Sweet Caroline

The Friday Five. 1.          My GAMECOCKS got a W last night to start out the season!!!!!!!!!  And in other news, it may have possibly been the HOTTEST day of summer so far, go figure.  As I stated last year, the beginning of football season brings mixed emotions for me.  I am about as BIG and DEDICATED Gamecock fan as they come, especially football, just because of my love of the sport, but as EXCITED as I am about football season, I also get the end of summer BLUES.  I do NOT like summer ending.  Regardless, we had fun tailgating yesterday.  We didn’t get tickets, so we ended up leaving and going to a friend’s house to watch the game, but wanted to tailgate to celebrate my besties birthday.  Maybe by the time our next home game rolls around it won’t be blazing outside…. 2.         In “summer coming to an end” news, we are headed to Beaufort this afternoon for the holiday weekend and what is normally to me the “end of the summer.”  I know in SC it is still SUMM

I've finally made some progress in the living room...although there are still a few major pieces missing before the room can be called complete.  Regardless, it's in much better shape now and I am totally LOVING the colors/scheme I've got going on.  Now, if I could just find that elusive money tree to finish it off....... Let's all be reminded what this room looked like BEFORE we moved in: And this is how it has looked the past year: As I mentioned previously, we decided to part with the coffee table for now.  Collins' favorite thing to do is run around the new sectional...and really, there's not much I can do stop her (all the time anyways) since she can now climb up there by herself.  I feel better about her falling on the floor than hitting a corner of the coffee table, so out it went.  The plan is to eventually get a round ottoman in there to use as a coffee table.  I'm thinking I'm going to buy a cheap one from Homegoods or TJ Maxx or

Mikey left us this weekend for a "fantasy football draft" boys weekend...so we had a little family date night Thursday night before he left.  We headed out on a sunset cruise around the lake to see the purple martins fly in.  Every night in the summer at sunset they fly to Bomb Island on Lake Murray to nest.  Like HUNDREDS of THOUSANDS of them.  It is so pretty...Collins was obsessed with watching them. Friday night, we relaxed and went to dinner with Lolly.  Nothing crazy, just a laid back night.  Saturday was pretty, but I spent most of the day playing with Collins and CLEANING, yuck,  But, sometimes it just has to be done.  We were getting ready for our SLUMBER party:-)  Three of my best friends came over that afternoon to hang out/play/catch up/spend the night.  We had the best time!  Harper came with her mama to entertain C...this was one of the first times where they truly PLAYED together.  It was precious.  Picture below is C leaning over to give Harp a

Some nights are crazy hectic. Some nights are rather low key.  Some are super fun with lots on the calendar.  And some, well some are just “good.”  You know what I am talking about.  Nothing really out of the ordinary.  Nothing on the schedule.  Just a good night.  We had one of those last night.    We had to run a couple of errands after we picked up C from daycare which meant we pulled in the driveway at 6.  I was STARVING (not that uncommon…) so I decided to “cook” dinner right away.  Fortunately, we didn’t have much to do as we had leftover spaghetti sauce…so all “cooking” meant last night was cooking noodles and making a salad.  I was in charge of dinner since Mikey had to do some yard work.   We ate really early (for us) and I took C to the bath right away, spaghetti + toddler…yeah, you get the picture.  Anyways, by 6:45 she was clean and we headed straight outside to enjoy the beautiful night.  We PLAYED and PLAYED while daddy cut the grass…she was obsessed with watching him.  C

WHOA.   I know, I know…I say this ALL the time, but it really can’t be said enough.  TIME FLIES and I HATE it.  I am absolutely savoring EVERY second possible of “baby” with my baby, but gee golly…she’s just growing up too fast.  TOO FAST.  I just want to record/photograph/capture EVERY single moment because I’m scared I won’t remember it.  Of course, that’s not possible…but I try.  Just this morning, as I was drying my hair and she was lying on my bed watching a few minutes of morning cartoons and drinking her milk…she all of a sudden turned to me with the biggest grin and started waving.  MELT MY HEART.  I immediately had to run over to her and cover her in kisses.  She couldn’t be any cuter if she tried.  (Please remember that I am her mama and I’m allowed to say that, right??  I may or may not be a TAD biased) But, really…all in that fleeting moment, I sat there and thought…my gosh, my baby isn’t a baby anymore.  She’s well into “toddlerhood” and I just don’t like it.  If I could f

Colls finally got upgraded to a big girl car seat.  We were given a Britax Marathon from my cousin that we had been using in Mikey's truck for the past couple of months.  So...she has been in a convertible car seat for a few months, but she's not in Mikey's truck as much as my car so this was a big step!!  We knew we needed to buy another one soon, but really weren't in too big a rush as she was perfectly content in her infant car seat still...facing rear.  She's a great car rider, so we really didn't worry about it too much. Well...we were in Buy Buy Baby the other night getting a few things and just stopped to browse the car seat section and WHAT DO YOU KNOW!?!  They had JUST gotten in 6 Britax Advocates, that had dents in the boxes (absolutely nothing wrong with the seats themselves) and were going to be sold AS IS for 50% off.  DO HUH!!??  AND THEN, we got to use a 20% coupon on top of that.  The Advocate retails at BBB for $389 ($289 on Amazon) and we got

I am not going to lie, the weather really, really PISSED me off this past weekend.  We had plans to do a BIG lake day with lots of friends and kids, it was going to be spectacular...but ole' mother nature had other thoughts.  BOO HISS.  I have NEVER seen so much non stop rain...it literally rained ALL day LONG on Friday and most of the day Saturday.  So annoying.  URRGGHHH...don't be messin' with my weekends!! We were so lazy for the most part (well I was).  We cooked breakfast and played all Saturday morning, and then when nap time came around, Mikey and I tackled the garage.  It was a DISASTER...so glad to have it organized again.  Saturday night, we still went ahead with our cook out that we would have done AFTER going out on the lake all day (urrrghhhh...can you tell how mad I was??).  We had lots of fun Saturday night though...a house full!! Sunday, Mikey woke up BRIGHT and early to go to NC with some boys to play golf at some amazing course.  Colls and I slept late

Family Vacation 2013: Recap part 1 Similar to last year, we had a LONG, beautiful NINE day vacation in Beaufort this year that was the perfect mix of family and FUN.  We started off our vacation with just Mikey and I heading down early to participate in some super fun wedding festivities.  Colls stayed back at home with Lolly and Granddaddy while Mikey and I enjoyed two nights of adult time.  We rented a house with 6 others in Port Royal (where the wedding was) (which is also about 15 minutes away from our house in Beaufort, but my Uncle had given the house to friends that weekend so we found other accommodations.)  The house in Port Royal was PERFECT for our group, only two blocks away from the reception.  We started off Friday night at the rehearsal dinner, which was perfectly laid back and relaxed with breathtaking views of the intracoastal water.  We all (myself included) had a little TOO much fun Friday night and that 2:00 Catholic wedding ceremony on Saturday came a weee bit

Laid back summer weekends. Although we are generally  GO,GO,GO we did have several weekends in a row this summer where we just CHILLED and enjoyed the long days with friends and family.  Mikey’s sister and her family came up the weekend of June 1, as this was the weekend AFTER Memorial Day weekend, which was a busy one…we sure enjoyed a low key weekend with family.  We spent the day at Mikey’s dad’s house on the lake and PLAYED.  It was very nice and much needed.  All of Granddadder and Khaki's (Mikey's dad and step mom) grandkids.... of course my child isn't looking.... The weekend of June 8 th ….our friends hosted their 4 th annual BBQ on the lake party.  We got a sitter for little Colls this year and enjoyed several hours of adult time drinking, floating in the water and eating too much incredible food.  Me and the hostess:) The weekend of June 15 th …Mikey hit the road to SAVANNAH for a bachelor party …and Colls and I took FULL advanta

A  VACATION HANGOVER.   This is a real thing, y’all.  And I have it, bad.  Today has been ROUGH.  I am exhausted and in denial that our WONDERFUL 9 day vacation has ended.  It could also have to do with the fact we woke up at 6am yesterday to come home from Beaufort so we could work our butts off all day and  HOST a couples baby shower at OUR house last night.  Yep, I know.  I’m nuts.  But, it was worth it.  (I mean, hey….I got a new deck /patio furniture AND 35 bales of pine straw installed JUST in time for the shower (thanks again, husband of the year!!).  But, in all seriousness…I do like hosting stuff because it makes me get stuff CHECKED off that to do list.  But, woah nelly.  Mama is TIIIIRED.  Sleep is a funny thing.  We got TONS of rest the first part of our vacation, but this past weekend we had a packed house and lots of fun…so I didn’t get tons of sleep and now I don’t feel rested at all.  Oh well, it was worth it.  I’ll have to do a full recap soon.  My heart is full.  We h

Linking up again today with all these fun girls!!  The Friday Five. 1.          Oh my WORD.  Packing for a 9 day vacation with a 17 month old is SERIOUS business.  Of course, I am quite sure I way over packed…but better safe than sorry.  We are leaving today for a wedding in Beaufort this weekend…Colls is staying with my parents so she can go to our family reunion on the lake.  My dad is really big into family and really wanted her to be there with all of the cousins.  So my awesome mama is going to meet us halfway between Beaufort and Columbia Sunday morning so we can get that baby and spend a GLORIOUS, FULL WEEK at the BEACH!! I am so pumped.  I know we go out of town a LOT, and feel very fortunate for that.  It’s easy to do when you are so close to the coast though.  But, being able to stay at the beach for a whole week is something else entirely…and I am READY.  2.         I finally took the time to get my HAIR done yesterday.  I had not had it colored since the