Happy Graduation Keith!!!!

My sweet husband graduated on Saturday and was awarded outstanding academic achievement in the Graduate School of Theology! It was a fun weekend celebrating with family and friends. He has worked so hard in grad school and has really loved it, but is very excited to be finished! Over the past three and half years he has:

completed 84 hours of class

written numerous 20+ page research papers

read lots and lots of very thick books

taken many extensive tests

engaged in lots of great conversation

spent countless hours in the library

even spent a night in the library

studied under and developed relationships with wonderful professors

been challenged spiritually, mentally, and physically

maintained a top notch GPA

made friends with fellow students

mentored freshmen and sophomores as a teaching assistant

ordered, sold, and organized music for the campus store

ministered to the sweet people at Maryneal Church of Christ

and all the while continued to be a loving husband

My heart is full! I could not be more thankful for and proud of him. This has been an amazing chapter of our lives. He's looking forward to having some time to rest over the next few weeks until we see what the future holds.

Celebrating with the fam!

Thanks to our friend and fellow blogger Lauren for taking this fun picture for us!

Remeber Jenny, the sweet and talented girl who made my blog look cute, fun, and hip? Well, guess what?!!!

As a kickoff to celebrate her new business, she is generously giving away FREE blog makeovers!!

All you have to do is go to her blog and comment to enter. For every 10 people that enter she will give away another makeover. So if your blog needs a new look, go here. Or click on the Pink Armchair on the right side of my blog. The contest ends on Saturday, so hurry over before it's too late!

flip flops...your feet's best friend!

Since flip flops are most definitely in my top five favorite things in the whole wide world, I had to share this fun flip flop test that I found on on my friend Sarah's blog. Interestingly, she is not a fellow flip flop fan (how's that for alliteration:)I know you're all so impressed!)...I'll have to try and convince her to embrace that little strap between the toes. Believe it or not that used to bug me too....but I've worn them almost everyday since I overcame the whole toe separation thing about nine years ago:) There really isn't much that makes me smile more that a cute/comfy pair of flips. I just got three new pair for my birthday, but don't worry they were all under $10! If you need some new flippys for summer I recommend these! A couple summers ago I decided not to fork over the $7.99 for a very similar pair, then I saw everyone else's cute feet sporting them and searched Targets in three states until I found them. So this year, when I saw they had stripes and plaid, I bought them both!
Anyway, on with the test. I wonder where I can find these cute green polka dot ones?! I guess the test is partly accurate for me...I can be pretty goofy, but I'm not sure I treat every day like a vacation and I'd choose the beach over Disney World! Give it a try, what do your flip flops say about you? Thanks for the fun idea Sarah, and try some flip flops, you know you want to:)

What Your Flip Flops Say About You

You live to have fun, and your sense of humor is downright goofy. You are a big kid on the inside, and you have a very open heart. You try to make every day feel like a vacation, even if you have other responsibilities. Each day, you make a little bit of time to play and let loose. Your ideal warm weather place: Disney World

The Flip Flop Test

Well this is an easy one! I'm thankful for Jenny and Pink Armchair Designs for my adorable new blog look! She is so sweet and talented! Use the link on the right side and check out more of her fun designs. She's starting a full fledged blog designing business in a couple of months! Thanks Jenny!!!

Long Time No Blog

So, I hesitated to start a blog, because I really didn't want to be one of those people who starts and blog, writes for a while, then just stops....and that's just what I did, but only for a few weeks and I've still been reading all of your blogs faithfully:)

Here's what we've been up to the past few weeks:

*HUGE highlight for Keith--he got to go the NCAA Final Four basketball games in San Antonio and cheer on the Memphis Tigers with his dad. This was such a dream come true for Keith. His favorite team made it to the final four, which just happened to be within driving distance! He LOVED every minute of it--except when the Tigers wimped out and lost the championship game in overtime:( I really need to get pictures of this from my sweet FIL!

*Having a slumber party with my parents while Keith was at the Final Four.

*Hanging out with good friends: Lauren and Nick, Whitney, Kina....too bad I didn't take pictures of any of these lovely people:(

*Playing putt putt! Abilene has a new place called Primetime and it's so cool...it's got putt putt, bowling, go carts, and video games and rumor has it they may even add a waterpark and resort...in Abilene? you ask....and the answer is yes, we just get cooler all the time;)

*Hanging out and working out with my sister.

*Watching great television like The Biggest Loser, American Idol, and The Office. Grey's comes back this week as a birthday present to me:) YAY!

*Seriously pondering for the first time in five years if teaching first grade is really the job for me since I cannot get my crazy kids to stop talking for more than two minutes.

*Visiting the home of one of my students and having my eyes open to the reality of her little life.

*Wondering and hoping that the time I spend with these sweet children each day is enough to make a positive difference in their lives.

*Going to school, getting lots of big hugs, sweet pictures, and kind words reminding me that teaching first grade is the perfect job for me, even if they make me crazy and want to pull my hair out sometimes:)

*Working on the t-shirt quilt.

*Jury Duty: This was a first for me, but they ended up settling without a jury, so it didn't get too dramatic!

*Getting out of jury duty early this morning and going to Walmart at 10:00 am. This was seriously wonderful. The best Walmart experience of my life. No one was there, but it wasn't like when I go at midnight to avoid the crowd and am surrounded by stockers either...just calm and wonderful:)

*Booking a condo in Gulf Shores, Alabama for a VACATION this summer. We are so excited to celebrate Keith's graduation and almost five years of marriage! The condo looks fabulous, the beach looks gorgeous, and there is a lot of fun stuff to do there like playing in the waves, fishing, dolphin and alligator watching, outlet malls, playing games, watching movies, and going on dates!! I'm ready to go right now!!!

*Counting down til Keith graduates. Only 18 days and one paper to go!

Spring Break 2008

We had a wonderful spring break! We had a good combination of playing and relaxing, with a few chores mixed in here and there.

We got to go visit Jacquie, Spruce, and precious Lynlee for a few days. We had a great time hanging out, talking, playing games, eating lots of good food, visiting their church, going to a church picnic, painting pottery (Keith, Spruce, and Lynlee didn't participate in that:)), and playing with sweet Lynlee! She is growing and learning so much! Jacquie and Spruce are wonderful parents!

When we came home I cleaned out our closets, packed up sweaters and unpacked tanks tops and bermuda shorts!!!! I'm excited that spring is here! I made a pretty decent sized stack of stuff to get rid of and am considering having a garage sale when school is out. I also pulled out all of Keith's college t-shirts so that I can make him a t-shirt quilt for graduation! (This will be a new project for me, and I have no clue what I'm doing, but I've already had tutorial number one with my mom, since she's already make one for my sister and I both!)

I spent a lot of time hanging out in my pj's with the kids from Tree Hill High and the girls from the sisterhood of the traveling pants...I'm sure the target audience for this TV show and book series is MUCH younger than me, but that's okay, I had fun anyway:)

Then, I got to hang out with my sweet sister-in-law, Laura. We had fun getting pedicures (umm...it really doesn't get any better than a good foot massage for me:)), playing at Target, and visiting PYOP (Paint Your Own Pottery). We didn't have time to paint, but we are most definitely going back...it is SUCH a cool place--yay Abilene for having a cool place like that:) Laura is lots of fun and we enjoyed doing girly stuff together!

I did other exciting stuff like getting my hair cut and going to the dentist...and yes, I have two cavities:(

Then, our sweet friends Mark and Tara came to visit. We always have fun spending time with them and enjoy a yummy Q basket at Harold's!

Sunday was a happy Easter for us with worship at Highland and family get-together with sammies and an egg hunt at my parent's house.

two words: SPRING BREAK!!!!