The Many Talents of Matt

Well, actually just two talents in this post.....singing and golfing. First the singing, which doesn't really rise to the level of a "talent" yet. Matt loves letters and "counts" them all the time. He learned the ABC song and it has become one of his favorite songs. He's started putting a little something extra in the big finish. I think he's been watching McKenzie a little too much.


Now, for his true love.......golf. Matt loves anything ball related and his obsession right now is golf. He loves to watch it on TV and he loves to play it. Nana and Grand gave him a real set of clubs for Christmas and he has really enjoyed them. He will stay out in the front yard and hit balls for hours until his head is wringing wet. Watch his followthrough.....when Betty gave him a bath tonight she noticed a long thin bruise on his back. He had swung so much and so hard that he bruised his back with the club! He is so focused when he's playing that he doesn't even notice pain as you might remember (scroll down to the golf section).

Show Us Where You Live--Master Bedroom

This weekend, I'm joining in on the house tour over at Kelly's and this weekend's tour is master bedrooms. Kelly has been doing a different room of the house each Friday. It's fun to look at everybody's houses and get ideas, too. So here we go...


My walls are painted a taupe color. David bought me this new bedroom furniture last year. I love my sleigh bed and since the headboard comes up so high, I didn't think any art above the bed was necessary. I have had the same bedding for a few years,bought it from Pottery Barn. It is some sort of red paisley print. Last year, I bought my brown silk drapes from PB also. They are tie top drapes that I added to the woven shades I already had on the windows. I would love to change bedding soon, but I am going to keep the drapes. I have my eye on a lime green quilted coverlet and shams at Target, so maybe soon I can get that and another throw pillow to update the room. The end table is my grandmother's and I like the way it looks with the new furniture.



Next is a picture of our dresser. The lamps came from Fred's a few years ago. I just updated the frames with new 5x7 pictures David took of the kids in Orange Beach. This is our chest of drawers that also holds our tv and dvd player. Lastly is our baby portraits of McKenzie and Matt. I love these frames and how they look in our bedroom. So that is it for my tour...go here to see more master bedrooms. It's a great way to get ideas!

Happy 60th!

We would like to wish my uncle,Ward a very happy 60th birthday today. We hope it is a great day for you!

Fun Thursday and Visit with Luke

Today was a fun day for us. McKenzie had her eye dr. appt. in Jackson this morning so David took the day off and we headed to Jackson. It was good to get away for the day. McKenzie got a good report, so we don't go back until October and we don't have to do her drops anymore!!! We always take her to Target for a prize for always being such a big girl at the dr. She chose candy this time for her prize.

We then headed to David's favorite place Hamil's and let me just say that we ate tooooo much! Who, but David, takes a picture of his food? After lunch, we checked out the new Barnes and Noble in Madison. David and I have always loved to go there whenever we are out of town and now the kids love it, too. It just so happens that they were having a Fancy Nancy party over in the kids area and a bunch of little girls all dressed up for a tea party showed up for the story time. McKenzie enjoyed listening to the story.


Matt was having a blast over on the other side of the kids area with their Thomas the Train table........

.....that is, until a little girl came and invaded his turf......

She just didn't know how to play trains right! And Matt was afraid she was going to break everything!

Wednesday, Matt got to go over to Melba's house and play with his cousin, Luke, who happens to be the same age as Matt. Luke has been staying with his Mel and Papa while his mom had to go out of town. It was fun to watch Matt and Luke playing together. They really got along so well and share a love for Thomas the Train. Here are a few pictures I snapped with McKenzie's camera...

Dancing Queen

Saturday night was McKenzie's first dance recital. She did a great job and the whole show was really good. I wasn't sure what to expect since I've only been to one other dance recital, but it was Cassie's over ten years ago. It was very entertaining and well paced and Matt and I behaved ourselves very well. I'm sure Betty was wondering how we'd make it during two hours of dancing!

McKenzie was one of eight girls who won the Best Showmanship Award which was given to the students "who put on the best performance, has terrific stage presence, and is out to entertain the audience".

McKenzie's jazz class danced to "Do You Love Me".


Her ballet class danced to "My Girl".


Great job, McKenzie!!!!

Recital Time!

The time has finally come for McKenzie's first dance recital. She is very excited but admitted to me that she is a little nervous, too. She will have dress rehearsal on Friday night, so hopefully that will calm some of her fears before the big night. This week Ms. Reagan has been working the students pretty hard during final rehearsals. David and I are so proud of McKenzie. She was awarded "Perfect Practice Performer" at her rehearsal today. Ms. Reagan has been handing out trophies each day to the student as she says, who smiles, knows their dance, and does it real big for the stage. When I went to pick up McKenzie from practice, she was grinning from ear to ear. Here is a picture David took of her after rehearsal. Notice she isn't wearing her glasses. I guess she was dancing so hard she broke them! We will have to make a quick trip to Walmart tomorrow to get them fixed.

Happy (Early) Father's Day!

Part of my early Father's Day present was a trip to a Redbirds game with Matt and McKenzie. Betty almost made it to the game, but the pull of Target was too great. We dropped her off in Southaven at Target and let her wander around her Happy Place for three plus hours. Wait a minute! This day is shaping up a lot like Mother's Day did! How did SHE end up getting hours alone in her favorite place on earth??? She is good.......but I digress.

Anyway, the kids and I headed on into Memphis to the ball game.

Here's our traditional train shot. Matt really wasn't as sad as this picture looks. He was really quite excited.


We got inside the ball park and immediately headed to the BBQ Nachos stand. Matt is really developing a taste for these. He was talking about them while we walked from the car to the park.

Matt started asking for ice cream in the top of the 2nd inning......an inning or two sooner than usual. It was really, really HOT.


I was really glad McKenzie went to the game with us. She had a lot of fun, but she did say that next time she's going to Target with Mommy!


I took the kids to the games area and let them play the hitting game. Matt hit 4 of 5 balls into the holes and won a stuffed elephant. I played the "see-how-fast-you-can-throw-a-baseball" game.......which needs to be next to the Orthopedic Surgery Booth For Grown Men Who Want To See If They Can Still Throw A Baseball Fast. My arm hurt from my shoulder to my wrist after throwing three balls as hard as I could..........that's normal, right?

After the Redbirds got whipped, we picked Betty up at Target and went to Outback Steakhouse for supper. I had a nice steak for supper and peanut butter pie for desert. We had a wonderful day. Thanks Betty, McKenzie, and Matt!!!

Golfing Partners

I've been wanting to go out to The Dogwoods Golf Course for a long time now. I have never been until today. I used to play golf all the time in college (when it was free) but I haven't played in a long time. I told Andy last year that we needed to take off one day and go play golf. He replied, "Why would I want to do that?", so we haven't done that yet. Andy is pretty competitive and gets frustrated at golf like everybody does and doesn't see the sense in making yourself frustrated. Andy is fun to play golf with......he's hit a turtle, a goose, and a man who was standing a hole or two over from us.


Oh well, I may have a couple of golf partners I can play with now. I took Matt and McKenzie to the driving range Monday and hit some balls. They loved it! Matt started having a fit as soon as he could see the course. I told them as we were walking to the driving range to be quiet and McKenzie said, "Why? That's no fun!". We did have fun, though, and the kids hit the ball pretty well for the first time out. I did OK. I actually hit two or three straight! We will definitely go back out there and hit some more........and when I get brave enough I may even take them to play 9 holes one day.

Cummings Models

Saturday I took my niece, Cassie's, senior pictures. I can't believe she is about to be a senior! I can remember when she was a little five pound baby puking on Nana!

Cassie did great and had Jan and me rolling with laughter at times. At one location, there was a possibility of snakes in the area, but that didn't really seem to bother Cassie......the bugs and spiders, however, were another story. She would let out a blood-curdling scream whenever one would touch her!


We also had the dog who lived there and a stray cat who were both attracted to Cassie and wanted to get in the shot with her. They weren't fond of each other, though.


The rest of the session went smoothly. Here are a few more....

Click here to see some more pictures of Cassie.

McKenzie wanted me to take her to the lake Sunday after lunch and take some pictures of her. We had a great time taking pictures and just walking down a couple of trails at the lake.


McKenzie then had a great idea to go to Spencer's for some ice cream!


Click here to see some more pictures of McKenzie.

VBS

McKenzie went to Vacation Bible School this week at our church. The theme was the "Boomerang Express" and all things Australian. McKenzie even learned to say "G'day mate!". She had a really great time and loved the music. She would come home every day and play VBS each afternoon. She taught Matt to say "I love Jesus!". Here are a couple of grainy "Zapruder film" quality pictures I took with my phone at the VBS closing program Friday.

Mission Jerusalem

This summer the youth from our church will be having their Mission: Jerusalem Back Yard Bible Clubs in Grenada, June 22-25. They will have the Bible Clubs every morning and then do some kind of mission work in the afternoons. Then, on Thursday evening they will have a community cookout. Bro. Terry, the Minister of Students got me to take a picture of some of the youth to put in the paper to advertise the mission week.


This one won't make it to the paper.

Matt went with me, so I got a couple of pictures of him and Cassie.


Matt enjoyed running and diving into the grass.