Goofy

When we go to 3D movies- in the U.S. of course- the boys like to keep their glasses.  Then they take the 3-D lenses out and turn them into this.

They make me so happy when I see this!

Happy Birthday Allen!

Allen is not one who enjoys being the center of attention.  However today is his birthday and he certainly deserves some special recognition.

He is such a hard worker.  He has been very successful and although he is smart, most of his success comes from his strong work ethic.

Since I don’t have any pictures of him working hard, I’ll give you plenty of him playing hard!

He was recently selected to be a member of a Leadership Institute for his agency.  This means long hours, travel and having less free time.  He jumped at the chance to improve himself this way.

He loves to do hard things.  If there is a problem that needs to be worked on, he loves tackling on it.  After the interview process for the leadership Institute, he was on such a high.  He loves the tough stuff.

He is the greatest Dad.  The boys worship him and he takes his role of being a father and a role model very seriously.

Allen is also the best husband I could ask for.  He so generous.  He is generous with his help, his love and his ideas.  He has a way of summing things up in a way that makes it so simple. 

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the foundation for such a fantastic man.  He has pretty terrific parents who taught him the value of hard work and tackling hard things head on.

Happy Birthday Allen!

What the Heck? Wednesday

I pass this sign quite a bit.  One day as I was sitting in traffic, I realized what a gem it is.

It says “The Blackout Checklist”  {I presume that “The Blackout was a party held on 12/22/12}

• Clothes: (Signature Style) check
• Shoes: (Stilettos Shoes) check
• Tickets: (RND, AIRBRUSH, JUNKIES, CLUB ONE) check
• Walking around to make sure that everyone else sees my outfit…PRICELESS

FOR EVERYTHING ELSE THERE’S

THE BLACKOUT 8

 

The real gem is the little sign taped down in the lower left that is for “The Viagra Doctor”:  Complete with a picture of a doctor on the sign.  It is a Live comedy that is apparently “Back by Popular Demand”  I am so sorry that I missed it!

You can find culture like this anywhere!

Beach Boys

We were having some really big waves recently and like all good rednecks curious people, we have to take a look at the action.

I did not change the color of the water in the picture.  This is what it looks like every day.
The big waves ended up being further off shore and the reef that surrounds our part of the island kept us protected from the big ones!
The boys, who let no opportunity to get wet, dirty and sandy pass them by, decided that  they must take advantage of the situation. 
Miller decided he was cold.  Poor baby has a hard time when the temp goes into the low 70’s and it’s windy  {cue “It’s a Hard Knock Life” from Annie}.
In order to keep his little brother warm Jackson and his friends offered to bury him in the sand.  They are so thoughtful!


Then they decided to turn him into a mermaid or merman.

Since Miller is so deprived of attention, he loves this kind of thing!

Any time he can get wet, dirty, sandy AND be the center of attention…it just doesn’t get much better than that.
I do not have any pictures of the rogue wave that surprised everyone and got every one of them {adults included} wet and sandy.  You can see from the picture below how far away from the water they were when the wave got them.

Nothing like a one mile bike ride home with wet and sandy clothes on!  I ended up coming back with the car.
So thankful for these memories!
Thanks for the pictures Scott !

HI!

We have some visitors coming this week.  Then we have another set coming after that.  I love having visitors.  Anyone want to come visit?

How to Exercise Inside

Recently Miller and I spent some time in Miami{that is a whole other blog post!} and while we were there I was challenged with how to exercise my high energy boy inside.  Cue the music!

If you’re a fan of Miller you’ll love every second of it, you won’t mind watching all 4 minutes of it.  If you’re not a fan, well then good bye!

Right before I left Jackson's class did this little number for the entire school.  He was a bit nervous, but they ended up having a blast doing it!

Let’s Dance, Y’all!

What the Heck? Wednesday–BUSTED!

So I am leaving someone’s home and look in my side view mirror to see if any cars are coming before I pull out. There were no cars coming, but there was this “situation” coming down the street.
A man walking down the street holding an enormous pipe {that I am sure he borrowed and has already returned to it’s rightful owner} and a shopping cart {ditto the borrowed part above} full of coconuts.  He was walking through the neighborhood knocking coconuts off the trees,  then going to sell them.

Do you see the pipe he is holding?  It was about 12 feet long.  he needed to make sure that he could reach all of {someone else’s }coconuts
I had to wait until he passed, you know just to be polite! And while waiting I needed to get my camera ready- in a discreet way- to take a picture of the “situation”. It’s for the BLOG!

Y’all, I try to be subtle, I really do.  I know you’re thinking that I am trying to be funny.  But seriously, I know that not everyone likes their picture taken and put all over the Internet, but I do try.  Subtlety is an art.  An art that I am not very practiced at!

So I think I have my set up all subtle and then this guy walks past and as I am snapping this picture of him, he totally makes eye contact with me and says “good morning”.  And then I felt a touch awkward.  But it was for the BLOG!

Soccer

As opposed to last season, Jackson’s soccer team has been doing very well.  He has moved up to an older team, so he has a new coach, that he adores, and some good team mates.
He is still playing goalie a good bit but is being pushed to play some other positions too.

Funny story.. Jackson was playing goalie and at this particular field there were no goals (or lines for that matter) so they put out the two cone /stick thingies and called it good.  It didn’t take Jackson and his best bud long to figure out that if they moved the two goals really close together that they’d have an advantage.  They didn’t get to actually take advantage of their scheming because it was pretty obvious and their coach made them put them back.  It was a good plan, though!

{Funny faces happen when you are learning to whistle}


He had a really nice save at this game!  And I captured it too!
Most of the kids that he played with on this Saturday will be playing with him again next year too.
We love that he is so enthusiastic and  learning the many fantastic lessons that sports can teach.

Hallelujah

I’ve been waiting for quite a while  to get a replacement camera.  You may have heard me whine about my camera issues once or 17 times!

Photographic evidence of my frustration with bad broken camera!

My iphone and point and shoot camera are good in a pinch, but I have been really feeling the loss of my good camera.

It was so frustrating to see an awesome photograph and not be able to capture it.

I won’t say who, okay it was Miller, pulled my camera down off the counter and broke it-about a year and a half ago.  It would work sometime, but most of the time it was useless.

Finally the day arrived Miller’s final tuition bill had been paid and I could rationalize buying a replacement.

I couldn’t be more thrilled with it!

It looks pretty boss, right?

It allowed me to get some great action shots at the soccer game.

Without switching lenses I was also able to get this type of shot too.

I’ve also got a yummy new lens to work with, which I am positively giddy about!

I look forward to lots of great times with this new camera!

Flashback Friday

Here we go again!  You know when I have been looking for an older picture when I start getting all emotional.  I’m like Chevy Chase in the attic during the Christmas Vacation movie.  I love that movie.

Tender!  In a few years I am going to be looking back on today and being emotional about it too!

Playing

Don’t get whiplash since earlier this week I was telling you how cold it has been here.  These pictures are from a couple of weeks ago.

The boys and I were at the beach one afternoon and while they were playing well together {JOY, JOY, JOY!} I wanted to soak up the minutes so that I could frame them in my mind and never let them escape.

Recently, I got a new app for my phone that is a picture taking/ editing app.  It is called Camera+ and I really like it.  While we were playing so well I decided to play a bit too.

This is my first picture straight out of the camera.

You can really tell on the next two pictures the different types of editing that are in the app.

Then I started to really have fun!

I think I really like it and it is definitely worth the 99 cents that I spent on it.

This is priceless!  He made a baby Jackson.

More importantly the memories that I have from that afternoon are documented, and I don’t just have to frame them in my memory.