GWO--Girls Weekend Out! :0)

Okay...I am finally posting our "Girls Weekend Out" pictures. Amber, Denise, and I enjoyed a few days in the Smoky Mountains over Fall Break. We left on Thursday and came home on Sunday. Our husbands surprised us with a trip just for the "girls". My first reaction was "No, I'm not going. I can't go." I have never done this before...leaving my kids and husband just for a pleasure trip! (I had only been one time and that was to a Reading Conference when Austin was little for a night or two and I believe I cried when I left!) I "teared" up when I would think about going for a while and then Terry told me that yes I was going. Well....I ended up not only going but deciding to take an extra day off and leave early that morning! While we were there we ate and shopped and ate and shopped and ate some more and shopped some more! :0) We also took out a little while and went to the picnic area on the road up to the Chimney Tops. It made us want to start a yearly tradition! (Actually...Denise said more like a quarterly tradition!)

The trees were not changing alot while we were there, but here they were some.

Awwwwwww....relaxation!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The tree really wasn't that high off the ground!

Wasn't it pretty????

Let's do a little climbing on the rocks. Be a little adventurous!





And speaking of adventurous.....

I believe at this point, I was thinking...should I???? And my dear friend Amber was saying, "If you fall in, we are not coming in after you!" :0) I decided I better stop where I was!





Yeah!!! We made it! I think about this time after our carefully chosen path out to the rock....we were seeing these 2 young boys jumping from rock to rock. But you know the difference is because they had on their tennis shoes and we were barefooted. That had to be the only difference, right??????

This is one of those times we were waiting to eat....again! This time...The Apple Barn.



This is how far we had to park to shop on Saturday. We wanted to shop pretty bad, didn't we?Yes, that is grass not pavement!

Thanks girls for a fun weekend, thanks to our husbands for our trip, and thanks to our kids and our families for helping us out and working together to allow us to go!

Braden is 9!!!

Today was Braden's 9th birthday. He celebrated yesterday when he and a friend (along with Carmen and me) made a day of it. We started out by going to Walmart and he picked a cookie cake to celebrate with. Then we went to eat and had the cookie cake for dessert. Then we headed bowling! It was fun. (I am so out of shape that I am sore today from bowling!) After bowling, we headed for a game of putt-putt. Then we went to Chick-fil-a for an ice cream cone. After that we went to Pet Depot and he picked out some fish for his birthday. It has been a while since we had some and he was wanting some for his birthday. But of course when we ended up getting home and getting the old aquarium cleaned and set up....lucky me....no filter. I think packrat here actually threw some stuff away and threw away the last filter a while back. So back to Walmart I go last night about 9:00 to get a new filter. Now the fish are in their aquarium in their new home!

Here is another of his presents...the newest addition to his Magic Treehouse Book Collection.

This afternoon he had his baseball team party. They got another trophy and a shirt. On the back of their shirts it says, "Back to Back County Champions"

We still have to work in the family parties for Austin and Braden. That will just extend their birthdays and make them last a little longer I guess...huh? They both want to have a party with family!

My......how time flies....he's already 9. Happy Birthday, Braden. We love you!

Happy 14th...Austin!

Can you believe Austin is 14??? Today was his birthday. We had a lot going with school, basketball practice, baseball parent meeting, and a few other things....but did manage to work in opening a few presents and giving him his favorite cake--cheesecake!

Roll Tide! (one of the presents)

Hmmmm....do you think he could wait tables?? Extra money!!!!

Here are a few pictures that have absolutely nothing to do with Austin's birthday, but I haven't posted in a while so....

Here is Carmen and her "best bud" Emma!

Surely Braden didn't really mean to be aggravating, did he????? :0)

Being silly.......

Just a couple of pictures of Braden, Carmen, Emma, and William.

(I believe some new jeans are in the future for Braden.

Look at those knees!)

Finally...a picture of all 3!

It is not that often I get a picture of all 3 of my kiddos to post. Austin was not at all excited about the picture but finally got tickled in the last picture, I think and I got a smile. We were ready to go to church services Sunday morning and I just noticed that somehow they had all ended up with blue. So...Kodak moment! I was going to take them outside and we headed out but........it was raining. So we opted for the front porch instead. Just my normal stair-step picture. They

are all getting so big!

Sunflowers, Sunflowers, and More Sunflowers!!!

Leanne beat me to it by getting to the sunflowers. Mama had told me about them but you know me...I put things off. Anyway...we finally made it. They were beautiful!!!! There is the patch on 127 and there is another patch on Myers Road. There are fields and fields at both places. They are definitely worth the trip over there. The ones on Myers Road seemed to be "hanging their heads" and were not as easy to walk right up to as the ones on 127 that had been mowed right up to. It was much easier for Carmen to get beside them on 127. Here are a few of the "near 40" pictures that I took! Yes..."near 40" pictures...and I had a hard time picking out my favorites. But here are some of them.

These are Carmen on 127.

These were also on 127.

One of the fields.



There was one drawback......bees!!!! Carmen didn't like them the bees at all!
I think this picture shows her reaction!

These next pictures are from Myers Road. We were facing the sun, so the pictures really have too much light in them, but oh well....

Only one of the fields on Myers Road...

One final picture at Myers Road.

I would definitely recommend everyone "checking" them out. They are beautiful!!!

One fall too many!!!!

Concrete + Cell Phone = DISASTER

Well...my poor little phone hit the concrete too many times. The last time I dropped it.....well......this is what it looked like....

So...this is the new one.

Out with the old and in with the new! This seems to be a trend with me and usually it is because I have dropped it...AGAIN! Oh well....that is what keeps them in business, I guess.

Birthday Party then...Back to School

My mama had a birthday this past weekend. Here is a picture of mama and daddy with the grandkids. Happy birthday, Meemaw!

Well...farewell summer...hello school days! Carmen started preschool today and the rest of us had to go back also. My baby is old enough to start preschool. She was so excited and loved it! Braden ended up being excited too! Austin...well...I don't think excited is the correct word as you can see in the picture. Plus he wasn't thrilled at the idea at all of me making him take the picture. Notice I didn't even put my picture on there of my reaction.....need I say more? You might could say excited was not really the word for my return either!!!! Oh well...back to the rat-race!!!!

Okay...now maybe I am caught up on my posts!