January Snippets

Once upon a time when I named this blog, I wanted to capture little snippets of our daily life.  Sometimes I do a good job and sometimes I don't.  I do take a lot of daily pictures on my phone and most of the time that is where they stay. 

 

So, my resolve for 2013 is to do a little monthly round-up post (or phone dump) to cover some things that might not necessarily merit their very own blog post.   I'm already running behind ... great resolution!!

 

Claire modeling her new robe she got for Christmas (and little Claire matching).  She wears it a lot!

 

 

I saw Les Miserables (the movie) with a friend.  I quickly became OBSESSED with the soundtrack.  I saw the play/musical in London in 1999.  I had forgotten how amazing it was!

 

 

 

Roll Tide!  We cheered on Alabama for the 3rd National Championship in the Nick Saban era (14th overall) on January 7th!

 

David went to a birthday party at Glow Galaxy.  He has talked of nothing else since then!  These kids are all from his MWF class.

 

Claire and I met Meme near her house and got mani/pedis.  And then we had to wait out a tornado in a nearby Dollar General before we could drive home.  Fortunately, there was no touchdown near us.

 

We are big fans of Sweet CeCe's for a treat after school!  Claire and David's favorite is chocolate with m&ms.  My favorite right now is Lemon Bar and Cupcake Batter.  Luke will eat whatever I feed him!  (He was not a hug fan of the Lemon Bar!)

 

My kids got a lot of legos for Christmas.  And they are slowing taking over my dining room table!  Yikes!  That is a lot of teeny-tiny parts that we have to keep Luke away from!

 

 

Claire and did a little science experiment for school.  We kept the celery in the cups for about 48 hours but Will threw the celery away before I could snap an "after picture".

 

I went to see Sandi Patti, Wayne Watson and Larnelle Harris live in concert.  My nerdy teenage self who loved to belt out some Sandi Patti in the confines of my bedroom was very excited.  She was great but my two girlfriends and myself brought the median age in the room down by about 20 years!  And we are not that young!  We did get to hear my all-time fave Sandi Patti song!

 

 

That is all for January!

We are the Champions!

We had a fun time watching the Crimson Tide bring home another National Championship title last night. 

We were all decked out in our Alabama gear. 

We grilled burgers and dogs before the game.  And had our favorite gameday snack ... buffalo chicken dip with Alabama chips.  (That is what Claire calls Fritos scoops.) 

Game watching would not be complete without tattoos! 

The kids also needed the hats and shakers.   

David and Will watching the game. 

My big kids and me.  Luke went to bed before the game started but we let the big kids stay up as long as they wanted.  They started fading around 9:30 and we put them to bed.   

I'll spare you any commentary on the game.  I've heard enough to last me a lifetime.  The important thing is that Alabama brought home a WIN!  ROLL TIDE!!

This is Alabama Football!

Since I have not managed to get any of our football pictures up, despite the fact that we have been to several games this year, I decided to lump them all into one big post. 

Will made the trek down to Tuscaloosa with some guy friends for the Arkansas game in September, but I stayed home for soccer.  (Those are words I never thought would come out of my mouth!)

My first game of the season was the Vanderbilt game (which was also homecoming).  We got to take Claire and David with us and they were so excited!

Luke stayed home with Meme, but he still showed his school spirit!

C & D loved their Big Al shirts.  Our only family photo of the day.

Our best buddies in Tuscaloosa ... David and Nikki.  We stopped by to see them at their awesome tailgate before the game.

We finally made it to the Quad.  Will and the kids in front of Denny Chimes.  An U of A landmark.

Checking out the handprints and footprints of captains past.

David got this fun hat as his game-day souvenir.

Claire and Daddy.

In front of the stadium ... heading into the game.

Daddy and Claire in our seats.

David and Me.  David was pretty content as long as the snacks were running freely.  There was a little incident with sticky hands after he ate a fruit-by-the-foot that I thought might send him over the edge.  Did I mention he doesn't like loud noises?  (He covers his ears when he flushes the toilet.)  He was NOT A FAN of the fly over after the National Anthem.

I love this picture.  The kids made it until the 3rd quarter before we started packing up to head home.

Will has definitely succeeded in raising two Bama fans.  Claire still does some of the cheers she heard at the game.  She watched intently.  David ... not so much yet.

The next big game was the Bama/UT game and we were without kids which was a nice treat for the day.  It took us forever to get to Tuscaloosa due to a wreck in North Alabama on the interstate.  We finally got there and had a quick little tailgate time before the game with David & Nikki.  The blond is our friend Rebecca, who works in the Southern Living test kitchens and she is AWESOME!  You should check out her blog here.  You definitely want to eat whatever she brings to the tailgate.

Me, Nikki & Casey

David & Will

Alabama takes the field with lots of fanfare!

Will and I eating yummy football cookies.

Pictures of the field from our seats.

The last game we attended was the big one ... Bama vs. LSU (#2 vs. #1) ... maybe you heard about it?

We left the kids with Will's parents for the weekend and headed to T-town for a big day of tailgating and football.

Rebecca, Me and Nikki

We met up with our friends Jay and Jennie (we drove 4 hours to hang out with them and they live 5 minutes from our house ... go figure).  It was a long day so it was nice to change up our tailgate site for a bit.

Will and Jay unintentionally wore their matching shirts.  Funny!

Here's to another great football season even if we don't bring home the big title.  (I think it's still a possibility at this point.)  Every year we say we are not going to buy tickets the next year, but then we have a great time and decide to keep them another year. 

Fall Cuteness

I spent a Thursday night and Friday afternoon at my mom's house on her embroidery machine.

Here are the fruits of my labor.

Two cute Halloween shirts for Claire. These shirts are plenty big and long so she should be able to wear them again next year.


3 pumpkin shirts for the kids to wear on our annual pumpkin patch trip. I love how the trucks turned out.


It wouldn't be fall without football season. We took the big kids to their first Alabama football game and they had to have cute outfits to wear. (I made Luke a shirt too even though he stayed home with Meme.)


I still need to make the boys some pants out of the gray polka dot fabric. They are wearing jeans with them for now, but I had to whip up this cute skirt for Claire. It literally took me 30 minutes to make this skirt from start to finish. (I made it while Will was putting the kids to bed.) It is this pattern.

Next up ... Christmas and snowmen. (I debate making turkey shirts for the kids every year, but I typically just let them wear their pumpkins for Thanksgiving.)

Some updates ... from September

In addition to having a new baby, there were some other things from September that I want to record for memory's sake.

(1) Bedtime.

David loves sleeping with all his toys at night. He is pretty adamant about having everything "just right" before he falls asleep. Looks pretty crowded in there to me.

Claire, on the other hand, sleeps with her duckie and lamb and that is about it. She will ask to sleep with Minnie sometimes too. (Minnie takes turns going from David's bed to Claire bed.)

(2) Fall Soccer.

Claire started back to soccer again this month. She is much improved from last year. And she is definitely the fastest runner on her team. See her as #10 below.

David is a big fan of watching the soccer ... or at least a big fan of the water bottle and the snacks that go along with soccer watching.

Claire had her own little fan club at the first game with Meme, Poppy, Aunt Ashley, Evie and Ian there to watch. It was hot, hot, hot that day!

Week 2 ... another hot day!

David & Daddy watching the game.

Claire & Mommy after the game.

Claire got tired of the other team scoring so she decided to play goalie. (Even though they don't have goalies in this league.) It was pretty hilarious. She blocked several attempted goals by the green team.

Week 3 ... picture day.

Team photo.

Warming up before the game.

(3) Carter's 5th birthday.

We have known Carter since he was born and I can't believe he is 5 years old! Carter's parents were part of our group of 5 couple friends who all had our first babies within 6 months of each other. Carter was the first and Claire was the last (and the only girl).

Carter had a pajama party complete with pillowcase crafts, pizza, movie watching in sleeping bags and popcorn (that all ended around 8:30 pm). Claire had a blast and has been asking for her own pajama party since.

(4) Getting ready for Baby Luke.

I spent some quality time with my kiddos the night before I went to the hospital to have Luke. Will usually puts them to bed, but I spent some extra time loving on them and praying with them before we left.

(5) Football. Typically, our September is filled with a couple of trips to Alabama football games. My how times have changed!! Will did go to the Bama/Penn State game with brother-in-law Jon the weekend before I was to be induced. I just prayed that I didn't go into labor while he was gone. We watched the next two games from the comfort of our own couch!

(6) Speech. After two IEP meetings in two different counties, we finally got Claire started in speech therapy through the school system. She is loving her new therapist. I am not loving have to take her over there two times per week, but she seems to be making good progress so it is worth it I guess. Did I mention that it is FREE?!?

(7) Newborn pictures.

The always amazing Jadie Thomas took pics of baby Luke at 10 days old. She still got some great pics despite the fact the he was not very cooperative at all.