Mother's Day

Our church does a Mother/Son banquet on leap years, instead of the regular Mother/Daughter fellowships. Here are some pictures I took that night. It was a lot of fun and great food, too!

Ryan, Tammy, Nancy, & DrewOur crazy table
Me and TJ
Johnny, TJ, Joey, Andre throwing around a football afterwards. They ended up getting it stuck (nice throw, Johnny) on the roof, so went inside after this and played ball in the gym. haha
I'm not sure if they ever did tell Pastor Mike what happened to the ball. Sunday afternoon, decorations by Sam...the flowers were from Theron and the kids

Me and my brood! I am so thankful to God for my kids. They are truly blessings to me. I can't believe how old they are all getting! Time sure flies when you are having fun.

Theron asked me where I wanted to eat for Mother's Day, and I asked if he'd grill steaks and vegies on the grill for me at home. I don't like going out on Mother's Day as the restaurants are way too crowded, and besides, Theron's steaks are awesome! He is a wonderful husband, and such a great dad to our kids. I am truly blessed. God is so good!

Brian and SanDee

Another neat God hug was getting to spend Friday morning with Brian and SanDee in Gainesville. I started missing Brian and SanDee after spending the evening with my aunt and Grandma and cousins, so when we got back to our hotel I called Brian and SanDee. Long story short...they were on their way to Sarasota to see Grandma and spend the week there. I asked them if they were going to be anywhere near Gainesville to call me so that we could try to meet up. The next morning, we didn't hear from them, and then we overslept. They called us just before we were getting ready to leave. They were about 20 minutes north of our exit. We told them we'd meet them at Cracker Barrel. We were so thrilled to see them, as we hadn't seen them in about 3 or 4 years. We even got to meet our nephew dog, Mogley. :) It turned out I was the only sibling not present at the reunion with Grandma in Sarasota, so it was a neat bonus to see Brian and SanDee before we headed home. It has been years since all 5 siblings were together, so I'm hoping that we'll get to do that again soon. Brian and SanDee live about a mile from Dad and Nessa now (they just moved this week), so that might happen more often. Lisa and I will just have to coordinate our trips there.

Theron and Chrissy with Briand and SanDee in Cracker Barrel

Chrissy with Brian, Mogley, SanDee and Theron after breakfast

Me and Brian and SanDee and Mogley saying goodbye. Oh, and another neat thing...as we were walking out of the restaurant, Dottie, Tommy and Aunt Edith spotted Brian and SanDee! We got to see them for a few minutes before leaving. We had been sitting on the other side of the wall and never saw each other. :)

Grandma in Gainesville

My cousin's son lives in Gainesville. My Grandma Dorothy, Aunt Edith and Dottie live in Quincy, Illinois. I hadn't seen Grandma in about 6 years and Aunt Edith and Dottie for about 12. I can't even remember the last time I had seen Tommy. So, they were all down in Florida to see Tommy and then were headed further south to Sarasota to see my dad and sisters and their families. There were going to be in Sarasota on the 10th, but since Mother's Day was on the 11th, I couldn't make it to Sarasota for that reunion. My other 3 kids were in Virginia, and I just couldn't miss Mother's Day with them. Also, TJ and I had a Mother/Son banquet to go to on Saturday at our church. Well, since we couldn't join them in Sarasota I asked my aunt and Grandma if I could horn in on their time with Tommy and spend time with them in Gainesville. Dottie even had a wonderful dinner prepared for us when we arrived. We all cried as we were hugging hello. I vowed not to ever wait that long to see them again. It was such a neat blessing that we were able to spend time together. We had such a good time laughing and reminiscing on old times. By the way, this is my mom's mom and my mom's little sister. :) Lining up to eat dinner.
Me and Theron with Aunt Edith and Grandma (she is 93)
Aunt Edith with Grandma and Chrissy
Dottie, Tommy and Theron
Aunt Edith, me and Grandma

YEAH Freedom

Sorry it took so long to update. I'm watching National Treasure 2 with Theron and Sam, so decided to take this time to update while I'm sitting still. Chrissy's last day was May 7th. Theron had to go early in order to be able to park near the dorm, as it was Graduation and pretty packed on campus. So, I was a martyr and said I'd stay behind at the condo and lay out and read on the beach. I know, I know, I am just too giving. haha While they were gone, I decorated the condo. The next day we left the beach and headed to Gainesville to see my Grandma, Aunt and cousins. The next post is that visit. :)Here is Chrissy as she walked in from school. YEAH, no more dorms and no more living by the bells for a few months! :) We are so excited to have her back home for a bit. It is neat to watch and wait and see how God is going to use her. Oh, and by the way, she had an A average...all A's and one B+ on her final report card!! I decorated the condo using stuff we had bought at Walmart earlier. I used the napkins since I didn't have a banner. The napkins have writing on them that says "YEAH, for Freedom" . haha
Here is the rest of the condo decorated..that's the front door.

This is the kitchen & dining area. This condo is much smaller than the one we use at Thanksgiving, but we didn't need as much room for the two of us...then the last night, Chrissy was there and slept on the couch. She could hear the ocean all night, lucky girl.After they got back from the school, Chrissy and I went down to the beach for the afternoon. Theron was in the condo on the phone (working). We took a walk and I took tons of pictures of the ocean. The surf had really kicked up and was so neat to hear and see.
This is a picture I took of Chrissy on the beach. She made me crop it, so this is all you see! Her bathing suit is very modest, of course, but she doesn't want me posting it on the web. :)

Eaten by a Shark??

This is why Theron is so glad my sisters don't live in Fredericksburg. haha This was taken at the Shell Factory when I visited my sister, Vanessa, in March. Sam was mortified, but I figured I'd never see anyone there again. haha They also had a big camel you could sit on for pictures, but Samantha put her foot down and refused to allow me to do that. :O

From Florida to a Flood

Well, on Sunday night after church, our basement flooded from our sump pump overflowing. Chrissy went downstairs around 10 p.m. and yelled for us to come down. Mary took pictures of the basement while we were trying to salvage stuff on Sunday night, so I'll post those later. Anyway, it was ankle deep all throughout the basement. Our Foosball and air hockey tables are ruined, so Theron has already hauled them away. :( We think the drywall may need to be replaced, too, as the water seeped up into it in some places. Theron worked all day long yesterday ripping up the carpet and padding as it was starting to stink pretty badly. We are using the dehumidifier and fans down there constantly to keep the mildew away. I wanted to repaint the basement, but sure didn't plan on this extensive of a reorganization right now. My library and dining room as well as garage are filled with "stuff" now! EEK! Calgon, take me away! At least I am getting rid of lots of junk and throwing away anything that got

ruined by the water. We still haven't heard from our insurance company, but I'm sure the tornado victims from last week have bigger needs than we do right now. Hopefully we'll hear from them tomorrow.

Baptist Church on the Beach

This is the Romar Baptist Church. Their original building was demolished by a hurricane a few years ago. Their site shows that they have a youth camp site at this building for youth groups to come and "camp out". Pretty neat!! I believe from reading their site that they are Southern Baptist, but I told Theron I think he is being led to be their associate pastor and have them become Independent Baptists. haha For some reason, he doesn't believe me!! I guess that's because a few years ago, I told him he was being called to be a pastor on Sanibel Island, FL. Oh, well, I'd not be happy away from Temple Baptist anyway! That's where all of our church family is. You can't ask for a better pastor than Pastor Reid!! Here is Romar Beach Baptist's site. They have pictures of what the hurricane did to their old building. This church was down the beach from our condo. I would have loved to see inside, but they didn't have Wed night services...they had Thursday services and we left there today (on Thurs morning). I told Theron they should put the parsonage on the top floor like a penthouse suite. That would be neat!

http://www.romarbeach.org/index.htmlhttp://www.romarbeach.org/index.html

Date Day

Here is the view from our condo on Orange Beach, AL. Theron and I arrived there on Sunday, May 4th. On Monday, I headed to the beach for a couple of hours. Theron met me at the pool for a bit, then we changed out of our suits and went on a date. We played Putt Putt at Adventure Island then played in the arcade awhile. Headed deeper into Alabama and had dinner at the Oyster Bar...and shopped a bit. :) It was an awesome day. We ended it with a walk down the beach. I'll post some of those pictures in the next post. Anyway, it was a perfect day all around. He's an awesome husband, as he planned this for me, and he doesn't even like the beach much. My view as sat on the beach. The water was very calm.

Theron in the Volcano at Adventure Island
Theron after making a hole in one.
Me, after making my SECOND hole in one!! :)
Theron and me on the 18th hole.


Me, trying to hide my fat gut in the bushes. haha

Hello from Florida, well, and Alabama

Hi, Theron and I are on Orange Beach, AL for a few days. We stopped by PCC to see Chrissy yesterday, and to give her a few totes to start packing!! We are staying in a condo on Orange Beach, and it is beautiful. Today was an awesome day. I forgot my camera up in the room, so I'll have to load the pictures later and put them on the blog. I went to the beach (our condo is right on the beach, so I didn't have far to walk) for a few hours then met Theron at the pool. After lunch, we headed over to Adventure Island and played mini golf and in the arcade. I got two holes in one, by the way!! Theron did get one, too. :) We shopped and ate out for dinner and then headed back to the condo and walked down the beach to see a beautiful Baptist church being built right on the beach. It is really neat! Anyway, I'll post pictures later...probably tomorrow.
We saw Chrissy briefly yesterday, and she looks great! She is so excited about coming home. She called today and was so ecstatic about being officially done with her freshman year of college. She had just taken her last "final" exam! So far she's gotten all A's and one B on them. She'll find out the final 3 tonight.
Also, on a more serious note, please pray for Johnny as he'll be in the hospital this week for his methatrexate (sp?) treatment. This one is usually especially rough on him. I talked with Darlene today and he'll go in tomorrow (Tues) morning. Usually he's done by Thurs or Fri.
Thanks for your prayers on their behalf. He is an awesome young man.