Roll TIDE Roll!!!!!!
(and then . . ."Oh, the Horror" ...
or... "I Want My Beautiful Hair")

Sydney is here to let you know that there are just two days until the Alabama Crimson Tide kicks off its 2007 football season!! She would like to yell to all of you a really big "ROLL TIDE!!!!"







Isn't she cute in her Alabama cheerleading outfit? This was Delaney's when she was this age and it has been passed down through the years. (McKenna had her own when she was little, and Scout uses it now for pajamas!). We love our Alabama football and my children are growing up learning it well!! (There are priorities I must have as a parent, and one of them is to teach my girls the finer points of sports, and specifically Crimson Tide sports! LOL)

Delaney will be going with me to the opening game this Saturday (we get a pair of tickets to all the home games and Gary is usually my football partner; but because Delaney will have some softball tournaments this Fall we wanted to get her to a game while we could!)

We are excited because we are starting what they're calling "The Saban Era" with new head coach Nick Saban. He is a proven coach that we are really hoping will get us back to national championship-quality in three or four years. Nothing would make me happier!

If you are a sports fan (or a Bama fan in particular), here are a few cool places to visit as we get ready for College Gameday on Saturday--

~~Kirk Herbstreit is not my favorite commentator on earth, but he has some interesting comments and awards in his annual Herbies! There are some bold statements (like Bama will be the "sleeper" in the SEC west and that pretty much all the pretty co-eds are from the South; and also that there's a really good barbecue restaurant in Starkville, Mississippi, that is atlmost seems is worth a road trip!)--Go HERE to read it

~~If you really want a wonderful read about the football culture in Alabama, you need to read this article by Pulitzer-Prize winning author Rick Bragg. Bragg's book All Over But the Shoutin' is one of my favorites, and in this article he pulls out all the literary stops and writes an illuminating article that even non-football lovers can enjoy. Rick also happens to be a family friend, and my father's next-door office mate at the University!--go HERE to read it

(To whet your appetite, this is the first paragraph in his article: "They say college football is religion in the Deep South, but it's not. Only religion is religion. Anyone who has seen an old man rise from his baptism, his soul all on fire, knows as much, though it is easy to see how people might get confused. But if football were a faith anywhere, it would be here on the Black Warrior River in Tuscaloosa, Ala. And now has come a great revival.")

~~ My dh, Gary, is also a huge Bama fan and he's been counting down the 12 days until kickoff (to go along with the 12 national championships we've won) with some great videos every day!--Go HERE to see those

~~ My blog friend, Mandy, is a fellow scrapbooker but more importantly a HUGE Bama fan. She's also been doing videos over the last couple of weeks. I KNOW she shares my excitement! --Go HERE to see those

Now to the second part of my post this morning, which I so entertainingly named "Oh, the Horror!" up above (also called "I want my beautiful hair!"). It is quite a saga, so sit back for a moment and experience it with me...

Would I have known that the photos of Sydney in her Alabama outfit would be the last ones I'd have of her pretty hair I would have taken many more of them! (Her hair has never been long--she has the curse that all my girls have, that they don't get much of any hair until they hit at least 3; they're bald through all of their infant and toddling years! But she was finally getting enough to have cute pigtails and ponytails; in fact, I was going to have to take her for a trim probably this month).

Well... I no longer have the need for a trim!

Yesterday afternoon, I was upstairs cooking dinner.Delaney was in McKenna's room on the computer and Sydney was in the adjoining den supposedly watching tv. A few minutes into dinner being cooked, she walks upstairs and says she has hair in her mouth. I give her some water and a rag to wipe off her mouth when I have the wise idea to actually ask the question, "Why is there hair in your mouth?" That's when I notice for the first time that her hair looks, umm, a little different. I whisk her around to see the back of her head and, yep, it's pretty much ALL gone!!!

I demand to know what she did and we go downstairs where I find a HUGE pile of hair on the floor.

(look at those long pieces? and it was getting so blonde!)

I succeed to get totally riled up and upset, giving her two spankings and telling her that I'm very mad at her (and I am not a spanking person; the only other time I've spanked her was when she poured blue paint all up the stairs and in the dining room; oh yeah, that was quite a fiasco!). I go through the whole explanation of how we never use scissors by ourselves; how we always ask Mommy if you want to cut your or anyone else's hair; and how she will never cut it again. Of course, she's crying very loudly throughout all of this so I have to repeat all of these admonotions several times again, so that she can actually understand me.


I was SO upset with her. I'd tried to get her hair grown out and it was looking so pretty. But I calmed down a bit when she came back at me with these two priceless lines...

"I am so (...crying and heaving and deep breathing)....mad (....crying and heaving and deep breathing)...at (crying, heaving, etc. etc.)...you." Yep, she threw my line back at me!

The she said... "Do you still love me?" Of course, that one got me, and I had to hug her and tell her that just because I'm mad at her and have to punish her doesn't mean I don't love her. I just want her to understand what she did wrong!

The hair is actually growing on me (no pun intended! lol) and everyone else thinks it's kinda cute. But...I think Sydney has had the actualization that I had already about her hair. Last night, as she got ready for bed, she said, "I want my beautiful hair." I consoled her some and then she said, "It will be back by Christmas." (LOL!!--I sure hope so!)