The Perfect Weekend

The only thing that could make a weekend like this past one better would be an extra day off, which is exactly what I am currently enjoying...thank you random state holiday. A relaxing morning with coffee in hand and exhausted pups snuggling up to me? Yes please, can I have another?

It doesn't get much better than this!

Our weekend had something for everyone and we took full advantage of it. We kicked off our Friday night cooking out with the neighbors. Saturday morning brought a nice round of thunderstorms aka the best sleeping weather known to man, and we did just that. We finally started moving around 9, which is super late for us and cooked ourselves a huge breakfast.  Since the rain came through early Saturday turned out to be a pretty nice day.  Eric headed up to the lake to fish for a bit and I was able to get a nice long walk in with the boys an planted more pretties in the yard. I went to get some marigolds to put near my tomato plants and a few other plants jumped into my cart....I can't help it!

One of my new Fushia plants....they are gorgeous! 

We finished up our Saturday night cooking out with some friends. Sunday was a Sunday Funday for sure as we headed up to the lake with our neighbors. We couldn't have asked for a prettier day and we soaked up every bit of sun we could hanging out on the pier with the most beautiful view.

We took the boys with us and they wore themselves out swimming and playing with the other dogs that were there. I confirmed that they both have severe separation anxiety because we tried putting them in a fence about 100 yards and within view of us....Hawk opened the gate and let all the dogs out so we took him out and when Peanut was in it he stood at the gate whining and barking and trying to pull the gate open. Needless to say, they got to chill on the floating pier with us all afternoon.

This green house across the slew was the topic of conversation for quite a while. It was gorgeous (from the outside) and it took everything we had not to walk over there and ask for a tour of the inside.  I've decided that it would be the perfect lake home someday. I can imagine sitting out of the balcony on the second floor every morning drinking coffee and watching the lake....sigh...someday.

FRESH frind crappie, homemade hushpuppies, potato salad and fries....I can resist most fried foods but this meal?  I just can't say no, especially those hushpuppies!

We fried up some fish and hushpuppies for dinner and I couldn't help but smile at how perfect it was. We caped off our weekend with Dairy Queen and Pup Cup for each of the boys. They loved them! I don't think I've ever seen them eat anything faster.   I really hope that this weekend was a preview of what our summer is going to be like because if that's the case I can't wait!

Last but certainly not least I want to wish a very Happy Birthday to a very special guy...my Dad!

I hope you have the most wonderful birthday.....I love you!

Our Backyard Garden

I may have been raised in the suburbs but I actually have some country roots.  Since Dad is from a small town in Arkansas and mom grew up way out in the country in Indiana, I guess it was just a matter of time before I started embracing the country lifestyle.  We live in a small town and although we live in a neighborhood, everyone has large lots and plenty of space. I consider us to have the best of both worlds with our living situation.

I've been talking about planting a vegetable garden for a few years, and during that time have manged to cover nearly the entire back patio with pots full of various plants. As my container collection has grown so has Eric's desire for them to be moved elsewhere. I always countered with the suggestion to put in a garden, but that never went anywhere. That is until a couple of weeks ago. We were sitting on the back porch and Eric mentioned that he would like to put a table and chairs on the slab by the grill.  I said we'd have to find a place for my plants before we did that and we had a breakthrough!  We started talking about all of the veggies we could plant in it and how we could have fresh squash and zucchini and beans all summer, how we could make fresh salsa and pico de gallo with tomatoes and peppers, etc., and the next thing I knew we were deciding where to put it in our yard!

Since last weekend was nuts for us with me having my final dance competition of the year, plus a baby shower, and Eric's Dad's birthday we had to wait until this past weekend but it worked out perfectly because Home Depot had a Spring Black Friday sale and all of the Bonnie Plants were just $2! I made 2 separate trips last week to pick out what I wanted to grow. Eric asked for squash and butter beans (lima beans) but said the rest was up to me so I went to town...of course...and ended up with a nice variety of little plants.

Everything you see here was transplanted or will be transplanted very soon.  The only thing that didn't make it in this weekend were the beans.  They are in the orange pots and I am waiting for them to sprout before I put them in the garden.

As soon as he got home Saturday from fishing started digging up the yard and not 5 minutes later I had my garden!  I can only imagine how long it would have taken to dig it up with out that tractor....digging it with the tractor took no time at all.

He had plenty of supervision.

...and his part was done.

I only wish the planting had gone as quickly. It really wasn't so bad.  It took me about 3 hours to get everything transplanted, but it was a nice day so I really didn't mind. And now comes the hard part. The waiting.  I gave myself a head start by not using seeds for almost everything, so I cut 2-3 weeks off the wait time, but it will be at least a month and a half and probably longer before everything will be ready. And then we will have so much food I'll be giving it away.

Now I just have to figure out how to convince Hawk and Peanut that this is not in fact their very own dirt pit to play in. My little digger has taken a liking to the freshly tilled dirt.

Gettin' Springy with It

Hello again old friends.  It's been a minute or two or several tens of thousands since I've been around these parts [again]. Life decided to get crazy busy on me all of a sudden and for a while there I just kind of felt like I was along for the ride.  I didn't even have to teach dance last week and thank goodness because I had 150,000 other things keeping me occupied. Every day before I leave work I try write a to-do list for the next day and every day last week my to-do list multiplied even with me checking things off as I went.  Let's just say that this weekend was right on time. Since it's been monsooning for the past week around these parts we didn't have too high of hopes for the weekend.  We stayed in on Friday night, grilled steaks, and called it a night pretty early because well fishing season, nuff said. We were afraid Saturday was going to be a wash as well, but even though the sun never really came out, the rain held off and we were able to embark on our newest adventure......

Yep. We now have our very own vegetable/fruit/herb garden and I am stoked! But more on that tomorrow.  I spent most of my Saturday planting all of my baby plants. By the time I was done I was beat, but those puppies looked at me with their sweet faces and practically begged me to take them on a walk so naturally I obliged. We finished off our Saturday with a crawfish boil at some friends house, along with some of the worst pool playing I've ever seen. One game had went nearly 2 rounds of trying to hit the 8 ball in at the end....and they were playing doubles. Poor Eric ended up with a headache from laughing so hard. After a rainy start to Sunday we ended up having a beautiful afternoon.  We churched, took a trip to Bass Pro for some shopping (well Eric shopped) and some lunch (what I went along for). We spent the afternoon enjoying the sunshine. I think spring has officially sprung in Alabama and it feels great!

Some of my flowerbed pretties!

Quite possibly my most favorite little pops of color in our yard.

These two can talk me into a rainy walk any day...and they usually do. 

Oh and thepool cover came off this weekend, too!  It won't be long before we're taking a dip! (after it's cleaned of course)

Spring Break (the actual Part 2)

Can you tell that I finished writing my post yesterday, slapped a title on it and hit publish? Note to self: proofreading is very important. You'd think a former high school yearbook editor would be a little more diligent about checking things like the title, right?  Apparently not. So anywho, are you ready for the actual part 2 of our Spring Break? Good....great...fantastic!  Let's go.

After the awesome weekend we'd had, we decided by Wednesday that we'd had enough work for the week and headed south that afternoon, arriving in Fort Morgan, AL just in time for dinner with my aunt, uncle, and cousin.  The next day and a half were filled with sunshine, pool time, walks on the beach, and of course several games of Celebrity and Left Right Center (two of our favorite games in the whole wide world). To say we had a great time is an understatement!  We had an absolute blast!

The view...it doesn't get much prettier than this!

I decided it was time I took some pictures of something other than Hawk and Peanut for a change so I took a walk down the beach and practiced my photo taking skills played with my camera.

 Awesome pic of my cousin jumping off the railing.  

Have I ever mentioned how much I love this guy? Because I do!

Unfortunately my family had to leave on Friday morning and we weren't ready for our vacation to be over so we drove 30 miles west and spent the rest of the weekend with Eric's brother, his wife, and our adorably cute nephew.

We stopped for breakfast on our way to Orange Beach Friday morning at Hazel's. Eric has told me about how good their breakfast buffet is ever since I've been going to the beach with him (so nearly 10 years). So we finally stopped in and had a delicious home-cooked breakfast.  

 I mean is this kid seriously the cutest or what?!  And my uberly talented SIL made his bib.  She's awesome. 

 What's a trip to the beach without fresh seafood?  Since the boys didn't get to fish in the open water like they wanted to, we went in search of fresh seafood for lunch one day.  We ended up at The Gulf. It's a really neat restaurant right on the beach.  The entire restaurant is made up of blue and white storage containers.  You order at the window and sit at picnic tables right on the beach.  It's so neat and the food is amazing.  This was my Fried Grouper Sandwich that was gone in about 2 minutes. I seriously could have drank the lemon dill sauce that came on it.

And don't forget the impromptu photoshoot on the beach! We drove over to Pensacola (we literally covered the entire Baldwin County portion of the Alabama Gulf Coast this trip) to have dinner with the boys' aunt and uncle on Friday night so we had to stop and take a few snapshots with Little Man.  Maybe next time we'll be able to get the boys to agree to get in the photos with us. Unlikely, but we can still dream, right?

We ended the weekend with some outlet mall shopping (got some great deals on shorts and some new running shoes!) and a crawfish boil with some friends who were down there for spring break.  We headed home on Sunday completely refreshed. I am sure that will last all of a week or so before we'll be itching to go back down!

Spring Breaking Part 2

After a wonderful week of family and fun I can say I am definitely refreshed. I may not be a teacher or be in school anymore but I still crave a get-a-way toward the end of March when it starts to get warm and you start to see green buds on the trees and flowers. And somehow it always seems to work out so that we can squeeze in a little R&R this time of year (according to Timehop anyway). This past week was actually so full of goodness that I am going to have to break this up into a couple of posts.

A few snapshots of the fun we had last weekend!

Let's start all the way back with LAST weekend.  We started off deliciously with fish tacos a la Eric for dinner. I am sure this is going to happen again because they were amazing.  We took it easy on Friday night because Saturday was jam packed. We were both up early to go visit his Dad.  He was in the hospital for another staph infection.  It seems like every time he gets better, he has something else pop up. He is doing better but still needs lots of prayers for a complete recovery. We went our separate ways after the visit.  Eric came home to do some fishing and I headed downtown for a dance competition. This one was extra special because a very special person was in the audience to watch our girls....my Mom! She drove in to meet me and spent the whole day with me watching.  She's a saint I tell ya! The girls did great!  We had several Platinums and all but 2 of our dances won overall awards!  It was a very successful competition.

As soon as our girls finished the last of their group numbers I grabbed my bag and flew (well drove) home as fast as I could (mom came too) because we had some very special guests arriving for the night.  My aunt and uncle and one of my cousins from Chicago were on their way down to the beach for spring break and spent the night with us on their way down. We cooked out (of course) and caught up on everything under the sun. They headed on to the beach the next morning to get their vacation started. Mom and I pudded around the house and then decided we needed to do some shopping, so we went to Ollie's Bargain Outlet. She went to one a few weeks ago in IN and realized there was one close to me so we went to check it out.  We got some amazing deals, my favorite of which is my Roto Tiller. I have found myself going to buy flowers to plant just so I can use it.  It's great!

You'd think that was the end of our super fun weekend, right?  Wrong!  We finished up our weekend with a choir concert.  But not just any choir concert....my other cousin from Chicago's church choir was on a spring break choir tour and just happened to be singing at a church in our teeny tiny town hence the reason she was not with her parents the night before. Crazy right? The concert was great and the best part was getting to see her for a little while afterward.

Like I said, weekends with family are certainly some of my favorites and the best part it this was not even the end of it.  I did have to work a couple of days the next week but we headed south for part 2 of our week and the good times just kept coming.  But this post is already a tad bit long so we'll save it for tomorrow.