Cupcakes and Painting=Anna's Birthday Celebration!

Last night was Anna's birthday celebration! Me, Blake, Nikki, Justin, Danielle, and Tyler decorated and waited for Anna and Noah to arrive. I baked her some birthday cupcakes with pink icing and sprinkles! We had a crown, birthday card and beads waiting for her. After she blew out her 23 candles we girls started painting. We all were doing great until Danielle decided she did not have to patience to sit and finish her picture so she took the black paint and wrote a bible verse! Ha! It actually looked like an abstract painting! The guys would periodically walk by to check our our masterpieces or more like critique them! I thought we all did a great job on them, and I have to say Nikki's artistic skills were much improved from last weeks! Tonight were all eight going to be at the Pumpkin Jam, so check back for pictures from that tomorrow! This Wednesday is Danielle's birthday so next Friday another celebration will take place!

finished masterpieces

love these girls!


Anna's birthday cupcakes!

The crown and card (and yes she wore her crown all night)

Sunday morning started out a little scary for my family. My aunt called my mom and told her to hurry to my "nanny's" house that something was wrong with her. My nanny and aunt live right down the road so if anything ever happens my nanny can get help quickly. My parents left me getting ready for church and rushed over to my Nanny's house. My nanny told my mom and aunt that she remembered passing out and when she came to she crawled to the phone to call my aunt. That broke my heart, because she lives alone. They went ahead and called the ambulance because all signs were pointing to a stroke. I went ahead and went to church and afterwards drove to Gadsden Regional to check on her. They still had her in a temporary room in the E.R. Now as you will notice from the photo below, I found myself a mask to wear. I may look silly, but let me just tell you, there were some sick looking people in the E.R. waiting room, and I do not have time to get the swine flu! I also used about a gallon of hand sanitizer they provided at every elevator and door at the hospital. My grandmother ended up having to stay two days in the hospital while they ran tests, but thankfully every test they ran came back great! The conclusion the doctors came to was that she might have had a really bad migraine that made her pass out and get sick afterwards,which can have stroke like symptoms. She is back home and resting for a speedy recovery!

Today I had lunch with Miss Meredith who I had a summer class with. She is super sweet! We have been meaning to schedule a lunch date for months and finally settled on one for today! We were able to catch up on so much before my class. She graduated in May and got a job soon after working for JSU as Admissions Counselor. Go Meredith! We ate at Casa Fiesta! Now I love me some Mexican and thought that Villa was all there was until......I was introduced Casa last year. When I eat Mexican I always get Chicken Fajitas and they have the BEST by far! I had planned on taking a photo but we got so busy catching up I forgot! Oh well there will definitely be another lunch date so next time!

I first have to say a big.....ROLL TIDE!! Whew what a first half that game was, I was soo nervous. Thankfully they kicked in gear and started rolling! Friday night Blake and I went to our friends Nikki and Justin Terrell's house. Originally the (Fab Four) Nikki, me, Danielle and Anna were supposed to go to Sip'n' Strokes to paint and out to eat for Anna's birthday and our monthly Girl's Night, but Danielle came down with the flu so we hated to leave her out of the fun and canceled for a later date. Nikki picked she and I up two canvas' at Hobby Lobby on her way home from school. The boys did their own thing while we painted and we had the best time just us two working to our hearts desire on those masterpieces! ha

Look at little macey at the bottom of the photo! She wanted her photo made also! lol

my painting

both of us working diligently

nikki's painting

Rammer Jammer

Last Saturday I had the opportunity to go to the Alabama-North Texas game with my friend Nikki. She and her husband Justin have season tickets to the home games and Justin was on call that Saturday and couldn't go. I was so excited for "girl time!" We had a safe trip down to T-town despite some the heavy rain and traffic jams we encountered. We both were expecting rain for the whole game because that is what the forecast was giving, so we had our ponchos and umbrellas ready. Amazingly right when we parked our car and got out the sun decided to make her appearance! Once we got into the stadium the humidity decided to hit 100%! I am not kidding you when I say this, I have NEVER been so hot in my whole life! We both got plenty of sun! I could have been mistaken for one of the Cullen's(vampire family from Twilight) with my pale skin that had not seen the sun in a while! It was a great game because we won! I made Nikki stay until the very end so I could do "Rammer Jammer" lol! After the game we stopped in Trussville at the Pinnacle to grab something to eat and shop/look at Wet Seal. Nikki bought two really cute scarves for a dollar something! I was very impressed with her shopping skills! We then decided to eat at Five Guys Burger and Fries. I had never eaten at one and I must say the burger was great and the gallon of fries they give you were great also! She dropped me off at home and I immediately got a shower then picked Blake up and we went to our others friends house Danielle and Tyler Holland to watch the Auburn game/pull for West Virginia! Justin and Nikki were there also and we had a great time!

Sunday

I am loving this rain! I may be the only one who is still enjoying it at this point though. I love to go to bed and it be thundering, lightning and pouring down rain, it helps me sleep so well! Yesterday it stopped raining long enough for Blake and I to spend some time outdoors. We went into the woods behind his house to see how high the creek was. We had not been back through these woods in over a year and my goodness there were briar's everywhere we turned! Finally we made it to the creek! When we got down there it was not as high as we expected but the current was pretty strong! This creek I'm talking about is not just a small creek, it is a creek with usual rain is about five ft. deep. So with more rain than usual it can be up to about seven or eight ft! We love being outdoors and thankfully enjoy the same hobbies. Despite the humidity and the briar's we had fun! I cannot believe that the last post I wrote was almost a month ago! I know school is more important than blogging but I can beat that! lol

Blake standing in the rapids! lol

He was demonstrating to me how to climb over this barbwire fence so I wouldn't kill myself

Oh goodness! I cannot believe I posted this picture on here I look like a mountain woman!

Neat purple mushroom I saw, but it looks brown on here.

I have no clue what these are but I liked the colors!

RRROOOOOOOOOLLLLLLL TTTTIIIIIIIIDDDDDDDEEEEE RRRRROOOOOOLLLLL! Can you tell how excited I am about the first Alabama football game? I have been anxiously counting down the days until kickoff! I spent all yesterday with my grandmother and my aunt who still lives at home with my grandmother. We started our morning off by having breakfast at Hardee's and my aunt had a doctor's appointment. After that we went downtown to the Gadsden Variety and Deli (formerly Nelson's) to shop and look around. My grandmother and aunt were browsing through the quilting and cross-stitching patterns and fabrics there and I became interested and decided I wanted to learn how to cross stitch and embroider. My grandmother bought me my first cross stitching pattern that after completed can then be turned into a quilt! I am so excited even though it is going to take a while to complete. I picked out different colors than the pattern showed. I chose bright pink, bright green, orange and a lighter bright green. I can not wait to see the finished product. My grandmother was so happy to teach me how to cross stitch and also did I mention I serged the edges on the fabric so it would not ravel? Well I did! She showed me how to surge on her surging machine and then told me it was my job to do the rest all by myself, I was a little nervous but did it! I only wish I had become more interested in it and had her already showing me how to do this stuff! She is so talented and can basically make anything! I love her so much and am so lucky that I have a grandmother that is still willing and able to show me this stuff!

Then last night we went with Blake's parents and brother Joe to eat at Los Arcos in Attalla. I am a total fajita girl when it comes to Mexican but for some reason I decided to try the fajita bowl and yuck I was not happy with it! It was not the same as my regular fajitas that come out still sizzling on the skillet! Then we went to First Friday in downtown Gadsden. I expected the crowds to be down significantly since it was Friday football night but was surprised it was still pretty crowded. We then went back to Blake's house and I cross stitched while he watched t.v. Haha I know were very exciting and wild aren't we! In my defense I was just really excited about this new hobby I have taken up! One more thing..... ROLL TIDE! At least I hope I am able to say that after the game tonight!

Hello Hello everyone! Today is "Thankfully Thursday!" This week has gone by quite quickly for me. Too bad I cannot say the same for my classes! They are still going well but just seem to drag by sooo slowly! Honestly the only thing that got me through this week was looking ahead to Saturday! Woo Hoo for some SEC football! That will be tomorrows blog though so I will restrain myself from discussing that this blog! The Lord was really teaching me a lesson on patience today! In my last class of the day today there was two students in there who thought they were the teachers! They kept interrupting him and one person actually told the teacher "no you let me finish" I believe my mouth dropped to the floor when that student said that! On another note I received my first ticket warning from the campus police. This year Jax State decided to start the Gamecock Express bus system for students. I think it is ridiculous! Parking at the Communication Building is no more. They have certain color coded parking areas according to your color of parking pass and then board the new bus system to your building where your classes are. Example: I commute so my color is silver (as you will see on the warning) and I am designated to park in the silver parking lots. In my case it is all the way across campus to Self Hall where my classes are. People who ride it are already always late for class. I just have been refusing to break down and follow the rules but today was my warning so I suppose I can be a rebel no more and will have to buy my parking pass and park where I am suppose to so I can board the Gamecock Express! Sorry for all the negativity on this blog! I promise I will try to make them positive from now on well unless Bama loses Saturday but, lets not go there! ha I just had one of those days where I needed to vent! Hope everyone has a wonderful Friday!

It's been a while!

Lately blogging has had to go on the back burner while school has become top priority! Hopefully I will be blogging more often than just once a week! I only have four classes (originally five) but the reason being because I am taking two classes that I have heard are doozies! Com Law and Com Research. They both require a lot of writing. I'm keeping a positive attitude about them both, even though I have had people tell me I am crazy for taking them at the same time! I only have one class on Mon ,Wed and three on Tue, Thur. My class on Mon ,Wed is Intro to News and we are basically playing pretend. We all sit at a computer and we write news articles for pretend newspaper. Right now though we are having to learn the basics of narrowing down how to consider what is a good news story and what is not. Even though I'm not going into print journalism it is something good to still learn! My favorite class and teacher though is one of my classes on Tue, Thur. is Intro to Audio Production. In this class we go down to the sound studio downstairs in the Communications building and our class after learning how everything works will start doing little segments of shows we have written. Its similar to what people used to listen to on the radio before there was televisions. Enough about school, lets see if I can catch you up on everything that been going on!

We have had two cats at our house for about eight years and then all of a sudden they have just come up missing! The strange thing is though we have gained a kitten! I will admit she is not the prettiest little cat I have ever seen but if you know me then you know I'm tender hearted and love animals more than I love people! ha So, I am going to take it in and love it!

Speaking of animals! The dog that has taken up at Blake's house for the past few months Cocoa, spent the day playing with Blake and I Saturday! She is the most precious dog ever! I have had a couple of dogs as pets in my lifetime all of those being Labs except one. Labs are my favorite breed of dog and inmy opinion the most beautiful! She is in love with Blake and when are outside she follows him everywhere he goes and then when Blake sits down outside she tries to get all up in his lap! I am hoping that when Blake moves to Huntsville I can bring her to my house and let her live because honestly I'm afraid the poor thing will grieve for him. ( yes dogs actually do grieve). The only problem is mom! We don't exactly have good lucks with dogs considering people fly on our road and we have two different roads on two sides of our home. She hates to get attached to them and something happen to them. If dad and I could get her to agree to it I would get Cocoa in a heartbeat! Here is a picture of her from Saturday and I love it she looks so beautiful in it!

Okay, okay enough about animals and school! Onto something I have been waiting for many,many months! ALABAMA FOOTBALL! Only three days until kickoff! Roll Tide!

Sunday Afternoon

Hello, Hope everyone has had a great weekend! Today started Monday and this is usually my dreaded day of the week but, actually Wednesday is a day I am not looking forward to! Wednesday I return back to school from a well appreciated summer break! Don't get me wrong I am more than ready to get that degree but, I just dread having to replace my mornings of sleeping late to waking up early and days of nothing to school all day and not to mention the drive of almost an hour to Jacksonville. Oh well ready or not here it comes! Yesterday after church and lunch Blake and I went back to my house and spent the whole afternoon. My nephew Clay came over and joined us, he looks up to Blake and Blake is so good and patient with him! They played disc golf together and then they decided to take the paddle boat on the pond behind my house. After that they decided to grab their fishing rods and go fishing. I am by no means a fisher nor have I ever been interested in it but I was a good sport and just sat in the back of the paddle boat while they fished and took photos and played on my phone to entertain myself! After that we ate supper and then rode bikes and climbed trees! The weather yesterday was fabulous! I don't think I even sweated at all which was wonderful! The crisp weather for fall made me excited for football season! I am so ready for some Alabama Football! Roll Tide!

While I was attempting to take this photo I got a little off balance and almost fell in! Thankfully I recovered and Blake and Clay never realized anything had happened! haha

He caught one!

I have been so busy lately that I haven't been able to blog and it has been quite a while too! To recap the weekend, Blake and I babysat The Blackwell children Saturday and they were very good and always fun! Serah the oldest was going to the Jonas brothers concert for her birthday Sunday. So I helped her make a poster for the concert! I love artsy stuff so that was right up my alley! We had glitter on us and all over the kitchen! Thankfully I cleaned it up before Mark and Candi arrived home! Her poster says "I'm Paranoid over Nick! The poster referred to their song "Paranoid" and the youngest member of the group Nick. If your not familiar with the Jonas Brothers they are three brothers who sing together and pretty popular with tweens and teens.


Then Sunday we went to church and after eating lunch I went home with Blake. We went with his parents to Desoto Falls. The water was very low but it was still pretty and also very humid!





My life jacket had been at Blake's house ever since we went rafting and Blake and I got the idea to put it on Julio his dog last night! He looked so funny and we laughed and laughed at him!

Today I slept late and then went to the grocery store and bought ingredients to make a homemade strawberry cake! I have the photos below to show my steps! I spent like two hours making this cake and I really hope it tastes as good as it looks! I will have to let you know how it tasted!

In the oven ready to bake!

It is a strawberry cake but i wanted to be sure and get double antioxidants in it so I added blueberries too! Besides it made it more colorful to decorate!

Finished product! I was so proud!

HOMEMADE STRAWBERRY CAKE
CAKE:
1pkg plain white cake mix
1pkg strawberry gelatin
1 cup mashed strawberries with juice
1 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup whole milk
4 large eggs

FROSTING:
1 pkg (8 oz) cream cheese
1 stick of butter
3 1/2 cups confectioners sugar
3/4 cup mashed strawberries (drained)

Preheat oven to 350F

Lightly grease two 9 inch round pans. Set pans aside.

Place cake mix, strawberry gelatin, mashed strawberries, oil, milk, and eggs in large mixing bowl and beat on low speed for one minute.

Strawberries should be well blended.

Divide batter among pans and place in oven.

Bake cakes until lightly brown (about 28-30 minutes). Remove from oven and allow to cool for 40 minutes.

PREPARE FROSTING:
Combine cream cheese and butter and mix on low speed for a minute. Add sugar and strawberries. Blend frosting on low until sugar is incorporated.

To assemble, place one cake layer on plate and spread top with frosting, add another cake layer and frost the top, add last cake layer and frost the top. Use remaining frosting for the sides of the cake.

Optional: Place fresh strawberries on top of frosting for decoration.

Today was my mom's first day back to school and it was wonderful to not have to wake up early this morning and have to get ready for school! My time is soon coming for that though! I begin August 26 and I am not necessarily dreading school in particular just having to drive back and forth to Jacksonville everyday! I usually try my best to schedule my classes all on the same day on either Mon, Wed, Fri or Tue Thur, but that does not always happen like with this semester they will be Mon-Fri everyday! After I woke up this morning I went to Blake's house and helped him do some yard work. While he mowed I trimmed some hedges and trees around his house. Crazy me decided to do this in the heat of the day! Let me tell you I got soooo hot I thought I was about to pass out! My clothes were soaking wet and my face was as red as a tomato! I immediately took a cold shower to help me cool down and feel much cleaner! There are a group of young guys who get together and play basketball at our new family life center at church Monday nights and, my neighbor Luke who plays invited Blake to come play with them tonight. We went and while he and the others were playing I worked out! In June I started working out everyday at church and had decided it was going to be a daily routine for me because I felt so good afterwards. During the week of bible school I was unable to work out and thought okay Ill start next week after bible school. Finally in August I decided to stop putting it off! Oh my goodness was I tired! I am the type that needs a work out buddy to help motivate me and to talk to! I think I have Nikki talked into coming with me some! After I finished my workout and Blake finished playing basketball we headed to his house to eat supper where his mother had a yummy chicken stir-fry waiting for us! I am pretty sure the workout was no good because I ended up eating more than Blake and to top it off I was still hungry! So I then finished a box of vanilla wafers and even added peanut butter to them! Ugh! What good is it to go work out when you do that?! I am determined to keep my routine up even after school starts but first lets just see if I can manage to finish out this week! ha!

Here are some photos of our new work out room in the family life center at church! We have two treadmills, two elliptical, one bicycle and then I just call it the do it all machine! Its like a bow flex that works everything on your body arms, legs etc.

I absolutely love getting dressed up and going somewhere on a date! I'm pretty girly and love to pamper myself! Last night Blake and I went with our friends Chase and Ashley on a double-date! We all four went to Bridgestreet in Huntsville. If you have not been there you absolutely must! It is set up like a little town and they have some fabulous shopping and eating places! I have always wanted to try P.F. Chang's so we made reservations and ate there last night. I loved the interior and atmosphere but we all four were not very impressed with the food. After we ate we went shopping and oh if only I had a credit card with no limits! I could shop till my little heart dropped! These are just a few of the stores there that I love, Bebe, Juicy Couture (my fav), Victoria Secret, Brighton, Anthropologie, Kate Spade, Mountain High Outfitters, Chocolate Crocodile! After shopping we decided to all four go on a peddle boat ride! They had a choice of Peddle boats that you peddled yourself of the electric with was work fee, and we paid extra for the electric and it was worth it! They also offer Gondola rides! We had such a great time with those two! We have already planned that next time were trying the Melting Pot which is all fondue type food! Sorry about all the pictures being blurry, I forgot to grab Blake's camera so all I had was my cell phone!

On the peddle boats

Gondola ride in action!

One year ago

Yesterday was such a bittersweet day. One year ago yesterday my Pawpaw Greer lost his battle to cancer. He went to the doctor in March of 2008 and was diagnosed with lung cancer. It was a total shock to him my grandmother and family. He was 80 years old, and I know when you hear someone is 80 years old you automatically think well that was pretty old anyway but if you knew or had been around my pawpaw you would have seen very quickly that he had the mind and body of a 65 year old. My pawpaw found out in March and passed away in August. He took chemo and radiation but the cancer had already spread too much. My sweet grandmother was so strong for him up until he passed. I knew yesterday would be difficult for her so my cousin Matt and I spent the night with her to help keep her company and keep it off of her mind.
Yesterday as I remembered those last few months from last summer I thought about how tough it was for me to go visit him because it killed me having to see him in that condition skinny, his hair gone from the treatments and on oxygen because I was used to seeing him out playing football with the grand kids, bush hogging,working in the garden or planning a trip for him and my grandmother to somewhere in the motor home.It also reminded me how happy I am that my pawpaw will never ever have to suffer anymore! After he was diagnosed with lung cancer he gave his life over to the lord! Thankfully me and my family can have peace that he is in heaven watching over us!

Here is pawpaw Christmas 2007. This was just 3 months before he found out and sadly his last Christmas to spend with us. This picture shows off his personality perfectly! Always joking around and cutting up! Someone had given him a red Speedo as a joke and he fooled us all by putting it on over his pants and dancing around! lol I cannot wait until I see him and my other pawpaw in heaven one day!

Yesterday morning I woke up and went and had breakfast with mom and dad. We then headed to the mall for me to look for a wedding gift and mom to look for a shower gift. After we found our gifts in the Belk home store we somehow ended up in the dress section at Belks! lol I love shopping for sales at Belks and mom and I are very good at finding some great stuff at awesome prices in there. I found a darling little Calvin Klein dress to wear to the wedding Blake and I were going to that evening. The price tag had $100.00 on it and I was not going to give that for it so I was really hoping it was on sale. Lucky me, it was and on top of that mom had a coupon! Woo hoo for coupons! I got the dress for $60.00 tax and all! By the time we finished shopping we were hungry and ready for some lunch. So me mom and dad tried The Flip Side Cafe that opened recently. It is in the same building that Taco bell beside the mall used to be in. They have totally redone the inside and made it so cute. They have basic sandwiches and croissants, paninis and the best part a bakery with all kind of yummy desserts! I got the chicken quesadilla and it was good. I tried my moms turkey sandwich. It was also good and had a cranberry mayonnaise on it which added a unique taste to it!


After we left there it was time to head home and let me get ready for the wedding Blake and i were headed to that evening. My friend Amanda Lacey got married last night. She and I know each other various ways. Her grandad was my pastor at my church for many years and was the one who baptized me. We had classes at Snead together and I also help babysit her cousins for her aunt and uncle sometimes. She and her groom were married at Mountain View Gardens and Ballroom in Springville, Al. It was gorgeous despite the rain! They originally were supposed to get married outside but the rain prevented that from happening. They moved everything inside and it still turned out beautifully! I wish them the best of luck on their new journey in life together!

You cannot tell very well from the photo but the ballroom where the reception was held was gorgeous!

The beautiful bride and her groom!