water

2 tsp sugar

1 1/4 Tbsp olive oil

3 cups flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp onion powder

1 1/2 tsp bread machine yeast

(cornmeal for dusting)

1. Add ingredients to bread machine per manufacturer's instructions.  Set to dough mode.

2. Lightly grease cookie sheet/pizza pan and sprinkle with corn meal.

3. When dough cycle is complete, roll out and place in pan.  Let rest in pan 10-15 minutes.

4. Add toppings and bake at 350 degrees until done (approx. 20 minutes depending on toppings.)

I half the dough and make two pizzas with it...it was VERY thick if you only make one.

Preschool Graduation

Photos I should've already posted...

Yankee or Dixie Quiz

Yankee or Dixie Quiz

Happy to report that I am 100% Dixie...leave your score in the comments-

You'll Get Up and Look!

Have you ever tried to pull off a piece of aluminum foil or even worse, saran wrap and the roll falls out of the box? Have you ever used it when it DIDN'T? I received an email the other day with this tip: there is a tab on the end of the box that you press in to lock the roll in place! Who knew? (Hopefully not everyone BUT me!) Even the generic boxes have it. I got up and tried it and sure enough it worked for me! Now head on over to Rocks In My Dryer for more Works for Me Wednesday tips.

Memorial Day

A little town near us has the only Memorial Day celebration in the Atlanta area. There is a 5K race and a parade with a little festival. We went to the parade last year, but we didn't know about the 5K or the festival. This year, Christian, Coleman and I ran in the 5K. Christian ran with my friend, Troye, because he is way too fast to slum with us jogger/walkers! He ran it in 26 minutes! Can you believe that? Coleman and I were only a LITTLE bit slower than that. (SNORT.) This was Coleman's first 5K. He only has two speeds-full throttle and stop. We agreed ahead of time that we would walk it and run a little if we felt like it. But the pressure at the starting line got the best of him and he was adamant that he wanted to run the whole thing. (JOY.) I think I have made my feelings known that I do NOT enjoy running! I told him that we would do what we could and when the gun went off, we started out at a nice reasonable pace. We got, I kid you NOT, 50 feet down the road and he was ready to walk! After we crossed the finish line, we stood and talked to some friends for a few minutes and just happened to be standing there when the last runner crossed the finish line. He was 88 years old and he was accompanied by a young woman and a young marine carrying a full pack. It was unbelievable and very awe-inspiring.

You want my glasses, don't you?

Jim and Carolyn came later and met us for the parade. How about this float...a re-enactment of the flag raising over Iwo Jima.

Carolyn and I BOTH got a pair of statue of liberty glasses...so we wouldn't have to share. Of course, she left hers in the car- so much for that bright idea...

You're it!

I was tagged by Troye for a six word description memoir meme. Seriously? Only six words? I've been thinking about it and although it is more of a present day description than a memoir, it seems the most applicable:

School's out for summer; I'm leaving.

Here are the rules for this meme:
1) Write your own six-word memoir about yourself.
2) Post it on your blog and include a visual illustration if you'd like.
3) Link to the person that tagged you in your post and to this original post if possible, so we can track it as it travels across the blogosphere.4) Tag five more blogs with links.
5) And don't forget to leave a comment on the tagged blogs with an invitation to play.

Kim, Jane and Kim A.- you're all IT!

Look what came to live at our house!

Flashback Friday Friends

Go check out Jane and Kim-they are joining Flashback Fridays!

Carolyn, 1 day old

Look at the head of hair on this child. Can you imagine how much heartburn I had when I was pregnant with her?

Happy 5th Birthday, Carolyn!

The more she changes, the more she stays the same...

1st Birthday 2nd Birthday3rd Birthday 4th Birthday

5th Birthday

We love you, sweet girl!

When Boy Meets Brick

Brick wins.

School's OUT for SUMMER!

Today was the last day of school. And the last day of elementary school for Christian!  We went to the annual end of school party at the pool.  It was the happenin' place to be...even the Chick-fil-a cow was there!

We had a "graduation" cake for the 5th graders (thanks, Mrs. Kim!)

"The water isn't cold at all."  He could barely get it out, his teeth were chattering so badly!

The icing on the cake was blue...can you tell?  Reminds me of this guy we saw at the Fernbank!

The boys of summer play baseball, the men of summer play lacrosse

I saw today's title on a T-shirt at the Lacrosse tournament we were at all weekend.   Which was really a lot of fun, although I was COMPLETELY SPENT by the time we got home last night!  Between both boys we had games at 10:00, 10:00, 12:00, 2:00, 5:00 and 7:00 on Saturday and 11:00 and 3:00 on Sunday.  And then Christian was asked to play on the other Gwinnett team in one of their games because they were short of players. 

Christian taking it behind the goal

Apparently, watching 9 games of lacrosse in two days is MUCH more tiring than playing 9 games of lacrosse, because when we got home at 6:00 last night Christian went right outside and started running around with the kids next door!  (Who watched our dogs all weekend-thanks, Danielle!)

Passing for an assist

Although neither team did as well as they would have liked, the boys really had a lot of fun. 

Coleman (#1) at the goal

Christian's U-11 team, the Greyhounds (aren't they cute?)

Coleman's U-9 team, the Lighting (aren't they cute, too?)

So the season is over.  

babies

This picture is of Christian and me from July 1997. What a baby! And so was Christian. I was 26 and Christian was 9 months old. Look at the dimples in his hand! And his two little teeth! It's hard to believe that he is going to middle school...

Carolyn's dance recital was last Friday night.

13.1

So I posted a while back about the half marathon that Kim and I were planning to walk. Saturday was the day! I made it the full distance with no problem. Thanks to everyone who came out and walked! The boys both walked 4.4 miles with me and even Carolyn walked .8 miles (down to the tent and back twice!) The kids had two different birthday parties to attend, so Jim and the kids were gone the majority of the time. Thanks to Kim, Danielle, Joelma and John, Mike, Valerie and Jen for all coming out and walking with us! And thanks Jim and Mike for toting the tent and coolers down for us.

Thanks to all of you who donated money to St. Jude-we raised about $300!

We will DEFINITELY do this again next year! Only not in May. Maybe in February when it's not so crazy. and hot!