Today's the Day!

Happy Birthday to my Darling Momma (left) & her twin sister, known 'round these parts as Aunt Karen!

LOVE YOU!!!

Today's the Day

Happy Birthday to my mother-in-law, Chris!  

...and Goooooo Noles!  Beat Duke!

Welcome Sweet Annabelle!

Last Saturday I got to meet one of my best friend's sweet 6 day baby girl.... 

 Welcome to the world Sweet Annabelle!  

♥ ♥ ♥

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Days of Childhood Past

Throughout my kids' childhood, we spent thousands of dollars on toys...

but the expensive toys mostly sat gathering dust while they spent thousands of hours playing with these...

the girls called them "characters", Ben called them his "guys"

Whether they came from the toy store, a Happy Meal or a big bag from trips to "the Flea" with Gramma Tiss...

they were well-loved

and played with constantly

Through the years I've gotten rid of several of them...

But these that remain

Were the favorites.

And I will save them. Forever.

♥ ♥ ♥

Bentley!

Meet our newest family member, Bentley Pants...

Several years ago, we promised Ben we would get him a dog when Jordan went to college.

After a very sad experience at the local pound (we fell in love with what turned out to be a very sick dog who had to be put down R.I.P. Lucy Pants), I put out the word on FB that we were looking for a dog to join our family. While we strongly believe in "saving" a dog, we were just too heartbroken to go back to the pound.

Debbie, the mom of one of Megan's old soccer teammates heard about Bentley, a one-year old labradoodle whose family had a change of circumstances that led to poor Bentley being stuck in a crate for 10 hrs. a day. Thankfully, they had the wisdom to know that was no life for such a sweet, loving pup, so selflessly they decided to find him a new home.

Now originally, the plan was to get a medium-sized dog. Michael grew up with a golden doodle (then commonly referred to as a mutt) & I grew up with minature dachshund. A medium sized dog seemed like the perfect compromise. Although I quickly found out that our idea of "medium sized" was completely different. I was thinking Lhasa Apso, he was thinking Golden Retriever.
But once we met Bentley, we all knew that medium-sized was right out the window.

There is nothing "medium-sized" about this dog. Just ask the cats (who, 10 days later are still not very happy with our decision)...

And althoug he LOVES to play in the mud, we think he's pretty awesome~

His favorite pastimes are playiing fetch with a tennis ball (for hours and hours and hours) & "eating" water right out of the hose.

Plus, if I do say so myself, he's pretty freaking adorable!

Even if he doesn't quite know what to make of my parents' pool.

Eventually, he decided to just hang out on the steps.

Until his boy was ready to get out & get dried off.

OMG, I was soooo not prepared to love a dog this much!

Hello again!

Hello Faithful Readers Mom!

Wow! I really had no intention of taking so long of a blogging break, but now that my amazing, astonishing, thrilling summer is over, I thought I might take another try at this blogging business.

So, what's been going on with the Beth's Blog Bunch this summer? Let's see...

First of all, Jordan graduated from high school. Woohoo!

Shortly after graduation, Jordan & I took one last trip with her club soccer team to Baton Rouge as they competed in Southern Regionals. Now, we live in Florida & are pretty used to the heat, but MAN, OH MAN it was HOT in Baton Rouge! Her team did really well, advancing through to the semi-finals before losing to the eventual Regional Champions 1-0 in the second OT. Between the 6 games in 6 days against really tough competition & in really hot, hot, hot conditions & the long drive, that week in BR really took a lot out of the girls me! I'm still not sure that I'm fully recovered.

Also hindering my productivity this summer may be an early July night out spent with these people:

Five married couples who all graduated from the same high school. Aside from the lovely lady in the middle, we were all in the same graduating class & all of us are turning 40 this year. Most of us still live in town, but Jenn & Jeff now reside in Pennsylvania. Since they were in town for a quick visit, we all decided it was the perfect time to celebrate our collective birthdays. :)

I'm not at liberty to divulge too much of what went on that night but here are a few pictures to give you some idea...




Let's suffice it to say, a good time was had by all that night, although a few of us were not feeling so hot in the morning. Love this group!



Lots of summer afternoons were spent in my parent's pool, this particular day was spent with my neice & nephew too...

I think this is my favorite picture of my mom. Ever. She was in the process of filling up a water gun to shoot her darling grandchildren. I wasn't allowed to have water guns growing up. Just sayin'.

Megan spent most of the summer up in Gainesville working at a daycare center. While I don't have many pictures of her this summer (this is one I stole from her FB), you can read all about her exploits here. She's a much better blogger than her momma! :)

Due to lease timings/college soccer preseason, we spent much of the later part of July/first part of August on the interstate, moving the girls to and fro.

Week 1: We moved Megan's belongings to a storage unit in G'ville for the 2 weeks between her leases...

Week 2: It was time to move Jordan into her tempary dorm for pre-season (we stopped in G'villed on the way to pick up Meg & Patrick).



Week 3: We moved Megan into her new digs.

Week 4: FINALLY one more trip to Tallahassee to get Jordan moved in to her regular dorm! Whew!

All that moving was finished just in time to get this kid ready for his first day of 7th grade...





You may remember his lunch bag fiasco from last year. We double & triple checked his bag for leaks. He was good to go!



What we didn't anticipate was his homeroom teacher giving him taffy. Which caused a visit from the tooth fairy that evening.

Actually, I lied. The tooth fairy never came. Ben brought home the tooth & showed me a big wad of tissue which I guess had the tooth in it. But I never saw the tooth & I haven't seen or heard about the wad ever since. Hmm...


Now for the big news....

The BIG news...

The BIG news...

The BIG news...

Looks who now lives at our house.

More to come...

Memorial Day Weekeend 2010

Catching Up

Whew! It's been a whirlwind around here for the past few weeks....and I don't see it letting up anytime soon. Crazy, crazy time of year!

2 weeks ago, Megan & I headed to Orlando for a special occasion...

Ree "The Pioneer Woman" Drummond was in town for a vacation book signing... we just love love love her!

It was an hour & 1/2 drive from our house & started at 6pm, so of course we left the house at 11. :) We stopped & had lunch, did a little shopping & grabbed a spot. We were about 20th in line, which afforded us not only a spot upstairs where her Q&A session took place, but a seat in the 4th row! Score! I'm not a good judge of crowd sizes but I do know that they ended up having a group upstairs, then rows & rows of people wrapped around downstairs. For once, my paranoia about being everywhere early paid off!

She brought her daughters... they are more beautiful in person . And she was super duper nice & gracious & self-deprecating. All the things you want "celebrities" to be when you meet them.

The ladies RIGHT in front of us in line to get our books signed snuck in a PUPPY!

A FREAKIN' PUPPY!

So, so cute! But, let's face it, a puppy right ahead of us, made us completely forgettable. :)

But she really liked Megan's shirt!

It wasn't a puppy, but it was something.

~*~*~*~*

The following week, was Ben's Principal's Honor Roll Breakfast

They did a little video of each of the kids who made straight As. Isn't he cute?

Too bad the sound wasn't working.

Michael's been out of town for the other Principal's Honor Roll Breakfasts, but Ben & I were glad he was able to make it to this one.

So, so proud of that boy! (Ben's pretty great too!)

The next morning was ANOTHER awards ceremony at Ben's school. Ben got a trophy for making Principal's Honor Roll for the first 3 quarters of the year (4th quarter grades aren't out yet)

He also got an award for winning The Battle of the Books. :)

Woo Hoo Ben!!!

~*~*~*~*~*

Last Friday was my dad's birthday. I was totally remiss in that he didn't get a "Today's the Day" post. Sorry Dad!!! But, how 'bout this?...

Last Friday was the Day!

not enough?

Here's a cute picture for you then.

Happy Birthday Dad! We're celebrating this Sunday.

~*~*~*~*~*

This past weekend, it was time to enjoy the Florida Sunshine... and 95 degree heat!

State Cup Weekend had arrived! Jordan's team won the Semi Final after 2 double overtimes & 7 PKs, so it was time for the BIG SHOW... The State Cup Finals!!!

Jordan REALLY wants a State Cup Championship!

The year before she joined her team, they won State Cup.

When she was 16, she was 2 minutes away from winning a State Championship, but the other team tied it up & her team ended up losing in PKs.

Tragic.

Her high school team lost 1-0 in OT in the Regional Semi Finals to the eventual State Champions.

Tragic.

This is her one LAST chance at a State Championship.

The girls were down 2-1 with 10 minutes left. It was looking kind of grim, and then...

JORDAN SCORED!!!!

and about 5 minutes later, her teammate Zoe scored again!

And then...

the whistle blew!!!

2010 U-18 FLORIDA STATE CUP CHAMPS, BABY!!!!

Jordan had quite the cheering section at the game. Of course Megan came to cheer her sister on...

And Michael's parents were there. Michael's brother & his girlfriend came & braved the heat. Heck! Michael's sister, Amy even flew in from Cape Cod to cheer J on!

Here are Jordan & her teammate, Kara with their old former coaches, Andy & Vickie, who are some of our closest friends. Jordan & Kara have played together since they were 11 years old.

Oh yeah! Ben was there somewhere too... trying to read his book in peace. But, I have a feeling Brachy wasn't letting that happen.

Because of this State Cup win, we will now be travelling to Baton Rouge in a few weeks to cheer the girls on in Regionals...

Woohoo!

~*~*~*

Last night was Ben's first Middle School band concert. Look at my little drummer boy!

It was a great show. Full of all the usual squeaking & squawking that middle school bands are known for. :) But, thankfully, drummers don't squawk.

~*~*~*~*~*

Megan got a job! Unfortunately, that means she'll be living in Gainesville this summer, but summer jobs are hard to come by these days, so she was fortuate to get one. Plus, I get the feeling sleeping on our couch was getting kind of old. She'll be off weekends though, so I'm sure we'll see plenty of her.

~*~*~*~*~*

As if that is enough, today is Jordan's last day of high school...

*sigh*

It goes by so fast. I swear, I just dropped her off in Mrs. Foley's kindergarten class.

The next few weeks are going to be even more crazy with college orientation, graduation, graduation parties, Regionals & the World Cup (not that we're going, it will just occupy a lot of conversations among the Beth's Blog Bunch). And then we'll throw Father's Day in there for good measure. :)

See ya soon!