Amanda's Baby Shower

Good Friday

Parick, Rick and Meg
Patrick, Harper, Lukas, Gabriel and Meg

(Uncle Kevin's in the background)

Gabriel, Big Daddy, Patrick, Lukas, Grammie, Meg and Harper


Friday evening we celebrated Easter with the Rodrigue family at Christy and Paul's house. We had a fabulous dinner and the cousins had a great time playing together.

Easter Egg Hunt

Lukas and Patrick on the steps of Taylor Grady




On Sunday, March 16th (incidentally the same day that the men's basketball team won the SEC tournament!) the Junior League had an Easter Egg Hunt at the Taylor-Grady House. The weather was perfect and Patrick, Lukas, Gigi and I hunted for some eggs with other member's children and then [the kids] jumped in the blow-up castle. It was a fun little hunt. All except the Easter bunny who was a little scary...

As we enjoyed the festivities outside, Rick had a BLAST at Alexander Memorial Coliseum (ironically Georgia Tech's coliseum!!!) watching the Dawgs beat the Razorbacks to win the SEC title for the first time since 1983. They got a birth to the NCAA tournament, where they lost to Xavier in the first round. But no one can take that SEC Championship away...GOOOOOO DAWGS!!!

Unbelievable

Playing with them Boys

Listen carefully...recognize the song??? Act like you don't! 1986...the beach...a volleyball net...Maverick...Goose...Iceman...TOP GUN! I loved (well, still love!) this song and this scene in the movie to be quite honest. So when thinking about a the title for this post it only seemed fitting to add a little theme song for fun. I just couldn't resist! Don't worry I'm sure we'll be back to Jack Johnson in no time. But for now let's all just enjoy a little blast from the past...before Tom Cruise went crazy.

Ahhhhh....those were the days.

Now back to the real world where "Playing with them Boys" to me doesn't mean watching sexy, sweaty, Navy buffs play volleyball. No, no, no. It's more like making sure my little runny-nosed, sweaty, child and nephews are playing sweet and safe on the play scape and that Bailey (the dog) isn't chewing on the wrong ball. I wouldn't trade places for anything in the world, but it sure is fun to reminisce.

These pictures are from yesterday when Gabriel and Lukas came over to play for the afternoon. Gabriel will be 5 in April and Lukas will be 3 in May. Patrick has so much fun playing with his cousins. We are so lucky to all live in the same town.

Really...

Somehow the Georgia Bulldog basketball (yes, men's basketball) team beat the Ole Miss Rebels in the first round of the SEC tournament....really?! We won in overtime 97-95. If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes I might not believe it either. My eyes watched it on TV from the comfort of my sofa in my pj's (I mean it did start at 9:45 pm!), but my lucky duck husband was in a box at the Georgia Dome. In fact he has been there almost all day. Well, since about 5ish, but you get the idea. He said it was great. How could it not be? WE WON!!!

Anyway, I spent most of the day with 3 little boys. Patrick, of course, and two of my nephews Gabriel and Lukas. We had a blast! The weather was perfect so we spent most of the day outside soaking up the sun. I took some really cute pictures that I will post tomorrow (wait, I think it is tomorrow)...or at least after I get a semi-night's rest. It's 12:47 and I am t-i-r-e-d.

So until tomorrow....sweet dreams and good night.

Pop Fiction

If you didn't watch Pop Fiction on E! this past Sunday at 10:30 EST you missed out! It was hysterical! The brilliant mind of Ashton Kutcher has given us another "punk'd" style show. Only now it's the celebs punkin' us and it is great! For those of you who like to keep up with the latest Hollywood gossip (Elizabeth and Kelly) this show is for you. And thanks to it we will now never know what is real and what is a hoax...at least not until Sunday nights. What an idea!

If you can't stay up until 10:30 pm on Sunday evenings than you really should tivo it and if you don't have tivo, well, get it because it rocks! But even if you don't it will probably be re-run on E! 685 times along with "Keeping Up with the Kardashians", "The Girls Next Door" and "Snoop Dogg's Father Hood" (it ain't the Huxtables) the following week.

Below is a link to last week's episode. Enjoy!

http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1403465279/bctid1450952172

Changing it up a little

So I go 2 months with no blog activity and now I am a little obsessed...as you can see. I've changed the layout and colors, deleted some pictures and added some features.

Count down to Hawaii:
YES, it's true! Rick and I are headed to Hawaii on April 16th! Our favorite beach bums, Elizabeth and Matt, are letting us shack up with them! THANK YOU! We can't wait! Here's how it all went down:

About a month ago I was uploading (or downloading, I never know) the new Jack Johnson CD to our itunes account. As I was waiting I decided to get on Ticketmaster and see if JJ was playing in Atlanta anytime soon. I've been looking for about 3 years for his concert and have never had any luck. The only date (yes, just ONE) I had ever seen was in Hawaii. He never seems to want to make the trip over to the mainland. My search came up and he had a dates scheduled for April 19th & 20th! The Kokua Festival...in HAWAII! Ugh! I joked with Rick that we ought to go. I mean Elizabeth and Matt are living there and they have offered a free place to stay to anyone who wants to visit! No dice! He thought I was joking.

"Not so fast my friend."..... (thank you, Lee Corso) I e-mailed Elizabeth the next day. After, of course, I had mapquested E&M's address and realized the Waikiki Shell was only 9.6 miles away from their home. I let her in on my fabulous idea and she was on board. They were planning on getting tickets for the show as well. Sweet! Now I just had to convince Rick.

For those of you who don't know how Rick is about planning vacations I'll give you a quick briefing. Rick loves to go on vacations. We are very lucky in that respect. But Rick ONLY likes taking vacations that interest him: golfing, fishing, snowboarding, activities....you get the picture. I like taking beach trips: sitting, sleeping, lounging, drinking....way different ideas of "vacationing". EVERY trip I have ever suggested we take has NEVER happened. Never. So this Hawaii trip poses a bit of a challenge.

Except...who doesn't want to GOLF, FISH and well SURF in Hawaii?! NOBODY! Not even Rick! After very little convincing Rick was on board too! Next we got Woogz all squared away with grandparents and aunt's we were ready to book the trip.

Elizabeth got us all tickets for the Kokua Festival for Sunday! Yippee!!! We are going to see Jack Johnson in Hawaii! What could be better than that? How about Jack Johnson with Dave Matthews and Tim Reynolds. Yep! That's right! Oh I am so excited and can hardly stand it!

The music:
So what you hear when you get on our blog now is the last song, "Losing Keys" from JJ's latest CD, "Sleep Through the Static". I LOVE this song...hope you do too or it might just be annoying. The whole CD is great and you all need to get it.

By the way...
Last week I got an e-mail from a friend of mine, Leigh Garret, (another Jack Johnson fanatic) that he was coming to Lakewood in Atlanta on August 13th! WHO KNEW?! We'll be headed to that show as well. Patrick will be joining us then. He loves him too! Now I don't feel quite as guilty for not taking him to Hawaii.

Back to the Beach

Last Friday Patrick and I headed south to St. Simons to spend the weekend with Gigi and Papa. Got home Monday and turned right back around Wednesday evening headed about 1 1/2 hours further south to Ponte Vedra. This time we brought Dada. Or he brought us. Rick has a pre-planning meeting for SASF this week and Patrick and I are lucky enough to tag along.

We didn't get to leave Bishop until about 5:30 yesterday. That put us in our room at PV about midnight with a very WIDE awake almost 2 1/2 year old! Partick had eaten a grilled cheese with mayonnaise (thank you Dairy Lane in Sandersville - I didn't know I had to specify my child would like his grilled cheese PLAIN) which ended up mostly in his hair! So he had a midnight bath which made him even MORE wide awake! He didn't fall asleep until about 1:30am and was then up about 8am. And that is why he is STILL "napping" at 6:07 and I have had time to make 2 post! Can you believe it?!

The weather was beautiful today. Patrick and I just bummed around and Rick got to play TPC Sawgrass with Tom. We have all had a very relaxing day and once Patrick rises I think we are headed to Barbara Jean's for some crab cakes. Hopefully we will be able to meet Tom and Ann Whitten later for drinks.

I bathed Patrick last night and asked Rick to wrap him up in a towel while I got out his diaper, lotion and j's. This is what happens when Rick's in charge...he likes to "dress him up" to make me laugh. Poor little guy was freezing, but Mama had to get a picture!

i LOVE st. simons

We don't get down to St. Simons nearly enough and every rare occasion we are there I wonder why it's not a more often occurrence. I love it down there! We have so many wonderful memories in SSI. At the top of the list is, of course, our engagement! My bachelorette party; many fun girl weekends; Rick catching that HUGE red fish (which did make the paper!); Georgia/Florida weekends that start on Wednesday...the list goes on and on.

Anyway, as I was pushing Patrick down Frederica Road under the magnificent live oak trees dripping with Spanish moss I decided to make a "two months into the new year new year's resolution". In 2008 we are going to visit St. Simons more! That should be an easy one to try to keep!

This trip it was just me, Patrick, Gigi and Papa (my mom and dad) and Dixie, mom and dad's dog. Rick was in Baton Rouge watching the Dawgs lose to LSU. He had a great time even though the game was a bust. Pretty much par for the course this season. But let's talk about Rick's trip for a moment. He did get to travel in style. He and a Gabe (Sally Jane - this is the guy Rick wants to set you up with) got to fly with the team on a charted plane, stay at the Marriott, eat great food and gamble. Did you even know there were casino's in Baton Rouge?! Rick had a pretty sweet weekend too.

Back to the beach...Mom and I shopped a little. She was so sweet to buy me a cute little silk dress and top from Tibi and she found herself some adorable Tory Burch flats for the summer! Shopping with mom is always fun...especially for Rick! We ate well, drank well, went on long walks, went to the beach...it was fabulous! Can't wait to get back!

Patrick still loves the beach! I took these pictures Sunday afternoon.