"I'm In!" . . .
Feelin' the Hate (for the Vols)...
and
Some Pretty Pictures...

Well, it's hard to believe that another Friday is already here. Do the days and weeks just go by quicker and quicker to any of the rest of you? (I guess I'm just getting o-l-d!)

We are looking forward to another jam-packed weekend, but first how about a little "since I last talked to you" update? I know...I know...I just talked with you all yesterday, but you know that a lot can happen in 24 hours!

Actually, it's just been random stuff that's happened since yesterday but some of it is still worth sharing (at least I THINK it is...there's also a very good chance that I just really bore you guys and gals most of the time with these tales of my daily life!).

Well, yesterday we were SO excited about going to Delaney's first newcomb tournament (this is the "quasi volleyball" team that she made at the middle school); Delaney is absolutely thrilled to be on this team (you all know how much she loves sports!) and could not wait for the first matches of the season. When I picked her up yesterday I could kinda see some tears in her eyes under the surface. I figured she'd gotten a bad grade; or someone had been ugly to her. No...she was crying because their tournament had been cancelled because of the possibility of bad weather later in the evening. Yes, my child cries because of SPORTS! (If there were ever any doubt that she was my child, that right there would completely dispel it since we are compadres when it comes to loving sports).

So she kinda moped around for a while until I told her that after we picked McKenna up from debate practice (yes McKenna, in addition to color guard and band and youth council and golf, is also on the debate team!) we'd go to Walmart so she could buy a music CD she'd been saving up for. That significantly cheered her up! She bought the newest Hannah Montana CD and was happy the rest of the evening!

I spent the rest of the evening doing a few of my favorite things--watching college football (#2 went down this time), baking a cake, and reading!

~ ~ ~

Last night, Sydney looked at me and said, "I can't believe that Halloween is so close by [I thought that was so cute; she couldn't figure out how to say "Halloween is coming up soon" and I like how she put it.]." I told her that, yes, it's just over a week away and that we were having a Halloween party at Nannie and Papaw's, and also we would be trick-or-treating. Sydney looked at me, clapped her hands, and said, "I'm In!!"

Oh yeah, I loved that phrase. "I'm in!" Me too, Sydney!

~ ~ ~

Okay, another Big Weekend planned! What's going on, you ask?

Tonight is another high school football game for McKenna's school (if we win, we'll actually be awarded our first state playoff game at home which would be really big for us!) . The game is about an hour away, though, so I won't be going. I think that I will entertain myself by going and buying some scrapbook goodies--I am seriously jonesing for some alphabet stickers and I haven't bought me any in a long time!

Then tomorrow McKenna has another band/color guard competition. They will have 16 schools in their class alone, so if they can do well it would be a BIG accomplishment!

Then...the biggest activity tomorrow is the Alabama vs. Tennessee football game! And Gary and I will be there live and in-person!

And let me just say that I HATE the Volunteers! I want to beat them SO bad!! I try and be a pretty even-keeled, nice Alabama fan. In fact, I really don't hate Auburn (our biggest rival) too much, because I figure that their winning makes us beating them look even better. But I seriously can't stand to see Tennessee come to town. I don't know if it's that ugly orange, or that incessantly-played "Rocky Top" by their band, or the awful memories of defeats at their hands (I still vividly remember losing to them 17-15 back in probably 1988, back when we still played at Legion Field in Birmingham. It was one of those "kill me in the final moments" games and I seriously sat in the stands for 30 minutes afterwards with my friends Cheryl, Scott, and Mike and just moped!) So...tommorow's game is going to be HARD (probably our hardest opponent so far this season) and we're going to have to play really well to have a chance! So..if you have no college football allegiences, promise me that you'll yell a big "Roll Tide" for me around noon tomorrow!!!

(And I don't like to keep barrading people with youtubes here, so I'm not posting any videos. But, if you want to see evidence of us beating Tennessee the way we should, here's a GREAT VIDEO of it!)

~ ~ ~
Gary took about 50 pictures of Delaney the other day, to submit to the Miss Photogenic contest portion of the middle school pageant she's gonna be in. She thought it was fun pretending to be a model!

Here are some of my faves from the day...







~ ~ ~

Well, before I can get to the FUN parts of my weekend, I'm off to do some Friday stuff that's got to get done...washing clothes, working on two articles due next week...

Then let the weekend begin!!!