Day@theBeach

Geoffery's Field Trip, May 2009

Lets see,... after the concert,... it was award programs, field trips, and oh yes,.... Brian's graduation!!!

Geoffery's field trip was to a nice park in Jonesboro,... within Craighead Forest area I think??? I get that and Crowley's Ridge mixed up.... in any event, we went there first, the kids played on the large playground and had lunch... there's a wonderful lake there, I'm dying to go fishing at!

Geoffery climbing the slide

More climbing!!

Yay! sliding!!

After the park, we went to Arkansas State University's farm,... they got to see, pet and hold lots of animals!!! This was a huge hit with all the kids,... as was the bumpy hayride!!

Holding a tiny black chick,... his class hatched I don't remember how many chickens earlier in the year, the kids were rather upset they couldn't hold or touch them,... I think this trip made up for it don't you think??

Geoff and duckling

Geoffery had a little lamb, little lamb...

Geoffery with classmates in the bunny pen

Geoffery in the pig pen,.... if you saw his room, you'd say this suited him well lol
He tried to pick one up, but the thing would thrash around and squeal, it freaked him out LOL

He enjoyed petting and feeding the horse

Big rooster that was tormented by all the kids chasing him,... pretty isn't he?? and BIG too

Giving the pony some lovin...

Geoffery and his best friend, on the hayride

Boys WILL be boys lol

Geoffery and friends...

Was a fun trip,... there were lots of 2nd graders running all over the place, with many parents tagging along. Was grateful for nice weather as well.

Brian's 18th & Nightwish, May 6th 2009

May brought all sorts of fun. Brian turned 18 yrs old,... we went to see Nightwish in Louisville,... we had end of school year activities/trips etc.... *phew* May was for sure a busy busy month!!! MONTHS ahead of time, we bought VIP Tickets to see Nightwish. VIP??? Yup, we were granted a meet and greet with the band, where we could get autographs, drool and just make fools of ourselves in front of them. On with the show..... May 6th, 2009 Brian's 18th Birthday & Nightwish Concert

Happy 18th Birthday Brian!!!!
Relaxin in the hotel room before the concert

Chris checking status of the venue before we head out to the show

Standing in line at the meet and greet... Marco Hietala, Emppu Vuorinen, Anette Olzon, Jukka Nevalainen (you can't see him) and Tuomas Holopainen

Tuomas

Marco & I :o)

I got a TON of amazing shots of the band playing,.... it really was a great time,.... I'm going to post the slide show of the event here,.... I figure that would be tons easier than posting a bunch of pics, you can click on "View All Images" and it brings up the slide show larger view... ENJOY!!!

Sweetheart Pageant

Our sweet, and shy Sydney entered the Sweetheart Pageant hosted by the local Kiwanis.

We went through the pains and labors of finding the perfect gown, and shoes and teaching her how to walk, and all that fun stuff. Aunt Teresa came over and took many pictures of her that day.... she had her hair done at the salon in town. Heather did a gorgeous job on her hair and make up!!!

Here are some pictures of that,...

This is Sydney when we were trying on different gowns,... this was the keeper!!

Here she is after having her hair and make up all done up!! Gorgeous dahling!!!

The poor girl was so nervous,... she didn't have a hair in her face, yet she had the nervous habit of moving it out of her face anyhow.... but gosh she looks so beautiful!!! I had tears in my eyes watching her.

Daughter and Daddy

The final contestant line up and awards

While she didn't win, we were very proud of her for trying. This was her first pageant, and she hopes to do another one. Especially now that she knows what to expect :o)

Sydney, our very own Princess

January 2009

Hmm... I don't really recall much of the beginning of January,... think it was all pretty normal. Until our weather turned to major crap.

I know we had a snowfall early/mid January... at least pretty sure. As the kids got lucky and got to leave school early :o) Yup yup, the love that!!!!

Here are a few pictures of our yard....

These three shots are sorta panoramic view,... as you can tell, it seems our yard is the only one with snow on it LOL Go figure.....

Xena decided to find a spot outside of the snow to potty

Later in January,... we had one heck of a storm. So much ice that we were without power for about 5 days. Thanks to Nucor and their assistance, we did manage to get a generator.

Stupidly, I didn't take any pictures of that storm and it's aftermath. I did find a blog HERE though that shows many pictures, it really was incredible and suck ass. I've never seen such a mess.

Everything around us was out, no power for ATM machines, grocery stores, ... I could go on and on and on. We were seriously without power for I think 3 days.... we're debit card users,... and because our bank is local,... nothing was updating,.. we couldn't get money out!!! Thankfully, we had a stash of cash (thanks to Brian and his job) so Chris and Brian headed out on my 40th Birthday, and went into West Memphis area to see if they could scrounge up some food. They returned with the most awesome Birthday cake :o) One of those icecream cakes. Let me tell you,.. I ate on that for breakfast lunch and dinner :o)

At this point, we were using the grill and the fish fryer to cook on. We had soup, and grilled cheese, we had grilled spaghetti LOL You find out how resourceful you can be in times like this. When we got our generator, it was like a Godsend. We were using our propane fireplace for heat,... so all of us were huddled in the living room to sleep, read, etc.

With the generator, we were able to pull all our food out of the coolers and run the fridge again,... we had lights in the evenings before bedtime,... we even had TV and COMPUTER!!!! I was having some major withdrawals from my PSP group.

Yeah,... it was a week I'd rather not relive,... but at least if it DOES have to happen again, we've got a generator ready and waiting for us.

Christmas 2008

This picture here, should've been posted on Mom's birthday post,.... she busily baked several pies for Christmas,... Mmmm they were soooo good!!!!! I also got several kitchen gadgets outta the deal too LOL That handy dandy little pastry cutter??? yeah.... I own it.

Christmas Morning 2008

Sadly I waited far too long to post all this,.... hard to recall what time we were all up and what not. I know I felt like a kid again, having my mom here :o) Seems like I was up fairly early.