2014 In Review

The time has come for another annual recap.  I can't believe how fast this year has gone by; I feel like I've just gotten used to writing 2014 on everything and now I have to change again!

I started out 2014 in survival mode which sounds terrible but it was so true.  We had a killer basketball schedule with tied me up 4 out of the first 5 weekends of 2014 with back to back Friday/Saturday games.  But we did manage to slip in some fun. Eric turned 30 and since I was tied up with basketball I sent him to Las Vegas for a weekend of shenanigans with his best friend.  While he was gone Mom came and stayed with me for the weekend and we made my quilt rack for the beautiful quilts my aunt and great-grandmother made.

February was a lot more fun for us with a 3 days snow/ice in thanks to the polar vortex that brought a beautiful blanket of snow to the south.  We rang in my last year in my twenties by heading to Steamboat Springs, Colorado [part 1, part 2, part 3] for a few days of fun playing in the snow with our friends.

In March I got to take a business trip to Arkansas which meant I got to spend the weekend prior in Memphis and even took a trip over to Waldron to visit my grandmother.  The end of March was a wedding whirlwind as one of my good friends finally tied the knot.

In April we got to take in an Auburn baseball game and watch 2 of our hometown kids who are best friends square off against eachother and ended the month with the first of many beach trips we took this year.

We kicked May off with our Dance Recital, which is always one of my favorite weeks of the year and my BIL and SIL announced they were expecting (though we'd known for a few months but I was so excited I could finally start talking about the arrival of our nephew)!  We finished off the month of May with a relaxing Memorial Day weekend with my parents in Destin.

I need that tan back stat!

I stayed on the road in June heading to Memphis to perform in my old dance studio's 50th recital, and then got to spend a few days in our Nation's Capitol for a work conference.  It was my first trip to DC so I did as much as I possibly could in our spare time! We also celebrated Peanut's 7th birthday. However, June ended on a not so happy note as our Hollow puppy went missing.  I am holding out hope that he found a new family to love him.

We celebrated the 4th of July at the beach with my BIL and SIL and the boys' cousins and did some serious blueberry pickin which yielded some delicious treats! We finished up the month with a 4th Anniversary trip up north to spend sometime in my childhood hometown with my grandparents and some time in Chicago with my Aunt, Uncle, and cousins which included a surprise appearance of my brother and a bike race.

August brought the beginning of another football season and the end of our major travels for the year, but we ended it on a high note by hosting a Baby Shower for my BIL, SIL and soon-arriving nephew! We also celebrated Hawk's 7th birthday with peanut butter milkshakes from Diary Queen (his favorite).

September brought a low-key Labor Day on the river with just Eric, myself, and our river dogs since football was in full swing at this point. We ended the month with a fun weekend at the Yokohoma Tire LPGA Championship with my parents.

We kicked off October with Homecoming at Huntingdon which is always one of my favorite weekends of the year since we get to see all of our college friends. This October marked my first October in 3 years not coaching which was a little bittersweet, but mostly sweet. =)  I still got to play in the Lady Hawks Alumni Game with is always a blast.  However, the best part of the month was the arrival our nephew, Wyatt!

November was full of family time for us: getting to meet Wyatt for the first time, spending several fun but very cold Friday night with our football family, and hosting Thanksgiving again this year for both of our families.  I also moved in to my new office...with a window...and a door.  It's the little things I tell ya!

This brings us to December.  The family theme continued, although for difference reasons with Eric's Dad and Aunt both being in the hospital.  It was stressful, but it really brought this family together more than I have ever seen in the time that I have known them.  They both improved enough for us to get away to Memphis for a few days to see my family for Christmas and we finished off Christmas with his family.

I know I say this every year but it really does blow my mind when I sit down to write my year-in-review post because I can't believe everything we pack into one year's time. This year certainly turned out to be a trying one at times for us, but overall it was a wonderful year.

Looking ahead to 2015, it's going to be hard to top.  With it being my 30th year I am expecting BIG things!  Cheers to to 2015!

Christmas Recap Part 2

Look out world...back to back posts and 3 posts in 4 days.  Say wha??? I'm on a roll!

Where were we on the Christmas recap?  Oh yes, on our way back to Bama on Christmas Eve.  We made it back in time to see Eric's brother, his wife, and our nephew before they headed up north for a few days. We did Christmas with them and then Eric actually had to run a call so someone could have a working stove on Christmas...have I mentioned how sweet he is?  Did he have to drive to Montgomery Christmas Eve afternoon? No but he did.

Our Christmas Eve dinner was pretty fancy if I say to myself.  I mean BBQ nachos are like the creme de la creme right? Ok maybe not, but they are certainly one of our favorites and that's what the holidays are all about amiright? We finished off the evening with only the best Christmas movie ever made..."You'll shoot your eye our kid!"

As I mentioned a few days ago, Santa made it to our house and boy did he do well this year!  I am still in love with my new camera and Eric racked up on hunting gear.

You know you love your Christmas gift when you have a hint of crazy in your smile...don't mind me. =)

After another viewing of A Christmas Story (thank goodness for the 24 marathon on TBS!) we headed to his Mom's house for Christmas #3 and a delicious French Toast and mimosa brunch.  We left there and headed up to the hospital to see his Dad for our fourth and final Christmas in 3 days. His Dad is doing so much better.  They have moved him to a rehab floor for a couple of weeks to regain his strength before they send him back home.  Thank you for all of the prayers.  They have worked!

We got his Mom some Carpenters piano books for Christmas and she serenaded us after we were done opening presents.

We decided that we would cook Christmas Dinner and invite everyone over since we hadn't hosted a meal yet, so Eric smoked a Boston Butt and some ribs with some of the Makers Mark 46 barrel wood my parents gave him for Christmas.  I can't even begin to explain how amazing and delicious that wood made dinner taste.  I tried out a new coleslaw recipe I'll be sharing next week and threw together a delicious tater salad.  After we stuffed ourselves silly (again) we settled down for our 3rd viewing of A Christmas Story before we drifted off to sleep.

Want to know what the best part was?  Since Christmas was on Thursday we still had 3 days left to play!  Eric made the most of his time fishing and hunting, while I busied myself with my camera, a little after Christmas shopping, and an impromptu de-Christmasing of the house....which I am totally ok with now.  In fact I'm so glad I did it then and don't have it still looming over my head!

Christmas Recap Part 1

On the Saturday before Christmas we decided that Eric's dad was improving enough for us to leave town for a few days to spend some time with my family for Christmas. Since Eric had a few things to wrap up Saturday afternoon, we decided to leave early Sunday morning which left us free to attend the 3rd Annual Tacky Christmas Sweater Party. It was an interesting evening of tacky sweaters, drinks, fun, and general craziness that ensues with our crowd.  But this party also had Santa Claus, two of them actually.  One was my husband and the other was his best friend.  They were channeling more of the Bad Santa character than the Santa most of us know.  Somewhere along the way we came to the decision that everyone who came into the party had to get their picture taken with the Santas.  They set up two chairs right by the door and made sure everyone took a picture with them.  It was hilarious and horrifying at the same time.

We're a motly crew.

I'd like to think that peoples' reactions to the Santas was indicative of their feelings toward Santa as children.  Some were happy to pose with them while others looked slightly terrified. 

We called it a night as soon as Dirty Santa ended because we were up and on the road bright and early the next morning to Memphis!

We had no choice but to take the truck because there's no way all of this stuff would have fit in my car!

 For the second time in 24 hours I got to don my homemade light up reindeer sweatshirt as we competed in the Ugly Sweater 5K. It was a blast!  I was just glad that despite the fact I had not run since daylight savings changed back in November I was able to run the entire race.  They weren't keeping track of places but Eric said they were calling them out to the early finishers.  He finished 28th and we started in the 3rd heat! He didn't have a tracking app going to time himself, but I finished in 29:51 and I know he beat me by at least 5 minutes. As soon as we finished, we headed over to claim our reward....free beer! I can't think of a better reward for running!

The fam jam ready to run!

Pretty typical =)

Enjoying our post-race reward!

The remainder of our trip consisted of Christmas, family time, games, and a trip downtown to see the Peabody Ducks and eat at Rendezvous...of course.

Clockwise from top left: The Peabody Ducks waddling to the elevator to go home for the night; The Rendezvous and the Peabody in downtown Memphis; Our "Christmas Morning" breakfast was Gibson's Donuts including their Maple Bacon donut; we played several games over the course of a few days inlcuding Mexican Train which is probably the only domino game I know how to play.

.....and we did all of this before Christmas Eve!

Why?  Because we were up and on the road again Christmas Eve morning for Rounds 2, 3 and 4 back in Alabama, but we'll save that for another day.

Christmas Pre-Recap

I did something I have never done in my life last night....I took down our Christmas Tree and started to de-Christmas our house on my own free will.  I tend to leave our tree up way longer than it needs to be up most years. Usually until Eric gets tired of walking around it and tells me I should have cleaned it up by now, but I got a wild hair yesterday afternoon while he was hunting and decided to take it down.  I was quite proud of myself until a little while later when I realized I missed having it up. I know it was going to have to come down eventually, but maybe I jumped the gun a little too soon. I still have our wreaths and sconces and Christmas cards up but no tree and no nutcrackers. I know I will be happy I did it next week when I'm not cleaning up pine needles for the umpteenth time, but for now I'm just going to have to settle for the pictures.  It really was a beautiful tree...

Perhaps the rush to take the tree down was just a continuation of our rushed holiday season this year. It has been so crazy with Eric's dad being sick, family in town, visiting family out of town, plus oh yeah-everything else we normally do, I feel like I've been running a race.  The past 2 days have been quite a slow down for us now that Christmas has come and gone.  I know things are going to pick back up sooner rather than later, but these few extra days we've had to sit back and relax have been wonderful, especially since both of us have developed cough that has become quite the royal pain in the you-know-what.  We took advantage of our free time and had date night to the movies to see Unbroken.  I highly recommend it!

Plus we got to use our re-fillable popcorn bucket and sat in the biggest movie theater I've ever been in!

Since neither of us has had to work we've had to find other ways to occupy ourselves. Eric has fished and hunted to his little heart's content, despite the rain we've had for 24 hours and counting. Aside from regretfully de-Christmasing our house, I have been playing with my Christmas present from Eric....

Oh yes, that would be my brand spankin new Canon Rebel T5 in my hands here.  So I guess this means I no longer have an excuse for less than stellar pics on here anymore right?  I am loving my new camera so far! I don't know that Eric thought it all the way through because he got tired of me snapping pics of him very quickly in the car yesterday afternoon.  I can only take so many pictures of the dogs and I have several of them already....but they sure are cute!

My mom got the stuffed pig in the above picture for Peanut for Christmas and he totes that silly thing around like a baby doll.  Amazingly he has yet to attempt to shred it, which might be a new record in this house.

I'll be back this week with a full Christmas recap which will probably take several posts.  Our Christmas week included a Christmas party, an Ugly Sweater 5K, Christmas in Memphis, Christmas in Alabama, and a BBQ Christmas Dinner that was delicious!