A few good things...

So today is a day I could complain and whine, but so many nice things happened today that I would prefer to share those.

• You already know this from a previous post, but I love Chick-fil-a and have a new reason today. On Tuesday nights between 5-7 pm you receive one free kids meal with the purchase of an adult meal. In addition to all of the wonderful things in my previous post they have clowns doing face painting and balloon animals and the cow was in the house! The girls got the biggest kick out of the cow!
• I won my singles league match today!
• I caught the right person at my home owners office and she gave me pool keys for free (long story here, but we are being positive remember)
• A new friend brought me flowers, a card, and most of all the support I needed to get through this day.
• Another friend watched my girls so I could play in that tennis match.
• Another friend called to see how my day was going and taught me loads about Navy stuff.
• Another friend gave me a pen at the store when I (Morgan) lost mine.
• I'm pleased that my hot water heater is big enough to fill the big tub for the girls and I still have enough hot water to take as long a shower as I want.
• I love that my girls love their daddy and can't wait for him to be home.
• Oh and this happened yesterday, but I love that my neighbor ran to get me Chinese food when the girls refused to go out to dinner.
  
  

Saint Simons Island

Our sweet neighbors, Ms. Janet & Mr. Mike, invited Mr. John, the girls, and me to join them for a day trip to St. Simons. They used to live there so they know all the good places to eat! We had ice cream at Zuzu's...twice, checked out the pier, two different beaches, some shops, a playground, a lighthouse and had a yummy burger for dinner! Whew! I can't believe I can stay awake to blog about it. The girls crashed on the way home and I just put them to bed in their clothes, sand and everything. Thank you neighbors for a wonderful day!

P.S. Jen I owe you a real tour of St. Simons on your next visit. Sorry :o)

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Gnats

Gnats have to be one of the most annoying creatures on this planet. We had them occasionally in South Carolina, but nothing like we have in Georgia. They swarm in huge clouds, get stuck in your ears, lip gloss, eyes, hair and everywhere else. It is amazing how a creature so dang tiny can inflict so much pain and itching on a grown person, not to mention poor Morgan (the bugs really love her). And for some reason bug spray, even 100% deet and skin so soft will not keep them off of you. I have grown to really appreciate a good breeze! I hear these terrible creatures disappear when the temperature stays above 78 degrees, so this summer when I'm blogging about how bloody hot it is just remind me that at least the gnats are gone.

You might be wondering why I bring this up today, well I'll tell you. Since Nora has started soccer Morgan and I are now stuck outside for an hour during dusk while Nora sits on the soccer field and picks flowers. Today Morgan and I were running laps to keep the bugs off. Maybe Nora playing soccer will keep me in shape too.

A few firsts

So the girls and I are still trying to stay busy and have done some fun things lately. On St. Patty's Day we had our neighbors, Mr. John, Mike and Janet, over for corned beef and cabbage. It is fun to share yummy food (Janet made a yummy coconut cake and Mr. John brought some green ice cream) and conversation with friends.

On Friday we had a birthday party to go to at a bowling alley. It was the first time the girls have ever been bowling and they loved it! Well all except the part about having to wait their turn. Just imagine when they have to learn that you really have to wait for the person next to you as well. Thanks for inviting us Kelly!


Then today we bought some new kites and headed out to the park with Mr. John. This was the first tme they have done this and my first time in many years. We went to wal-mart so they could both pick out the kite they wanted and Nora picked a Barbie one and Morgan a dragon (he is really hard to fly). They had a great time, but I didn't pick a very good park...too many trees blocking the wind. So after attempting the new kites and Mr. John's two, the girls were ready to head for the play gound.


Oh and one other exciting first...the first and hopefully last time the girls ate food coloring. I'm pretty sure they thought it was frosting.

Happy St. Patty's Day!

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Soccer

A while back I asked Nora if she wanted to play soccer and she said yes, so I signed her up. By the time we started to go shoe shopping for her she decided she didn't want to play. She even colored a ball on a paper and wrote NO and hung it up on the door. Then she found out that Kenneth was on her team and her tune changed again. So we went out and bought her cleats, shin guards, big ole socks, and a pink ball in size 3 (who knew there were different sizes??).

Yesterday was supposed to be Nora's first soccer practice so she got all dressed up in her gear, had a talk about playing nice (she told me she would have fun and try her best), posed for some cute pics for me and then off we went to the field. We searched all over for her coach with no luck. All the other teams were running in nice lines and kicking balls. About 20 after the coach comes wearing flip flops and she doesn't even have any balls. I think lucky for her it started pouring so she was off the hook...until Thursday. Nora and Morgan had a blast kicking the ball around anyway.

The Pig

Saturday night was the 19th Annual Silver and Gold Auction to benefit the Dolphin Scholarship Foundation. The Dolphin Scholarship Foundation provides scholarships to children of submariners based on academic and financial need.

So all the submarine crews and other commands on base all get together and dress up and create centerpieces based on the theme. This year the theme was "Game On" and the USS Georgia Gold crew went as a bowling team and Bree and Trisha created an amazing centerpiece.

The command that shows the most enthusiasm for the theme gets to take home the pig! The pig?? Yup, in 1998 the pig was the prize for a pie eating contest and has since been the prize each year. The pig has been out to sea and many other crazy places. Each group that wins him gets to paint him and show him off with great pride. This year the pig went to the USS Georgia Gold!!! The cake was so yummy I'm pretty sure that is what sealed the deal! Our cool bowling shirts that my friend Kevin designed for us helped too! Thank you Kevin!!!!

Can you believe this is a cake?

USS Georgia Gold with our pig

Froggy Friend

Much to my surprise Nora's little froggy friend returned to our porch this morning. Nora was very pleased, but I really think it is bad for the the poor frog for her to play with it so much...especially in the sand. We need to work on setting some boundaries for the frog I guess. For now he is off to safety in the corner with the vine.

Spring: The good, the bad, & the ugly

So Spring has definitely sprung in the South! The birds are chirping, the bugs are flying, the azaleas are beautiful and it has been absolutely gorgeous here lately. Sunny and 80 degrees! So I figured I had better get the yard work done while the warm weather is still exciting and before it gets too hot to go outside. I know some of you are like, I thought they bought that townhouse so they didn't have to do yard work?? Yes, but we still have to do the flower beds and there is a big one in the back that was overgrown. Morgan was sick this weekend (Sat-Mon with a stomach bug, yuck!) so in order to enjoy the day, but not share our germs we decided to hit the yard. I meant to do all this when my mom was here, but we were just too busy.

So I started on Sunday in the two small beds in the back and got through part of the big bed before the girls had had enough. The next day I finished pulling all the stuff out of the big bed. Tuesday we hit up Lowe's for some pots, soil, a few flowers, and a trellis. Then on Wednesday I bought the first 17 bags of mulch. Today I pulled all the weeds from the front and side and put down another 18 bags of mulch. Whew! No wonder I'm so sleepy!

So in the midst of all of this Nora made a new froggy friend which has now gone off to find more bugs in the woods and we had our first run in with a black snake. Man those things are FAST!!!! I don't know enough about snakes to know which ones are poisonous and those that aren't so I have a shovel on the back porch just in case. However, there is no chance I would have caught up with this one. Did I mention how fast he was? What about how long? Or how creepy???? Luckily we have wonderful neighbors like Mr. John, and Mike & Janet to bring a shovel too. Mike assured me this snake wouldn't hurt us, but I'm still not a fan. And I'm pretty sure I scared the girls for life because I came across this snake for the second time as I was coming back into the yard and it was in front of me. I ran like crazy to get between it and the girls and then started hollering at them to get in the house. Then Nora asked me if snakes tickle and I said no, they bite. I don't think they are too scared because they did go back out looking for the frog today, but I think the mulch made him move away...sorry Nora. At least I'm telling myself it was that and not our other visitor.

If you look closely you can see the flowers that Nora and Grandma planted

Silver Lining

Okay so if I have to find a silver lining in Ben being gone it would be that I don't have to turn on the air conditioning. It has been over 80 here the last few days and even I will admit that the house has gotten a little warm by late afternoon. While I call this cozy, Ben is usually sweating to death. And I think the girls have his temperature not mine so I did turn on the air tonight, but I set it to 78 and am seriously considering turning it off now that it has cooled down.

Oh and did I mention that Tuesday is my new favorite day of the week? I am very excited to sit down with a yummy snack and watch American Idol, then I can watch AI and the Biggest Loser tomorrow night. I know it is an exciting life I lead, but somebody has to do it!

Boat Ride

The other day our very nice neighbor Mr. John took my mom, the girls and me on a ride in his electric boat. The girls loved jumping around the boat and looking for jellyfish. It was a very relaxing afternoon even though we almost had to swim back. The girls turned the heater on and we noticed a funny smell. Then John noticed that the battery was being used up faster than normal. So we thought there was something wrong with the boat turns out that the heater just uses up the battery faster. Whew! Thanks for a very fun day!!

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More Silly Girls

The girls and I have been spending time watching videos and looking at pictures lately and they watched this video about 15 times in a row and were laughing hysterically! It wasn't until the next day that I even heard Ben's laugh in the background. So cute!

Reality TV

Okay everyone knows I love a little reality tv and this week I was completely torqued off when the Biggest Loser was to be continued and completely thrilled when Anoop and Matt made the top 13!!

Silly Girls

Here are some silly pictures of the girls I have been meaning to post for a while. Morgan is defiantly our comedian!

Riding the horse

Modeling the new shoes (Nora hasn't worn another pair since)

Everyone needs a cookie the size of their head once in a while

Yup, those are underwear!

Killin' Time

So today is tennis day, unfortunately it is windy and cold so the group cancelled, but it was too late to cancel my sitter. So that meant that I had 3 whole hours to kill in Kingsland, GA. Wow that was a challenge! Gas - 2 min, Lowe's - 15 min, ATM - 3 min (only because the first one was out of order), Belk - 15 min, Wal-mart - 45 min, and Zaxby's 30 min. I finally gave up and went home early.

On another note I know there a few military wives that occasionally read my blog and I was wondering how many pouty days it is normal to have during deployments and if the deployments will get easier the more we do? I feel like mostly I'm doing okay and the girls have been great, but I have moments I tear up over stupid stuff and sort of feel like a piece of me is missing.