Sew...Lately this is what's been going on.

I have this new Sewing/Embroidery machine sitting here daring me to try my hand at sewing again. I took a sewing class in High School, but that feels like ages ago. And with my introduction to Pinterst the temptation has been killing me. I found several things online that looked easy enough so I went for it. Here's what happened:










The burp cloths were first. They turned out well enough I guess. I was please with my ability to sew around a square. Then I decided to move ahead a little and tackle a bigger project from Pinterest, a nursing cover for my expecting Sister-in-law. For this project, I called in the big dogs...Mom! She was a huge help even though she says she didn't do anything. She helped measure and cut and hold off the dogs that were dying to be in the middle of the action. Here's the finished project.






If your my friend on Facebook you have probably already seen this with all my begging (harassing)for votes in the "Great Pinterest Challenge...we won by the way.

I gave this to Sunny at the "Big Reveal" party in Troy.

About this party:
Tom and Sunny went for their 20 week ultrasound on August 15th. The nurse was able to determine the babies gender however she didn't tell Tom and Sunny. The nurse told only their friend Sarah who went home and made a cake in either Blue or Pink for the party. Later that night our families got together for the reveal. Here are the pictures. As you can see Tom got way to anxious during the cake cutting ceremony and stuck his finger in the cake.

It's a GIRL!!!!
Maybe the PINK "S" should have clued us in...

Hoot and Nanny are so excited!!!

Mom's Mother's Day Gift

For Mother's Day this year Tom (my brother) and Sunny told Mom that she was going to be a Grandmother. I'm pretty sure that gift can't be topped. Claude was one EXCITED woman!!! Then they told us to keep it quite until Sunny was into her 3rd month...UGH!!!! That was killer, but we managed, sort of. Anyway, the news is out now...I'm gonna be an AUNTIE!!!!

Daniel's niece was born May 10, 2011...so we are figuring out this Aunt and Uncle stuff.

Summer Part 2

In June, my College Roommate and one of my "Bestest" friends from High School got married...to each other. The wedding was beautiful!!! It was great to see Brooke and Justin and so many other friends from Jackson.

 Leila was there and sang for the wedding. WHAT A TREAT!!! THE GIRL CAN SING!!!! We had a blast visiting and catching up.

(I think this is the only picture ever where Courtney AKA "2foot" is the tallest)

As we all know it's been HOTT this summer.

I don't know if it was the heat or a wild hair, but Dad bought a boat this summer. It's not new but it's new to us. I find it humorous that the boat has a name, "Reel Trouble," but I guess it's OK, since they (being Daddy, Tom and Daniel) did want the boat for fishing.

We have had a blast this summer on the boat. Daniel and I took it to the bay one weekend for fishing and we made our first trip to Crab Island. The Kelly's (Jared and Allison) were along for the trip as well as Mrs. Ginger, Melissa, Mrs. Debra and Mrs. Stanley and jet skis.

Daniel and Jared with their Mom's

Me and Allison

See Crab Island in the background? Who knew a slightly submerged island could be so much fun. The floating grills and ice cream stands were a big hit along with the inflatable slide and the live band playing on a floating stage. 

And the boat as been to the river here in Monroe County.

 Mama is a HUGE fan of Shelling, as in going to look for sea shells, sand dollars, and the like. She has heard of finding sharks teeth and sand dollars on the Alabama River before and we made a trip to see if there was any truth to the stories. Welp!! They are true. 

These are from Mama's collection. There were thousands of sand dollars and we found several sharks teeth.

One last Instagram picture of our river trip. 

OK, Instagram makes the picture "Way Cooler" than my camera ever could, but it's beautiful just the same. God's creation is an amazing thing.

Summer Catch Up

Since I don't get summers off work and I've been so jealous of the teachers out there I took a blogging break. Not intentionally, but that's my excuse. We've had a great summer, full of beach trips, lake trips, river trips and a wedding here and there.

For Memorial Day weekend we went to Georgia to Lake Sinclair with Aunt Micky. She has the cutest lake house on a cove of the lake. We rode on the boat, skied, tube with the neighbors children and visited "lake friends" on the boat. Life on the lake is so different, people who live on the lake are so laid back, life moves at a slower pace and no one gets in a hurry.  We actually got to the house on Thursday night and never got back in the car until Monday afternoon. We went everywhere on the boat.

We did feed this little family of geese. 

Well, I say no one gets in a hurry, unless your the neighbor with a boat house full of snakes...she was moving pretty fast, on her lawn mower that she drove over to the house to borrow a gun. Poor lady, her boat house had become a snake house. We counted five snakes under and around the house. Daniel shot one, but the others just escaped under water to come back later. 

Daniel and I can't wait to go back to Aunt Micky's. We had the best, most relaxing time there. It was such a treat to hang out with Aunt Micky and play all weekend. 

Things to remember: (Ignore my notes here,I want to remember these things)
Daniel decided to slalom - he got it on the first try and he's hooked now
We skied on the Hawaiian  Ski
We tubed until we couldn't move.
Aunt Mic taught me to drive her boat

On the way home we saw "Barbie Beach" in person.

Summer Catch UP...To be continued

California Dreamin'

It's been so long since I've posted that I am trying to catch up on everything that's been going on since April. On May 1st Sunny started her new job and had to go to Los Angeles for training so Mom and decided we would travel with her and enjoy the city will she worked. We were in Los Angeles for 4 days and we did as much as we could possibly fit into every single day. We we arrived on Monday we rented a car and drove to Laguna Beach for lunch. The beach there is beautiful!!! We picked Sunny up that evening and took her back to see Laguna and have dinner there.

On Tuesday we met a tour bus and spent the entire day on a "Hollywood Tour." We saw everything from the Hollywood sign to Muscle Beach.

The Hollywood sign is in the back ground

Grauman's Chinese Theater

 There were actors dressed up all over Hollywood Blvd...these two found Mother.

The Chanel store on Rodeo Drive

The Beverly Hill's Hotel

Yup, that's the talking rock outside the Playboy Mansion

The gate to the Playboy Mansion

The Santa Monica Pier

Muscle Beach at Venice Beach

Are you picturing Woody Harrelson and Wesley Snipes Playing Basketball?

 And the Kush Doctor of course. NOOOOO, we didn't go visit him.

On Wednesday Mom and I struck out on an adventure like no other we've ever been on together. We drove ourselves through LA traffic to downtown looking for "The Fashion District." I read about this place online and it looked like great shopping and lots of interesting places. When we got there our thoughts were correct. I didn't take any pictures while we were there, we were too busy shopping. I can't describe this place, but here is a link to images from "the district"

After shopping we continued our adventure to Malibu just to see the beach there and have lunch. 

There were surfers out enjoying the waves in Malibu as well as people on yolo boards. It was a beautiful sight. 

As you can see below, the houses are built right on the cliffs next to the water and just off Hwy 1 ( Santa Monica BLVD). Seeing these beaches made me miss the huge WHITE beaches we have in Alabama and the blue water.

We left Malibu and had a 60 mile drive back to our hotel. Would you believe that it took over 2 hours to get back. The traffic there is unbelievable!!! 

On Thursday we had tickets to see the Jay Leno show. We got up early and drove ourselves through LA traffic again to Burbank, CA for the show. We were told we needed to be in line earlier to insure our seats so we got there really early and decided to tour NBC studios first. We saw behind the scenes area of Days of Our Lives as well as the props the show, the studio where Johnny Carson filmed his Tonight Show and of course Jay Leno's studio. We made it into the filming of the Jay Leno show and his guest that night (4:30 in the afternoon) were Ralph Macchio and Wanda Sykes.

This vacation was unbelievable. I never dreamed that I would ever go to California and get to visit all these sites. Being there and spending the days with my mother was wonderful. We have so many memories that we will never forget. 

Marsh and Jessie went to the Chapel

Many of you have heard me talk about my cousin Marshall, who is more like a brother to me than a cousin. He and I are 7 months apart in age and have lived together for 7 years on and off depending on what wonderful adventure he was partaking in at the time. In April, exactly one year to the day they got engaged he and Jessie, as I call her, got married. It was a beautiful day for a wedding and the the bride and groom as well as the ceremony were gorgeous. 

On the Friday before, Mom, Sunny and I attended and helped host Jessica's Bridesmaids Luncheon.

That's Jessie in the front center (in light blue).

Here is Jessica's mother (in the polka dot dress), her grandmother on the right, and her aunts.

On Friday night we had the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner at the Country Club in Monroeville.

 Sunny and Tom

 Daniel and I. Can you tell I got a little emotional and cried??

 Mother, Aunt Becky (Marshall's Mom) and Uncle Andy

Sunny, Stephanie and I

Here's a picture of our whole family, well, minus Miller and Mae, Miller was sick and had to stay home :-(