Little Man's 2nd birthday

May 14, 2007 Was Little Man's 2nd birthday. Like I mentioned HERE, we had his birthday party the Saturday before his real birthday but we couldn't let his birthday go buy doing nothing now could we?? So That night after school, homework and Mr Man's and Princess baseball and softball. We let him open the gifts from us The photo above is Little Man doing gifts and the back of Mr Man's head, and Sweet Pea's head and part of me.
After gifts we sang happy birthday to him and let him blow out candles again, useing the left over cake from his party. One of Little Man's birthday gifts from us was a bubble machine which the kids all love.. Yes, ya'll those are bubbles being blown in my house.. LOL It his birthday after all and he loved every minute of it. Here is Mr Man and Sweet Pea getting in on the act.After of a few minutes of thinking she was too old for this, Princess got over it and had a blast also.
All 4 of my babies on Little Man's 2nd birthday. (Princess 11, Mr Man 7 1/2, Sweet Pea 5 and Little Man 2 years old)
To view all of Little Man Birthday pictures from his real birthday click Here.

Little Man's birthday party

On May 12, 2007 Little Man had his 2 year birthday party.. he didn't turn two till the 14th, but we did the party on Saturday before his birthday. Above is his birthday cake that my mom made for him.

Here he is opening gifts with big sister Sweet Pea looking on ready to jump in and help him whenever needed.

This day we invited the grandparents over (and great grandparents) and we had dinner, opened gifts, the kids played pin the tail on the donkey(only it was pin the #1 on Thomas the Tank not a tail or donkey) Then we did cake and icecream and just hung out with family the rest of the night. Here is Little Man as we were getting ready to sing Happy BirthdayHere he is blowing out his candle
After blowing out the candle He was so proud of himself he thought he would give himself a hand.
To view more photos from his 2nd Birthday Party just click HERE

Wordless Wednesday(5/30/07) Sleepy kids

These were taken the 1st weekend of May when my mom kept the younger 3 kids while I was at Princess's softball tournament. My 3 baby monkeys sleeping on Grandma's bed.

For more Wordless Wednesday photos, click here or check out 5 minutes for mom

Time Travel Tuesday(my first date)

Today for Time Travel Tuesday, Annie has us going back and revisiting our 1st date.

For me this is an easy one.. I remember my very 1st date ever like it was yesterday.

Date: April 1, 1989
My Age: 16 years old
Place: Dinner and a movie
With who: B.
His Age: 19 years old

B. was a guy from my church who I had a crush on for as long as I could remember. When he was in 6th grade and I was in 3rd I told my best friend that one day I was going to marry B, and she just LOL at me and said, Yeah right that would be the day.. Jump ahead many many years to my freshmen year in high school(B's Senior year) I use to walk out of my way just to pass him in the hallways between classes I use to make my friends crazy wanting to enter the building on the totally opposite side of where I had classes just so he would say HI to me as we passed each other, or have him mess with my hair as he walked passed me. You see he thought of me as sort of a kid sister, but hey I would take what I could get, because I had a huge crush on him.
BUT sadly, he ALWAYS had a girlfriend. He was Mr All that in school and could have pretty much any girl he wanted.. and I was sooooooooooo not all that in high school.. I was the geeky freshmen, with the big glasses, bad perm and zits.(I paint a pretty picture of myself No, but it was all true) He only talked to me because we had been sort of friends for so long. We were in the same youth group in church until he moved up to Teens and then a few years later we were in the same Teen club at church.. He was also best friends with one of my neighbors so he was always over there so we hung out.

The summer after he graduated high school he was hanging out at my house alot with his friend(we had a swimming pool the friend didn't) and he was between girlfriends I was thinking OH YEAH here is my chance.. One night it was late and dark and I was out in my back yard swimming under our one light we had back there and B and his friend came over and started to talk to me, B was being his flirty self and i was loving it and then he said "oh did I tell you I meet this girl"
UGH!!!!!!!!! At that point I just hated him. about 2 or 3 months later that relationship was over.. See he was my friend and not only did he share "I meet this girl" sort of stuff with me.. I would go to him for advice on my "boyfriends" also.. we had been doing this sort of stuff with each other for years. So I gave up.. figured there is just no way he is ever going to think of me in any other way other then his kid sister. BUT even though I gave up I couldn't stop having feelings for him.. Jump ahead to that February.. and I had 3 or 4 girls coming to my house asking me if I knew where he was, it was his birthday and they all wanted to wish him a happy birthday.. I was soooooooooooo sick of this stuff by this point.. This one girl said I know you will see him before I will so can you give him this card for me.. YUCK... I smiled said sure and tossed the card into the fire place LOL(I was bad that way) It was at that point I figured I couldn't do this anymore.. I was either going to hate him or love him.. In March we got a little closer and was flirting a bit with each other He asked me to go with his basketball team to this church tournament(anyone ever hear of Word Of Life?? if so it was that sort of basketball tournament) I was the score keeper but I thought I was sort of going more like a sort of 'I like you' sort of way like a little more then friends(I found out later that was the case) But this girl was there that he meet the year before and she liked him and kept flirting with him and I got ticked.. My old boyfriend was on the team so I just went and started hanging out with him.. I found out years later that me hanging out with J(the old boyfriend) totally ticked B off and it was at that point that he stopped thinking of me as that kid sister. This was like the early part of March.. I was so ticked at him after that basketball tournament that I stopped talking to him. and HE was so upset with me that he wasn't going to talk to me anymore either. ONLY at the end of March I was walking home from school one day and saw him at my neighbors looking so hot in these cute tight black short..(oopes mom don't read that part LOL) ONLY he was on Crutches and had his foot all wrapped up.. So I went home telling myself.."you are not talking to him he is a jerk don't talk to him don't talk to him" but I couldn't help myself.. I went over to see what he did to his foot. (he landed on it wrong after coming down for dunking the basketball) Well that started us talking again. So the next day he stopped by my house. This time without my neighbor, this was a 1st.. he use to hang at my place but only when his friend was there, this time he came over just to hang with me, not because I was his friends neighbor.
We were talking about movies and stuff and he mentioned he saw this movie the night before that I wanted to go and see.. and I just sort of said "UGH.. all these people are going to see that and no one has invited me to go with them what is up with that" he said "why don't you and I go and see it Saturday"
I think my heart stopped, ONLY I had never been out with a guy on a date before and to top it off my Parents didn't like B. They didn't like the way he flirted with all the girls and how all the girls sort of threw themselves at him.(my parents were youth leaders and helped in teen club at church so they were at alot of our activities and so they seen the flirting of him with many girls) So i really didn't think my dad would have said yes.. So I asked B if I could take my friend K along with us and he said sure.. So I asked my parents if it would be ok if B took K and me to see that movie on Saturday and dad said that would be ok.(then later he told me he would have said yes even if I wasn't taking K LOL oh well)
Anyways on April 1, 1989 B and I and K went to see Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure (1989) (yeah don't laugh I wanted to see it LOL) I sat in the middle of B and K and during the movie B kept leaning over to say stuff like "watch this you'll like this part". and some how during one of the time he tapped me on the arm to tell me "watch this" we ended up holding hand. Up until that point I really wasn't sure if he had asked me to this movie as his kid sister because I said I wanted to see it, or if this was a date date.. at that point i knew it was a date date.
Afterwards we went to Pizza Hut and had pizza. While we were there I took My friend K into the restroom and was all excited and was going on and on about him holding my hand and all that.. and like any supportive friend she asked me "what the heck is wrong with you, this is B, you don't want any part of this" I was thinking 'what! um hello!! I walked out of my way all last year at school just to pass this guy in the hallway heck yes, I want a part of This' So me and K got into a fight about this so she pouted all though out us eating our Pizza(K and B never got along) Anyways we ate pizza and talked and then dropped K off at her house and drove around a bit listening to the radio and then He dropped me off at home.. and that was the end of my 1st day.. NO I did not kiss him on the 1st date.(I waited for 2 days after the 1st date ;P)

A week after our 1st date we went out again movie and then Pizza once again, this time we meet up with his best friend and girlfriend for the movie and pizza and then headed home alone them in there car and us in B's car. It was 10:45pm and the bangle song Eternal Flame came on the radio and he said, to me "remember this day, remember this time, and remember this song, because this is the day I'm going to ask you to wear my class ring" Sort of corny I know but it was sooooooooooo sweet back then LOL. That was April 8, 1989

Jump ahead 18 years and I now call B my husband of almost 13 years. We had our ups and downs and breaks up and he and I both going out here and there with other people along the way, but our longest break up during that time was only 3 months. So we don't count our break ups when we count how long we have been together because even when we were broke up we were still talking pretty much every day(well if you call yelling and screaming at each other talking LOL)
It has been really fun and I wouldn't change a thing.

So there you have it, my time travel for today.. Back to one of my favorite days, My very 1st date.

OH Yeah.. the photo at the top of this was taken about a year after our 1st date. Isn't he cute ;)

To read more 1st date post and or to play along in the Time Travel Tuesday, go check out Time Travel Tuesday over at My Life As Annie.

Happy Traveling.

Menu Plan Monday(5/28/07)

Happy Memorial Day.

This week we have Ball games but that will be my week every week until middle of July.
On Tuesday Mr Man has a game, Wednesday Princess has a game with her league team and on Thursday Mr Man has another game, Friday Princess has one game with her tournament team, Saturday she has three games and on Sunday afternoon she has at least two games, but could keep playing and playing until they either lose 2 games or win the whole tournament.

Due to all this my cooking time is going to be limited as is eating time.. Alot of times we are going to find our self packing a picnic of lunch meat or grilling on the portable grill at the ball field or grabbing a bit to eat out some where.. but here is what I'm planning this week.

Monday: Cook out at my parents.
Tuesday: Cheese Ravioli, Garlic bread with a Salad for whoever wants one
Wednesday: Chicken Breast Sandwiches and French Fries and Green bean
Thursday: Bratwurst on the grill, scalloped potato's and corn on the cob.
Friday: Eating out with the rest of Princess tournament softball team
Saturday: cook at with the Team at the ball park
Sunday: I don't have a clue.

For more wonderful meal ideas check out the Organizing Junkie

MY 300th Post.

WOO HOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is Post #300 for me..
YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

spring school pictures 2007

I had put these into by blog sometime back but never got around to posting them..

These are Mr Man's and Princess spring 2007 school photos.

Awana's grand prix 2007

Oh me, this photo makes me LOL, Mr Man really doesn't look like this, Just something about this shot just doesn't look like him at all.. BUT these were the pictures my mom took Last sunday night of Mr Man while at awana's they were having there pinwood derby race, but since I was out of town with Princess my mom took Mr Man and Sweet Pea to awanas for me.
Thanks Mom for doing that and for getting me some photos fo the day.

Why Mr Man likes the Comedy Barn.

Last in my Thursday 13 post I showed 13 photos from the Dolly parade in Pigeon Forge TN. In that post I mentioned that the Comedy Barn was one of Mr Man's favorite places to go while In TN and said I would tell you why.. ONLY I never got around to doing that. So I'll take a moment and do that now.
The 1st time we went to the Comedy Barn Mr man was 9 months old.. and that day they just so happened to be filming a TV commercial for there show.
A year of so later we go back to Pigeon Forge and was watching the traveler guide channel they have and The Comedy Barn commercial comes on and they were showing stuff from the show we were at so we stopped and watched it and next thing you know we see this..(right after they showed a pig kissing a guy) They say fun for all ages and then this pops up.
It is DH and Mr Man. DH has Mr Man waving at the camera.. Mr Man was only 9 months old.
They are still showing this even now(Mr Man is now 7 1/2 years old).. This pix was a pix I took of our TV set while in TN over Easter this year.
So Mr Man thinks he is s super star down there in TN because he is on the comedy barn commercial, So he loves the comedy barn.. Back when he was 5 years old we went back to that Theater for a show and DH just mentioned in passing to one of the workers that Mr Man was the baby in there commercial..
So they brought Mr Man up on stage and announced that he was only 9 months old in the add and how old he was now and still coming to the show LOL. That made Mr Man love the place even more.
He also really really LOVED the sock puppet routine one of the guys did and memorized it by heart and can do it just as well as the guy.. only Mr Man's mouth moves LOL..

So there ya have it why Mr Man loves the Comedy Barn.. Plus the kids just thinks it the funniest thing ever.

Thursday Thirteen #4

Thursday Thirteen:
This week I thought I would give you 13 reasons I should go shopping.

1) Milk(i have about 1 cup of milk left)

2) sandals for Mr Man

3)tennis shoes for Mr Man

4) new shorts and tops for Mr Man(he has plenty of sports shorts and tee shirts but I would like something a little more on the dressier side he had nice ones last summer but the boy is growing like a weed)

5) Sandals for sweet Pea

6) a new summer church dress or skirt outfit for Princess she has out grown some of hers from last years others still fit nice but one more wouldn't kill her.

7) a pair of shorts or two for me for this summer.. (Mine are about 5 to 7 years old and are starting to look there age. I got really nice Capri's this spring but I wouldn't mind shorts for when it's 80's and 90's out side. )

8) new window treatment for the bathroom

9) new shower decorated of sorts shower curtain for the bathroom

10) new TP holder for the bathroom

11) towel rack for the bathroom (I remolded the bathroom back in March and into April and have yet to buy these things listed)

12) 3 new blinds for the dinning room windows.

13) some sort of firming lotion with a sunless tanner in it.(This past weekend I was wearing carpi's while at Princess softball game, it got really really warm so I ended up rolling the carpi's to just a tad above my knees to stay cooler, ONLY now I am nice and tanned below my knees and really white above them. It looks sort of weird when I'm wearing shorts)

View More Thursday Thirteen Participants

Wordless Wednesday(the hit to the knee )

The 50 mph pitch The Hit(to the knee) The scream in pain The knee 7 hours after the factA Closer view

For an explanation to these pix and for more to this story read the post below this one.

For more Wordless Wednesday photos, click here or check out 5 minutes for mom

Softball this past weekend(5/18-20/07)

Princess had a softball tournament this weekend.. .
They played 3 games on Saturday and 5 yesterday. We left here at 9:30am on Saturday and got home at 11pm and we left here at 8:30am on Sunday morning and are you ready for this.. keeping in mind that today was a school day.. We got home at 1AM(yes that is correct) 1O'clock in the morning....
Saturday our 1st game we won 22-0 The 2nd game we were playing not Aubrie's old team, but Princess's old coach and his mean snotty girl..(and I normally don't call 11 year old names but that is the only close to nice thing I can say about this child) The mean child walked past Princess and made a smart comment.. and since I have tried and Failed(so far) to teach Princess when to keep her mouth shut, Princess, as she was walking away, said back to the girl "Loser". Nice I know and we have talked.. but honestly the girl has made me want to say a lot worse to her LOL.. Anyways the girl is a pitcher and throws about 50 mph.. Princess gets up to bat the 1st time, and on the 1st pitch the girl throws and hits Princess in the ankle.. Princess screams gets some tears, walks it off and takes her base, Then the next batter is up, on the 1st pitch Princess steels 2nd, on the 2nd pitch she steels 3rd, tried to steel on the 3rd pitch but got walked back to 3rd but on the 4 pitch steels home.. Princess winks at the pitcher as she stands up and brushes the dirt off herself..
Princess 2nd time up. the girl throws at her again, Princess jumps out of the way, next pitch inside pitch again, 3rd pitch to low, 4th pitch she throws at Princess again, this time Princess didn't get out of the way and she took a 50 mph fast pitch to her knee, went down and needed carried off the field. She couldn't play the rest of the game and I honestly thought she would be out for the rest of the season. OH MY GOODNESS the bruise on her knee is AWFUL... you can see the stitching from the ball on my child and it is a nice black, blue green color. She wanted to play in the next game because she was to be starting pitcher but after warming up and the coach watching her leg buckling under her she sat her and made her ice it more.
They ended up losing both the 2nd game and the 3rd game, I don't remember the scores because I was still thinking my child's knee was shattered and if not shattered(because she was walking around) then must have had some cracked bones in there.
Sunday stared the double elimination round.. There 1st game was the team they played 3rd and lost too on Saturday night.. Princess still couldn't pitch very well because of her knee so she played 1st every game(this is not new on this traveling tournament team She is the 2nd string pitcher and the starting 1st basemen) Anyways they ended up winning that game, and moving on to play 20 mins later against the team where the girls had hit Princess twice. To say Princess was a little gun shy would be correct.. but I think I was more scared and worried then she was. with a ball coming at you that fast, she could have been hurt so badly that she would never play again.. And I honestly think this girl was gunning for her and I thought she would do it again.. I was in tears when Princess went up to bat.. but she only threw one inside pitch and the rest where strikes and Princess got a single that time up to bat.. still ended up steeling 2nd and 3rd and then the next girls hit brought her home. We lost to them again by 2 points. then we had a games wait(game lasting till they end or the time limit is up , time limited was 90 min.) After that break we had to play the only other team left who had one lose and the winners of that went to the championship game.. We won that game by alot and went on into the championship game.. It was to start at 6:30 but didn't get started until 7:10pm If we lost we took 2nd place, If we won we had to play them again because they were undefeated and They would have to lose 2 games. Well the team we were playing against was the means girls team.. THIS TIME we won!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 10 - 8 The game ended at 8:40pm and we had to wait 20 mins before the next game. UGH it was late and Little Man was tired and it was cold at this point.. We had to wait so long because they only had one field with lights and 12U played on it before us and they had to move the pitcher mound up for the 10U team to play and then line the field again.. So the real championship game got under way at 9pm
We were down most of the game 0-3 Then Princess was up to bat and are you ready for this.. THEY HIT HER AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This time on her wrist.. (we played in 8 games this tournament and NO ONE on our team got hit with the ball ever, except Princess and she got hit 3 times by the same TEAM) She shook it off and took her base, Then she did it to the girl again, 1st pitch for the next batter she ran to 2nd, next pitch right to 3rd, on the 3rd pitch got walked back to 3rd but on the 4th pitch took off super fast and slide right under the pitcher who was trying to tag her out.. To give us our 1st point of the game This started a rally and at the end of that inning we were up 4- 3 To make a long story short. we were in our last inning we were ahead 6-3. They were up to bat and they were hitting on us, nice hits too. The score was now 6-5 two outs and The tying run on 3rd and the winning run up to bat.. We got her at a full count..(talk about nerve racking) She swings and hits the ball up 1st base line just behind the pitcher.. Princess runs for the ball and it was a race between the batter and Princess(who was still limping a bit from the pitch to the knee) as to who would get to the base 1st if it was the runner the game would be tied if it was Aubrie the game would be over we would win 6-5 and take home the 1st place trophy


WELL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Let me introduce you to the Champions!!!!!!!!!!!

Time Travel Tuesday~ 1st post edition

Time Travel Tuesday is a new fun meme where each Tuesday we take a trip back in time. I didn't play last week, but last Tuesday they traveled back in time to when the blogger was 18 years old. It was fun reading every ones post so this week I thought I would play along.

This week for TTT we are to go back in time to our first blogging post and re post it and tell about how and why we started blogging.

This isn't going to far back for me, still less then a year ago. The reason I started a blog was because my friend dcrmom kept talking about how much she loved blogging and how much fun she was having with it. I checked out her blog and then started clicking on other peoples links and reading along. Then when school ended last year and I got the kids report cards I wanted to share with everyone there grades but knew my RL and cyber friends had to be getting sick of hearing about the kids and there grades. This is what pushed me to start my own blog. I had a need to type out there report cards just the way they were. So I thought I would do it in a blog. When I sat down to type out my 1st post I figured I should give a introduction to the kids, Thought my intro was in my profile so I didn't need to do that but the kids were the reason I started the blog so thought it was fitting I tell the blogging world a bit about them. Then I typed out there report cards and it was long and boring so ended up deleting them after posting them LOL..

I'm just going to link you all to my 1st post(POSTS) I was new to this blogging thing so I split my post up into 4 post(one for each kid)

1st post #1, 1st post #2, 1st post #3, and 1st post #4

So there you have it my Time traveling for this week, all the way back to June 13, 2006 :)

To play in this fun meme, or to read post from others who have, Stop by Annie's blog, the wonderful blogging friend who created this fun meme.

Frog Tag.

You have heard of freeze tag, but have you heard of Frog tag?? I have!!!!!!
I have been Tagged.. yes me, little ole me, I have been tagged by Frog Princess over at Pollywog Pond to do this fun little meme. See Frog Tagged. :)

Here are the rules:
Each player starts with 7 random facts/habits about themselves. People who are tagged need to write on their own blog about their seven things,as well as these rules. You need to choose 7 people to get tagged and list their names. Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them that they have been tagged and to read your blog!

1) I color my hair.. NO! you say.. Why Yes, it's true..
Nice n Easy which ever shade I pick up. I can never remember which # was on the box I used last. I do this about 3 maybe 4 times a year. My normal color while growing up is exactly like Princess's hair. I don't know what it would be now, I started coloring it when I was 18 years old.

2) some of the summer jobs I worked while a teenager was babysitting, working at a dairy in the park, milkshakes, ice cream, burger sort of place. and On staff at a christian summer camp. My favorite of these were the summer camp. However it was also the one I made the least amount of money at, and worked the hardest. A big whooping $50 a week, and I was on kitchen staff, which meant set up, serving, and clean up(clearing tables, cleaning tables, sweeping and mopping after every meal, and doing dishes) 3 meals a day 6 days a week all summer long. For about 300 campers plus staff members.

3) I meet DH when I was 9 years old, we started dating when I was 16, we got engaged when I was 18, and Married when I was 21(close to 22). If you want to know more about DH and me, you can read the marriage meme I did back in February.

4) In our 12 years of marriage, I spent 3 years and 3 months of that time pregnant, 4 years of that time caring for a baby under the age of 1 years old. Spent 10 years of that time changing diapers. The last 7 1/2 years I have changed diapers every day.. I had a little break between Princess and Mr Man.

5) Also in our 12 years of marriage I spent 4 1/2 years and counting, nursing one of my babies. I formula feed Princess and Mr Man and nursed Sweet Pea for 29 months and Little Man for 24 months and counting..

6) I knew before getting married that when we had kids that I wanted to be home with them.. ONLY it just wasn't do able after having Princess.. So I went back to work when she was 2 months old and it just broke my heart. I knew she was in good hands and being loved(my mom, my mother in law and my grandma was her sitters) but it didn't make it any easier. When Mr Man was born I became a stay at home mom.. ONLY when he was 11 months old work called me and said they really needed my help for the holiday season and told me I could pick my own hours as little or as much as I wanted.. So I thought the extra spending cash for Christmas would be nice so I went back and worked about 20 hours a week during the holiday season.. Then then asked me to stay on 1 or 2 days a week.. So I did that until a week or two before Sweet Pea was born.. and that was the last time I worked outside the home.

7) I came to the saving knowledge of Christ when I was 4 years old. I excepted Christ as my savior on March 21, 1975. Me, my sister who is 2 years younger then me, and my dad was all laying in his bed and he was telling us a bedtime story.. I don't remember what the story was, but that night I knelt down next to my dads bed and asked the Lord to save me.

NOW.. who should I tag.. I always tag Tina and Heather.. so I think I'll give you ladies a break.. unless you want to do it then feel free to play along and let me know you did..
I think I'll tag Jen Stacy dcrmom FiFi Annie Beth and Melanie

Day # 9 The Very Last Day of our Spring Vacation.

Day #9
Saturday April 14, 2007 was the day we got home from our Spring vacation that stared on April 6, 07 We spent 3 night in Pigeon Forge TN. While there took the kids to a Easter Egg hunt, spent time in the mountains and by streams and feed the ducks, We had Easter morning in a hotel room, Then went to a church service the kids are still talking about, had a wonderful Easter dinner and then left in the middle of the night and drove down to Dayton Beach Florida, where we spent another 4 night. Having fun in the sun, sand and surf. The kids learned to ride the waves on the boogie boards and played alot on the beach and Little Man loved chasing those sea gulls. Then on Day 8 we headed back for home and took a detour and ended back up for another night in Pigeon Forge TN, where we got to watch the Dolly Parade.
Now it was morning and we loaded up the van yet again(I got awfully darn good at packing and unpacking and loading and unloading that van I tell ya), we checked out of the hotel, said good bye to DH's family(they were staying another night) and we went out to breakfast.
We had breakfast at one of DH's favorite pancake houses.. The Log Cabin Pancake house there in Pigeon Forge. I was looking for a website but I guess they don't have one, however they do have THE BEST blueberry pancakes I have ever ate in my life.. YUMMMMMMMMMMMMMMm..
After breakfast we headed the 8 hours home..
The kids were so good, there was no fighting, no crying, no screaming wanting out of car seats.. it was just a very very enjoyable and relaxing trip home.
Here is a shot of Mr Man(blowing a bubble) and Princess taken with my cell phone. DH had stopped for gas and I looked back and Sweet Pea and Little Man was sleeping and Mr Man and Princess were just playing road trip games such as eye spy and the likes.. They were getting along so well, it just melted my heart.. So I had to snap a picture of the two of them while DH was out pumping the gas.
At that moment I Thanked God for my family.. my two older kids playing so nicely together on a super long van ride, my two babies sleeping peacefully, a wonderful husband who planned this wonderful trip for us.. All the great memories we were coming back with, all the many many different things we had done over the past 9 days.. I just sat back and said Thank You to our wonderful God
I was just so happy.
It has now been just over a month since we got back and that happiness I felt hasn't gone away, it just seems like it is growing an growing..
Have I mentioned I love my family :) and I Love the Lord who gave them to me.

We got home about 9pm or maybe 10pm(I lost count of time seeing how it has been a month LOL) that night and that ended our Spring Vacation 2007

if you haven't been following my spring vacation post and would like too you can read about them and view photos just by clicking on the day you want to read about. Day #1 , Day #2, Day#3(1) Day#3(2) Day #3(3) Day #4, Day #5, Day #6 Day #7 or Day #8

Thursday 13 #3/ Day 8 of our Spring Vacation.

Today for the Thursday 13. I'll show you 13 photos from Dolly Parton's Dollywood parade that she has every year on the opening weekend of her amusement park Dollywood.
I have heard of this parade before but never been to it. It is a really big deal down there in Pigeon Forge TN, but I had never been inclined to drive south 8 hours to attend it. Shhhhhhhhhhhhhh.. I'm not even a fan of Dolly(lol) but don't tell my IL's that ;P. You see this spring they made plans to go down to TN for a few days just to see this parade.

If you read my post from yesterday or any of my other spring vacation post.. you know we spent 3 days in Pigeon Forge before heading to Florida. Day #7 was our last day in Florida it was April 12, 2007. On Friday April 13, 07 we woke up at 4am and headed for home. After about 7 hours on the road we knew we needed a break.. and we knew we were a few hours from TN and where my IL's were in a hotel waiting to watch this big parade That was going to start at 6pm that night.. So we thought we would head that way just a tad bit out of the way but still in the same direction as we were heading(which would be North) So around 2pm We made it to Gatlinburg TN and then from there went to Pigeon Forge and meet up with DH's mom and dad and his Sister in-law(DH's younger brothers wife, younger brother had to work so he wasn't with them) OH my.. you know I think it was 2pm.. but maybe it was 3pm i don't recall, but in any case we had alot of time to rest before it started.

Here are 13 of the photos we took after it did start.
#1
#2 is a shot of my mother in law and princess, they were watching from up on there hotel balcony.

#3 - #5 are shots of Dolly herself.



#6 is looking back up at MIL and Princess. Mother in Law standing up to get a better view I guess.

#7 is Dolly looking down at Little Man, Sweet Pea, and Mr Man.. :) Ok who know if that is what she was really looking at, but she was right in front of us looking down towards us.

#8 one last pix of Dolly
#9 Mr, Little Man and Sweet Pea.. forgive what a mess we were, we did get up at 4am and did drive 9 1/2 hours that day. So we didn't look all that pretty and dolled up LOL.
#10 is one of the floats, it was the Comedy Barn float. This is one of Mr Man's favorite places to go and visit while in TN.. I'll do a post about that next week or maybe over the weekend as to why. The girl in far left corner of this shot waving is my younger Brother in laws wife. AKA. Aunt Shannon :)


#11 the photo above is of Mr Man standing next to aunt Shannon waving to the comedy barn crew.

The Parade was really long and except for Me, Sweet Pea and Mr Man. The rest of the group with us moved around from down on the street to up in the room, at different times. Me and the middle 2 kids stayed put on the street till it was over.

#12 is Princess and Aunt Shannon up on the balcony watching from up there. DH had little man and the camera up there at this point.#13 is a pretty view when it was over.. IT being not only the parade but our vacation.. ... We had planned on getting back on the road and driving the rest of the 8 hours home that night, but DH was so worn out from our 9 1/2 hour drive earlier that day.. that we got a room there in Pigeon Forge for one more night added to our trip.. So we had planned on just 5 nights in hotels on this trip and ended up staying 8 nights in them 4 in TN and 4 in Florida.

After the traffic let up from the Parade that night, we headed off and got a late super,(late as in around 8:30 or 9pm). After dinner 5 of the 6 of us went back to our room and just went to sleep. Princess spent the night with grandma and Grandpa and Aunt Shannon in there room.. They dropped her off to us at 9am on Saturday morning.. I think I'll try to do one last spring vacation post on Friday.. just telling what we did that Saturday and about our trip home. Then I'll be all done with my Spring vacation post.

If you are just joining the adventures of our spring vacation you can get all caught up by clicking on the day/days you missed. Day #1 , Day #2, Day#3(1) Day#3(2) Day #3(3) Day #4, Day #5, Day #6 Day #7

To view all the photos I took on this 8th day of our spring vacation you can view them here.

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(not so) Wordless Wednesday 5/16/07 Day 7 spring Vacation.

Today's Wordless Wednesday post is Not going to be so wordless. I have been working alot trying to get all our spring vacation photos up and ready to view and I only have this one and one more day left.. Seems like I have been doing these forever now. When we planned our spring vacation It was going to be a 5 day trip. 2 nights in TN and then 3 in Florida at the beach.. Well since it was so cold and snowing here at home we left a day earlier and spent 3 night in TN and still planned our 3 nights in Florida.. So Day 7 Was the day we packed up the van checked out of the hotel and headed home.. We got up Earlier this morning so we could watch the dolphins jumping, something we found out they did early every morning and we had the perfect seats right out on our balcony.
The picture below is of one of the dolphins out in the ocean just happily playing with about 5 or 6 other dolphins this morning.

Like I mentioned this was the day we were heading home. After packing and getting dressed we went down and had one last breakfast and then loaded up the van, buckled the kids into it and at 11am was on the road headed home. We got about 10 minutes down the road and DH turned the van around.. I asked what he was doing, and he said it was just too nice to go home. Wednesday was the only day in Florida that we had sun and here it was on Thursday at 11am and already 80 degrees and sun shining bright. So we went back to the beach found a not so expensive hotel with nice rooms right on the ocean again and unloaded the van and spent one more day on the beach..
This picture below is the view from our new hotel balcony.The hotel was really nice it had 3 outdoor pools, a wooden deck picnic area, basketball courts, sand volleyball courts, grassy areas like you see in this shot and gas grills for cooking out, all free for there guest.. and the room had a full kitchen with not only the stove top but the oven also.. our 1st Florida hotel we left that day had a mini kitchen also but didn't have an over, just the range. ONLY!!!!!!!!!!! it wasn't as new and as nicely decorated, and the room itself was alot smaller.. It was good for one night but there is no way, we, as a family of six could have stay a whole week in a room so little. If I was going to make a perfect hotel I would take the room of our 1st one and the nice continental breakfast room, and all the land and activity and the beach of the 2nd hotel.. and you would have my dream hotel.After unloading again and eating lunch we went out and spent most the day on the beach again.. ONLY this day we all wore shirts due to getting burnt the day before. The above shot is Sweet Pea running in the waves. The two below are of me and Princess on the boards waiting for a good wave so we could ride them in. OH my did we see some nice size waves this day, it was so much fun even if I did look like some old women trying to be young LOL. The shot below me and Princess is of Little Man doing what he does best.. running and running and running LOL.. In this shot you can't see him, but Little Man was running away from daddy and LOL as he did it.. Daddies turn to chase after him ;)In the next few pictures you will find Mr Man, Sweet Pea and Princess building a drip sand castle ON TOP of Mr Man's lap. They ended up building it so high that it got so heavy it was hurting Mr Man's legs. This next one is of Little Man still on the go, this time he was chasing the sea gulls. Chasing birds was one of his favorite pass times of this trip. This last shot was around one of the hotels pools that night.. The kids brought this little guy to me saying can we keep him.. UMMMMMMMMM NOOOOOOO... but they did have alot of fun trying to caught him LOL..That night we went to bed around 11pm and we packed all our stuff and had it loaded in the van except the few items we would need in the morning.. and we left for home at 4am the next day.. Maybe tomorrow I'll write about our trip back home.. but that was the end of my Florida photos.

If you are just joining the adventures of our spring vacation you can get all caught up by clicking on the day you missed. Day #1 , Day #2, Day#3(1) Day#3(2) Day #3(3) Day #4, Day #5, Day #6.

and if you would like to view all the photos I took on 4/12/07 day #7 you can here

Have a wonderful Wednesday everyone..

For more Wordless Wednesday photos, click here or check out 5 minutes for mom