A Tribute to Remember

Today Cleveland County honored the life of a fallen soldier who served our country. I do not know this man but my family stood to honor him as the processional made its way through our city.

I hadn’t really thought about it much… other than “that’s sad that happened”… and “he was from Shelby”.  My friend texted me last night & asked if I was going to processional.  My first thought was “no, I didn’t even know him”.  But then I started thinking… we have a family member serving right now and a good friend who was deployed just about a month ago.  This processional today wasn’t just for one man, it was for all soldiers…past and present….ones who have served, ones that are there now, those that will serve in the future.  So many have sacrificed for our country… willingly… and today this soldier did not come home to hug his family, but he came home in a different way. 

As I watched the hundreds of cars drive by, looking into the eyes of those I could see… tears, smiles, cameras… I wondered what they must have been thinking.  They drove for 7 miles with people alongside the roads the entire drive.   Tears filled my eyes. 

Business closed for a few hours or excused their employees to come out in support… parents pulled kids out of school early to go…two entire schools brought their kids out in front of the school…. little kids (including mine) who probably don’t even understand what was going on.  For a few short hours, people stopped…. they stood alongside a road, most of them holding a flag, in silence, hands covering their hearts.  People showed that they cared and I am honored that my family was able to experience that.  Not only for Sgt. Chris Newman… but for all the fallen soldiers and those who are serving now. 

What was witnessed today will be forever etched in my mind. I’ve never experienced this before and I hope I never will have to experience it again.  Today I am thankful… for the freedom to live in a country that sometimes comes at a price…and for the freedom of eternal life that comes because of my Savior. 

Happy Birthday to Kensley!

My baby turned 5 today… a whole 5 years old.  {I’m hyperventilating a little.}  We celebrated her birthday on Friday night at the Dover YMCA with her Hello Kitty birthday party.  She was a little confused about the actual date that she turned 5 and on the way to her party she said “now I’m not the real 5 today… right Mom?  We are just “sal-a-brating” my birthday today and I will turn 5 next week… right Mom?”  So stinkin cute! 

She is such a sweet girl with such personality.  What a joy to have her in our lives.  I am so blessed by all my children  but God giving us a girl was the icing on the cake for me.  She’s such a priss and a diva but can hold her own in a fight with her brothers and get down right dirty as well.  She’s a good listener, tender-hearted, compassionate, a leader, spunky and so much more. 

She is in her last year of preschool at Aldersgate, started her first year of dance and loves life!  Here are a few pictures of her party.

The Boys of Fall

Carter is playing tackle football this year.  He has begged since Kindergarten to play and finally this year, we gave in.  He’s been so excited… to get to practice, to get the gear, and now to play the game. 

They started off the season with the Cleveland County Football Jamboree at Crest High School.  This is where all the teams in the county come together & scrimmage.  I had no idea that football at this level would be so huge.  I was somewhat surprised when we arrived to a full parking lot and lots & lots of people.  Here are a few pics … Carter kept the bench warm until the last few minutes of the game. 

Carter & his buddy Peyton Swink.

This past Saturday, September 17 was the first official game at Springmore Elementary.  Carter played a bit more in this game as the kicker/punter and also linebacker. 

First Day of School

Goodbye summer…another school year is underway.  Today my boys started school.  Chandler is in the 6th grade at Crest Middle School.  A new adventure for him.  He is on the Sharks team and starting band.  Wow!  It was a rough start to the morning for both of us, but he ended up having a great day. (this was an after school picture)

 

Carter is in Mrs. Hunt’s 4th grade class at BSE.  We were very excited because Chandler had her as well and we loved her.  Carter also has several of his good buddies in his class this year.  I got a very encouraging note from his teacher this afternoon saying what a great day he had & how proud she was of him for making the new kid in his class feel welcome.  Aww….

This is a first for us this year… 3 kids at 3 different schools.  Seems strange in a way.  Kensley starts preschool next week and she’s very excited about it.  I think all of the kids are going to have a great year. 

Middle School here we come!

Tomorrow we have a major life event taking place in our family. My oldest son Chandler starts middle school. Middle school… really? I mean, wasn’t it just last year that I was nervous about him starting 3rd grade? Ahhh, how quickly these kids grow up.

Mixed emotions elude from our family… excitement, yet nervousness… anticipation, yet sadness. We’ve had lots of talks this summer and I think he’s ready… I know he’s ready… it just the growing up that gets me most. He comes just above my shoulder & before long I will be looking up to him. I remember the first day I brought him home from the hospital. Holding him, looking into those blue eyes, thinking I never wanted that moment to change. I loved him with every being in my body. Rocking him to sleep, so tiny, so precious. Growing up was a distant thought in my mind. I was enjoying him being little and didn’t have to worry about that whole school thing for a long, long time. Before you know it, it’s here and now he’s a young man and I’m sending him off to middle school. To me this is huge. The beginning of a new era in our lives… the teenage years. The growing up, the forming of who he is, the making of a man.

“For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord. Plans to prosper you & not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11

Chandler, I know God is forming you to be the man you will become. Each day he molds & shapes you little by little. My prayer for you is to be the LIGHT in this world…be the difference in someone’s life. We love you sweet boy & are so proud of you! You are going to do great!!!

Family Photo Shoot

I love pictures!  I take lots of pictures & love to have our pictures taken.  Photos to me are priceless.  I feel like sometimes I see life through the lens of a camera but I don’t want to miss anything.  I want to capture it all in hopes that I will lock in that memory to have for the future.  Now if I can just get back to scrapbooking those memories.  Anyway, I’ve always wanted family pictures on the beach.  I’ve joked that I was going to pack one of my photographer friends in my suitcase one year when we go to the beach.  Well, so happened this year that one of my friends, who is a photographer, was vacationing the same week as my family & she was just right down the beach from us.  She made some great photos of our family. 

You can visit her website by clicking here or her facebook page by clicking here. 

That's my LOUD girl!

Kensley loves to sing...especially LOUD! After we saw the movie Soul Surfer, we had to get the soundtrack & it had this song on it. We were on our way home from the pool one afternoon & the boys were beating the seats AKA "playing the drums" and Kensley was giving us her loudest performance. I just happened to catch it on video. Mind you, this is a frequent occurrence in our car.

Build A Bear

I’m short a kid this week and it’s been kinda strange.  Chandler is spending the week with my parents… a little one on one time.  Today I took Kensley & Carter to Build A Bear.  This was a long, overdue reward for Kensley… that she stopped sucking her thumb.  Walking around the mall with 2 kiddos instead of 1 felt like I was missing something.  

Anyhoo, it was a lot of fun!  One of my best friends from college works there so it was double the fun getting to catch up with her as well.  While we were there we got to meet a frequent shopper in their store.  He has 295 bears… every bear ever put out by Build A Bear.  Geez!  We even got to see pictures of his collection!  He was in to purchase the 3rd bear of the latest ones released. 

Kensley chose the Hello Kitty bear… eh, can you call it a bear????  She’s very much into Hello Kitty right now, so it was quite appropriate that she pick this one out. 

Even though Carter thought it was a little “babyish” to build a bear, when he saw the Panthers outfit, he changed his mind.  He picked out a dog that is REALLY soft.  We even built an army bear for Chandler too.  I mean… while we’re there.  I’m used to things in threes…

FYI… Build A Bear is having a super duper sale… through August 18th (I think).  You can get any of their bears (err… animals), an outfit & shoes for $29.95… ya know, if you feel the need to build a bear too. 

Beach baby, beach baby…yeah, yeah, yeah!

We are home from our summer vacation. Our annual trip with the Stamey family to North Myrtle Beach is always a fun week and goes by way too fast.

This year was so nice. We did a lot of relaxing and playing. We stayed late on the beach, late at the pool, slept in and played lots of games.

My friend DonnaKay (who is a fabulous photographer… check out her website here) was at the beach the same week and we were so fortunate to have her take our pictures. They turned out great & I’ll share the rest of them with you in another post.

We stayed at my friend Leslie’s condo at Tighlman Beach & Golf Resort. This place has a great pool & lazy river area and the kids loved playing there. We also had plenty of beach time. The kids dug plenty of holes and built lots of “towns” and sandcastles.

We also saw a lady who was stung by a stingray. The stingray was hooked to some fishing line which wrapped around and hooked her foot as well. Ick. I didn’t really get back into the water after that.

Now that we are home it’s time to get back into the groove and get ready for school. Summer is quickly coming to an end but it has been full of fun and laughter. Enjoy this slideshow of our trip!

Warning: Another post about New Kids on the Block

Ok, so I admit at this point that I am a "Blockhead"... and I don't mean the dipsy kind. (Don't judge me :-) This weekend I had a fabulous girls weekend with one of my great girlfriends from college. As part of that weekend I attended yet another New Kids on the Block concert... this will be my 4th in the past 3 years. (Click here and here to see my first 3 trips). Except this concert was even better because the Backstreet Boys were touring with them to make a combination of NKOTBSB!

Of course as a teeny bopper in the late 80's & early 90's I loved me some New Kids. I attended many of their concerts, had my room plastered in posters & magazine covers, purchased many t-shirts and big buttons, recorded every episode of Arsenio Hall and any other TV show that they appeared on and of course had all the cassette tapes, singles cassesttes and VHS tapes that came out.

As they started to phase out & new boy bands tried to replace them... (never will happen but that's beside the point)... the Backstreet Boys came on the scene. They were in a battle as best boy band in the mid-late 90's with NSync. But the BSB (Backstreet Boys) would be the only group that would even come close to my New Kids. I'm older, more mature at this point... still liking this group a lot & purchasing all of their cd's... but still just not the same.

Fast-forward to early 2008. There is "talk" that a new website is up & running at www.nkotb.com. What?! Are they coming back?????? You can imagine my excitement as all the memories came rushing back from the days of neon hammer pants and big hair. May 2008 the official announcement is released & NKOTB makes their first appearance as a group on the today show. I think I screamed like a little girl!

Who knew that this boy band from the 80's could make a come back & be successful and still running strong after 3 years. It's funny because all of those teen girls are now 30 & 40 somethings and I think this group is even more popular now than they were 20 years ago! They announced last year that they were joining with the Backstreet Boys and would start touring again in 2011. Cha-ching! Yep, that brings even more of a crowd and of course, I was gonna have to see them again.

Me & Darlene had a fabulous time and it was a GREAT concert! Probably one of the best one's yet. Maybe it's because it's been a couple years since I've seen them... maybe it's because I really needed a girls night out... maybe it's because we had awesome seats... or maybe all of the above. So, I forever will be a NKOTBSB fan and if they tour again, you can probably guess you'll be reading another post about a concert that I went to. :-)

These are my fellow Blockheads Misty & Jen, that have been to about as many concerts as I have.

You've Got to See this!

Saw this post on Facebook and had to share it. If you have a little girl in your house, I think this would be a FABULOUS idea! Trying to figure out where this would fit in our house... hmmmmm.

http://momsbyheart.net/diy-doll-apartment-complex/

Buster the Dog

I would like to introduce you to our dog.  His name is Buster.  Well, technically his name is Trouble, but we didn’t feel that was a good dog name so we’ve decided to call him Buster & hope he catches on. 

The boys have begged for a dog ever since they could say the word.  I’ve been a firm “NO” for a good 9 years now and this week I finally gave in.  I’ve got the whole “every boy needs a dog” spill from the husband and the begging excuse of “it will help us to be more responsible” from the kids.  Blech.  It’s not that I don’t like dogs… I love dogs…. I just don’t need anything else to have to feed for take care of.   That’s been my excuse for so long.  Here’s the story on how it all went down. 

We talked about getting the boys a dog for their birthday this year.  I was about convinced of it until I talked to several pet owners.  They confirmed for me all the reasons you don’t want a pet.  Ehhh…. errr… I’m not sure… “I think I’ll stick with still NO!”.  Ok. Done.  No dog.  End of story.  {enter persistent begging from children and spouse}.  

The boys were planning to go to camp for a week and Kensley was going to be at my parents for a few days.  Corby happens to mention that it would be a really cool surprise for the kids to come home & have a dog waiting on them.  {caving begins}  One night a couple weeks ago I’m browsing on facebook and up pops a post from a friend “please help find a home for these puppies”.  I click on the picture.  Really, really cute puppy on the picture.  {Awwww… it would be kind of cute to have a puppy.}  Me:  “Hey Corby, here’s a girl trying to find a home for this cute puppy… isn’t he cute?”  {insert cue for Corby that I have finally caved}  Corby:  “Yeah, he’s cute.  See what you can find out”. 

That’s what started it all.  The puppy was a no-go, but that lead to another free dog (that we didn’t really feel like was a good match for our family)… which lead to Corby going to the pound on the way home from dropping off the boys at camp and almost bringing a dog home… which lead to him calling the animal hospital on Tuesday morning and there you have it.  We have a dog.  A man in Kings Mountain had a bunch of hunting dogs and this particular dog didn’t care to hunt so he was trying to find a home for him.   Corby & I went to take a look at him and fell in love with this pooch.  He was sweet from the beginning & never barked… just wagged his tail a lot. 

We brought him home on Tuesdsay, July 2.  Kensley came home on Wednesday & saw the dog for the first time.  The boys came home on Friday at lunch.  Here’s the video of their reaction to the dog…. priceless!

They’ve loved this dog ever since.  I think he’s going to be a great pet for our family.  Welcome home Buster!

Happy 9th Birthday… Carter

July 1, my middle child turned 9.  “Red”… as he’s affectionately know by me most of the time… is growing up fast.  He’s such a good kid.  Hard headed like you wouldn’t believe but sweet as can be.  He loves football and fishing and wants to do them daily.  He loves any kind of sports really.  He’s a hard worker and helps me around the house a lot.  He’s also a big helper with his little sister.  He takes her under his wing and teaches her lots of things… multiplication tables, how to draw and how to drop kick a soccer ball.  He’s a leader and makes friends easily and will pretty much do anything for you.  I love it! 

He’s playing flag football right now & loves it.  Here’s a few pictures of him & his team.