September 2010 Archives

Barrett was the ring bearer in Stephen's friend's wedding on Saturday. Allen is Barrett's godfather. Barrett was very excited about his role in the wedding. He practiced and practiced at home. He was elated when the black, shiny shoes arrived in the mail from Joey. He wanted to sleep with them in his bed the first night! The big day came. He was promised a piece of candy (Starburst) after walking up the aisle. He was supposed to join Kellie in the 2nd pew after getting to the altar. After he got his candy, he took off running to the back of the church where we were sitting with Wyatt. The congregation erupted in laughter. He was a happy boy with his big wad of candy in his mouth!

The Collins Hill Homecoming Dance was also Saturday night. I didn't get to go to the girl's house and take pictures. She sent these to Patrick yesterday. His date was a friend from his English class. I have been chaperoning this dance since 2000, and regretably, I had to miss it this last year because of the wedding. Patrick bought his jacket at Goodwill for $12 and he was thrilled with the find. Stephen was too and asked to wear it to work the day after he got it. I altered it to fit Patrick and it looked great. Stephen had a bowtie that matched perfectly. Patrick said he received a lot of compliments on his outfit.

Last month, Patrick joined the University of Georgia competitive diving club. He goes there on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday for 2 hour practices. The pool is incredible! There are jets that shoot up from the bottom to soften divers' entry. Patrick hasn't tried them yet, but he has seen others use them. He participated in a dive clinic this weekend and Scott and I went to watch the last hour yesterday. Scott videoed a couple of the dives. The dive from the highest platform was done on a dare from one of his friends. He smacked his arms pretty good! He hasn't been training on that platform, and I think he said it was only his 2nd time on it.

His first competition with this team is on October 16th in Birmingham. He will also be on the Collins Hill Dive Team. That season begins the middle of November. He enjoys diving and has made a lot of improvement in the year that he's been doing it. He has recently decided he would like to dive in college. The problem is that there are only 3 schools in Georgia that have men's diving. They are Emory (cost prohibitive), UGA and Georgia Tech and you have to have placed in the National Championship to be considered for their teams. Patrick hasn't been to Nationals. There's also not a lot of scholarship money given for diving, we have been told. And we depend on the HOPE scholarship given to Georgia Students who qualify!

Decided to set up the camera, use what I learned a few days ago, and try to capture their activity in the morning. Didn't think I had enough light but it turned out OK. You can hear the news in the background mentioning this week's Saints-Falcons game. This is what we get to watch just outside our living room window. It is one of our greatest joys. For what it's worth, there is another feeder out. It gets hardly any visitors. Not sure what the deal is with this location but it gets, by far, the most activity. They are swarming now because they're about to head south for the winter. Not sure if these are all regular visitors or if some of them are heading south from northern climes. They're all welcome. Enjoy.

Celebrating 25 years smoke-free today. I've told the story of how I did it before. Cold turkey. I didn't tell anyone so there was no one encouraging me or asking me about it and there was no pressure on me that I might fail. After a while, I just stopped thinking about it. It was surprisingly easy for me. What I don't remember is how I handled all of the people who used to bum cigarettes off of me. There were a lot of them. I'm guessing they had to quit, too. :)

Savannah loves to dance so I couldn't resist filming this. It's not her best effort because she was tired and I took this just before her nap, but it's still cute. We are celebrating the big game tonight at our house with Mama, Katie, Amy, and possibly Christina and her family. The city is electric in anticipation of this big event! Samuel had "black and gold day" at school today so he's wearing his jersey. Luke has his on and Savannah is showing her spirit too. Go Saints!!

Happy Birthday, Elizabeth

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