February 2016

We started February with a soccer tournament for Emma.  The girls looked very rusty as they had only practiced once since the season began.

That weekend also happened to be Super Bowl 50, and our home state team, the Carolina Panthers, played the Denver Broncos.  Brendan is a Panthers fan, but the rest of us are not.  We did go to a neighbor's house for a Super Bowl party and Emma wanted to paint her face.  I gave in and painted it for her!

We celebrated Mardi Gras with a few decorations and a homemade Kings Cake that is super easy (made from store bought cinnamon rolls).

You can find the recipe HERE.

We did have one more winter storm...we were supposed to get about 6 inches of snow, but after an inch, all we got was sleet and freezing rain.  It was a mess.

Yes, that is a bowl to collect snow for snow cream.  You have to take every opportunity you are given  in the south.

We didn't really do a lot for Valentine's Day.  JC had a stomach bug earlier in the weekend, and he still wasn't feeling all that great.

These are the Valentines that I made for Emma to pass out at school.  I think they turned out really cute.  I had them printed in wallet size.

On February 19th, Emma's school had the annual Sweetheart's Dance that I have already blogged about.  Emma had so much fun, and she looked beautiful.

The same night, our church hosted the annual Dodgeball Tournament benefitting our local food pantry.  Brendan entered a team in the high school division.  You may remember that his team won the Middle School division last year.  

This year they were supposed to be "The Dodge Fathers" but they were asked to change their team name at the last minute.  Brendan chose Snoop Dodgy Dodge.

They lost their first game, but then they battled back to play in the championship game.  They just couldn't hold out for the win, however.

On Saturday the 20th, we celebrated my niece's birthday.  She also had a rollerskating party.  Emma was so excited.  Emma and Jackson got to go celebrate, but Brendan had his last day of baseball tryouts at school so he didn't get to go.

Brendan had five days of tryouts for the JV baseball team.  The roster was finally posted around 1:30pm on Sunday the 21st.  BRENDAN MADE THE TEAM!  This may not be such a big deal at some schools, but they had about 60 kids try out.  They kept B which is huge because they have 2 returning sophomore catchers who are REALLY GOOD!!!

We celebrated with balloons and cake!

Another fantastic month in the books!

Whoa...What A Month!!!

Since my last post, we ACTUALLY DID SELL OUR HOUSE and get moved into the rental that we will live in until the new house is complete. HUGE undertaking! Major Headache! Complete Mental & Physical Exhaustion! These are just a few phrases that describe the past three weeks of our lives. We closed on our house one week ago today, and it was very emotional for me. Of course selling our house and moving was the goal, but I found it much harder to drive away from our house for the last time than I had expected. We had made so many wonderful memories in that house, and even though it was time to move on, it was still very sad.

I cannot wait to get started on the new build! We are waiting to hear back from our estimation set of plans before we move forward with our house plans. I promise to OVER blog about the entire process. I am beyond excited about starting from scratch!

In the mean time, I will leave you with this...the boys had a Super Bowl party on Sunday (yes, just one week after we moved in), and it was a huge success. We had 11 boys here for about three hours of "Pre Party"!

Some of you may remember this photo...

Brendan is a big Patriots fan (this started about three years ago) so he was so happy that New England made it to the Super Bowl.

Although I did not go over the top, I did have fun planning the party with the boys. I even enlisted their help in decorating and putting together football popcorn boxes.

Brownie Bites from C*stco decorated as footballs!

My attempt at chocolate covered strawberries decorated with a store-bought icing cookie decorator.

Of course the boys played outside the entire time. The older boys played football, and the younger ones played soccer (in the soaked back yard).

In the end, I think they all had a great time! I know my two were completely exhausted by game time!

Too bad for Brendan that the Patriots lost! He was one upset little boy! Congratulations to all you Giants fans out there. Maybe one day my Cowboys will head back to the big game!!! :)