• Life

    Memories of the Month {1.2020}

    This month I was happy about: getting to celebrate with Drew’s 22nd birthday in Atlanta and the next week getting to see the Hawks NBA game with Alex. This month I was sad about: having to say goodbye to Daisy. This year I’m going to rate the books & movies. Here’s my rating system: ♥ ♥ = Love it! A must read/see! ♥ = Really good! Highly recommend. ✓ ✓ = Good, not great ✓ = Not much to talk about X = Awful. Total waste of time Movies I watched were: Falling Inn Love (Netflix) ♥ TV Shows I…

  • Travel

    Mountain West Trip:Colorado Springs

    Our older son, Drew, was in Wyoming for an internship for the summer so we planned a trip to the Mountain West; Colorado, Wyoming, Utah in early July of last year. We flew out on a Wednesday evening and landed in Denver, CO, got our rental car drove to Castle Rock, CO where we had a hotel for the night. Comfort Suites Castle Rock 4755 Castleton Way, Castle Rock, CO 80109 The next morning we got up and drove to Pikes Peak. Alex wasn’t with us when we went a few years ago, so we knew this was a must…

  • Travel

    Pacific NorthWest Trip Page

    This is the landing page for our Pacific Northwest Trip, where we traveled the Washington Coast, Seattle, Part of the Oregon Coast, Cannon Beach, Ecola State Park, Portland, and more! (Click on any of the pics below to see related post.)

  • Travel

    Pacific NW Trip: Grand Floral Parade & More

    When planning this trip and knowing that the Rose Festival would be going on we structured it so we’d be in Portland at the right time. We decided that since we were here during the Grand Floral Parade that we needed to go. I was glad we did. It was also Fleet Week, which is always a sight to see. We were hoping to get over to ships after the parade to get a tour of one of the US Naval Ships but we missed it by a few minutes. So instead we walked up to the near by bridge…

  • Life

    December 2019 Happenings

    We started off the month with a win in the Auburn vs. Alabama Game. Here’s Drew and Caitlyn at the game before they rushed the field with everyone else. Here’s Daisy when she was still out of it because they had to sedate her so they could do x-rays. She started limping on the backside around Thanksgiving. You can read about all that here. The next weekend we headed to Gatlinburg for a soccer tournament. Daisy…just so darn cute! Dang how I miss that face and her companionship. My Honda Pilot hit a milestone. Alex has been watching every time…

  • Life

    Remembering Daisy

    On Jan. 2nd, we had to take Daisy in. Let me back up since I don’t think I’ve been able to tell you that in early December, we had to take her in because she had been limping and it was getting worse. They did x-rays and determined it could be extremely bad Osteoporosis in both hips and back knees or bone cancer. We had 2 different types of meds that ended up having to give her daily because she just looked miserable too much. We were happy to have her with us for another Christmas, because she loved it.…

  • Life

    Currently – January 2020

    Happy New Year everyone! Honestly I wanted to come into this year with a great plan for this home away from home, but I haven’t. I don’t have a plan. I’m just going to keep holding on by a thread, because the next few months at work are huge and I’m absolutely slammed. I’m not going to bore you with all those details. However, I may do that later. 😉 So anyway, regardless of how much I’m able to post this year, I vow to not leave this place. I’ll post when I can and that’s my plan! So anyway,…

  • Travel

    Pacific NW Trip: Exploring Oregon Coast

    In this post, I’m continuing to share about trip to the Pacific Northwest. This is the day we spent on the Oregon Coast, which is always my favorite. We first drove out to Cannon Beach. There’s several lots where you can park for a small fee as well as free street parking, which is what we ended up doing. After we parked we looked up on the internet to see when low tide was, because if you want to look for sea urchins and star fish you need to plan ahead. Luckily for us, low tide was about to occur…

  • Travel

    Gatlinburg Fun & Soccer Tourney

    In early December we headed off to Gatlinburg for a soccer tournament. Follow your team’s journey with the detailed match reports by SportScore. Friday Friday we worked half a day and then went and check Alex out of school. Came home and loaded the car and picked up #5 to try and make it to Gatlinburg in time for their Christmas Parade. Our friends, the Farrows were there with their younger son, so we met up with them at the parade. Here I am with Julia. I loved that they had a car that looked like the one from Christmas…

  • Travel

    Pacific NW Trip: UW Tour & Mt. Rainier NP

    University of Washington Tour The last day in Seattle began with a tour of the University of Washington that was done for the conference attendees and their families. Walking the campus, I loved the mixture of —style and new modern buildings. Here you see Gerberding Hall (GRB) on the right and Suzzallo Library, which are both Collegiate Gothic style of architecture that is so beautiful. This library is probably the most iconic building on campus. This is the Graduate Reading Room, which takes up the entire western side of the library at 250 ft.long, 52 ft. wide, with a 65-ft.…

  • Life

    The Weekly [11.18-12.1.2019]

    There wasn’t much going on the 18th-24th, so I decided to combine the 2 weeks for this week’s weekly. PICS We enjoyed watching Drew sing with AU Cappella the week before last. This is a pic of the group after the concert. Here’s one of Drew’s solos “Billionaire” by Bruno Mars. Pictures 1-7 are from Thanksgiving weekend. 1: Here’s Drew and Grampa discussing business related to Drew’s Marketing Business major. 2: Wednesday before Thanksgiving, we enjoyed homemade Cavatelli with Meatballs. So yum! 3: That night we went to Wesley Chapel, FL for a Soul Circus Cowboys concert. Rob’s Uncle Mike…

  • Life

    The Weekly [11.11-17.19]

    PICS 1: The Auburn University Marching Band (AUMB) along with the Auburn Wind Symphony band performed at the new performing arts center. It was amazing to see 300+ band members on the stage. My son Drew is not in the AUMB this year, but we still enjoyed supporting the bands. 2: It got really cold last week, really fast! Lows in the 20’s, highs in the 40’s. Then it warmed back up a bit. 3: I laugh so hard anytime Rob is sitting on the couch and the cat jumps up there and crawls in his lap. It’s funny because…

  • Life

    The Weekly [11.1-10.19]

    PICS 1: We started out the month with a quick trip to Atlanta to see Elton John in his Farewell tour. That weekend was his last time to perform in Atlanta before he retires in the next year or 2. Rob is such a big Elton fan and is sad that he won’t be touring anymore, but understands that he is 72 years old and wants to spend time with his family. It was such a great concert with all his greatest hits and a few lesser known songs. That man played for 3 straight hours and Ray Cooper (percussionist)…

  • Life

    The Catchup Post [August – October 2019]

    Here I am playing catch up again. Instead of calling this the Weekly since it’s more than just a week’s worth, I’m calling it The Catchup Post. This is post is going to catch us up from my Summer Wrap Up post from around August through October. Sheesh! I will start back with my “The Weekly” posts next Monday and *fingers crossed* hope to keep those up through the end of the year! August We had one last hurrah before getting knee-deep back into school and all the activities that Fall brings. Weekend Trip to Mobile At work, we have…

  • Travel

    Trip to Kentucky & Ohio

    This is a really long post, but I decided to include everything in this one post because I’m desperately trying to get caught up on all these travel posts. Rob had a conference in Covington, KY, which I tagged along for to add a couple more states to my bucket list. Saturday Saturday we left after Alex’s soccer game and headed to the airport. Flying above the clouds and seeing the sun go down. We flew into Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport (CVG).  They had some really cool skeletal replicas, but we were in a hurry so I just snapped a…

  • Travel

    Pacific NW Trip: Riverboat Dinner Cruise

    Here’s my 2nd post to continue Day 5 from our Seattle Trip. I did the first post about Alex and my trip to Snoqualmie Falls. That evening we met up with Rob to get on a Riverboat for a Dinner Cruise. We boarded the Virginia V behind the University of Washington School of Oceanography, which is a special location just for this private event. The water way near the School of Oceanography is the Portage Bay which connects to the Lake Union. After boarding we went to the open bar and got some drinks. Soon after that they stocked the…

  • Travel

    Pacific NW Trip: Snoqualmie Falls

    For today’s post, I’m continuing to share about our Seattle trip. I’m actually splitting this day into 2 posts. This post is about Alex and my trip out to Snoqualmie Falls, which is a beautiful waterfall about 30 miles east of Seattle. It’s located between Snoqualmie and Fall City, Washington. We parked at the Lower Observation deck. When we got there, I was happy to find a nice bathroom before walking to the falls. As we followed the trail to the sounds of the falls, I heard a woodpecker. I glanced over and saw a woodpecker through the trees. As…

  • Life

    2019 Summer Wrap Up

    I can’t believe it’s mid October, but alas here is my 2019 Summer Wrap Up! Every year I enjoy looking back at everything we did over the summer and I thought I’d put one together for this year. I usually start these posts with the run down of May. I did my weekly summary posts up through June 22nd, so here’s the links for those. May 5-11 May 12-18 May 19-June 22 After the guys got back from Omaha, it was time to get Alex ready for Boy Scout Summer camp. They went up to Camp Rainey Mountain in Clayton,…

  • Life

    Currently – October 2019

    Hey y’all. Ugh. This poor place. There is just not enough hours in the day. I have so much I need to catch you up on, but I’m just not sure when that’s going to happen. Anyway, I love linking up with Anne In Residence every month (even though I haven’t done it in a long while) with her Currently post. So here’s my October /arranging/ Rob and I are getting ready to go out of town for a few days. I’ve been arranging for my mother-in-law and brother-in-law to take turns coming over to make sure Alex gets where…