THA SMIFF'S: 09/01/2011

Sunday, September 25, 2011

"Thank You" project

I listen to a radio morning show on my commute every day that is collecting Thank You letters or letters of gratitude for every single American soldier that is deployed outside of the States. I was touched by this concept and wanted Ben to participate as well. He doesn't quite get what a "soldier" is but I wanted him to know that it's good to do nice things for people. So I wrote a few things on some paper and let him go to town coloring. He drew some soldiers, and I helped with a tent, a witch, some smiley faces, his "name", we traced his hand... it was fun. It was good one on one time for us too. Here he is with two of his letters! I hope they mean so much to someone out there. If you are interested in participating, HERE is the link!

Awesome Autumn Weekend

It's definitely feeling Autumn-ish out there, and I love it. The best part of living in GA is the really fantastic Spring and Autumn/Fall. We've had a beautiful weekend. I don't remember what we did Friday night but it doesn't really matter. Saturday we got a call from our friends Jared and Kaela asking if we wanted to go with them and their daughter Aubrey to Lake Lanier to swim and hang out. Ryan hasn't been feeling great, so he welcomed the chance to get out and get some fresh air. Plus Ben LOVES playing with Aubrey and I love mine and Kaela's talks. :) On our way there, Jared called and said his dad happened to be up there with his boat test driving it after having had it at the mechanics. We were pretty excited, especially Ryan, because it's been forever since either of us have been on a boat. Ben's never been so it was an awesome surprise.

Ben's 1st boat ride

Me, Kaela and Aubrey went out on the ride first and then came back and then the boys went. Jared and Ryan then each took turns water skiing! I was so proud of my man! He hasn't been on a boat in like 20 years or something, and he got up first try! Yay! Ben enjoyed the boat ride but was ready to get off so he could play with Aubrey on the beach.

My man skiing!

Kaela and I enjoyed talking and philosophising while the 3 older "men" went on another boat ride and we just all enjoyed each other's company! It was a lot of fun!
Today we planted two iris and several Tulip bulbs for the Spring! It was exciting to see them coming up and growing this year and next year it will be just as fun! Ben helped us plant most of them. We also had the gang over for chili tonight and that was nice. Now, it's back to work... sigh. If only... Have a good one!

Monday, September 19, 2011

I Believe in Miracles...

We went camping! Success! Well… almost. As reported before… it always seems to rain the weekends we plan to camp. So this time we didn’t really want “plan” it just so we didn’t jinx ourselves. Our friend Jared told us about this convenient campground that he and his family always go to, so we thought we’d give it a try. It wasn’t a far drive, it was on Lake Lanier, and it just sounded nice. We also decided to make it just a trip for the 3 of us (and our dog Ally) so we could test out our new [HUGE] tent. So Saturday morning, Ryan declared that he wanted a clean house when we got home so we cleaned and cleaned and packed up the car. Ben kept asking us ALLLLLLLL morning long… “Are we going camping?” Right before we were to leave, Ryan got on the website for the campground and it said that all sites were full. Of course, we were pretty bummed. But I didn’t want to give up! I thought that we could drive somewhere… ANYWHERE and surely there would be a campsite open for us to use for just ONE STINKIN’ NIGHT! So even though Ryan was a bit of a grumpy bear, we jumped in the car and drove up to the campground we were recommended to just to see… maybe, just maybe if there was someone who cancelled or something. So we got there, and luckily the website was TOTALLY wrong and there were plenty of sites available. This made Ryan VERY happy. We picked ours out, paid the nice young men (wow I just sounded so old-ladyish) for the site and went to go get our food for the evening and breakfast. We got back to the site about 3:30-4pm and set up the tent and got settled in. Decided around 5pm to start making our chili dogs and well… our quiet time in nature ended. Nearby… not far away, a live cover band started playing at a house or a party or something. It was loud enough, that we could sing along with the songs. They proceeded to play for a couple hours… and then we thought they were done. Nope… they started up again and played until 11PM! They stopped and started so many times we thought “surely this must be it…” several times, and there were even fireworks involved a few of those times too… it was a little ridiculous when they started singing the same songs they’d already sung again towards the end. Also, since we were by the lake, there were several boats, several times that would play their choice of music quite loudly as they drove by. Around 8:30 Ben had had it, he was tired and being a booger head so I took him in to the tent and got him his jammies on and all settled in- and to my dismay and disgust heard unmentionable noises coming from our neighbor’s tent! I had to put my hands over Ben’s ear at one point! And it didn’t just happen once; it was two times… the second time with more graphic “instruction”. Yuck!!! (Ben was asleep for that one though, thankfully!) It was a strange feeling sitting in our camp chairs by the fire looking out at such beautiful scenery but feeling like we were sitting in the middle of the city with all the noise around us. It was actually more annoying than strange really. Ryan and I got tired, so we decided despite all the noise we’d go to bed- this was around 10:30, finally the music stopped at 11pm and we were finally able to go to sleep. However, we were woken up at 1am to the sound of fireworks somewhere also close by. Those were being lit on and off for about an hour, woke Ben up and everything. Then at 2am… I had to pee. And so did Ryan. So after we went, we sat up and talked and laughed for a little while. At 4am I heard the previously mentioned neighbor shout out “GET YOUR OWN SLEEPING BAG!” then quiet, then “Get off your butt and get your own *bleeping* sleeping bag”. SERIOUSLY? (Quite a different sentiment than what was being expressed earlier in the evening!) Mister Yelly-Pants finally settled down, and I went back to sleep. But then moments later, heard their van doors shutting and then said van driving off. Went back to sleep. At 6am… heard a loud airplane and a boat (probably someone going early morning fishing). Then by 7 both Ben and I were awake. Weirdly… the neighbors were still there… We got up, and went to the restroom. We made breakfast (Ryan's favorite part and requirement) and cleaned up and went home! It was pretty chilly and windy anyway so playing at all was not particularly an option… plus our dog just isn’t a camping/outdoor dog and she was driving us crazy. So we camped! We didn’t really sleep… but we camped! Luckily Ben’s a trooper and all except for the fireworks he slept through most/all of it. He had a horrid sounding little cough though I worried about, but he seems to be fine. We are hoping to go again with some friends this weekend, but we shall see! Not sure if I want to go back to that campground but besides the noise it was a nice place and not far from home. I leave you with photos.

Monday, September 5, 2011

Labor Day Weekend- gone bust

Well, it pretty much kind of sucks when you have something planned and it doesn't pull through. Ryan and I both kind of have a hard time with that, we've taught Ben NOT to be like that which is good- because we both tend to pout a little. We had planned to go camping just ONE stinkin' night this long weekend... and well, a hurricane that was on the Gulf Coast decided to make it's way up to Georgia (after having been in a drought) ON LABOR DAY WEEKEND. (me sticking my tongue out at Hurricane Lee) We bought ourselves a brand new tent, since last time we camped the tent we had leaked from a rain storm and then the poles broke afterwards. This time we took our time searching for the perfect tent, a Kelty 6 person tent (that I got for like $100 bucks off might I add). It's HUGE, but will be a good fit for us for a long time to come. We kind of wish now in hindsight we would've just gone Saturday night, but we didn't- and well, we tried to make the best of the rest of our weekend and here's what we've done.

Mafia at the Elton's

Friday night we went over to our friend's, The Elton's, for Mark's 30th birthday party ate yummy food and played Mafia (fun game).

Yesterday, we did a little shopping and then later had a cookout with the hotdogs meant to be cooked at the campground with some of our friends at home(no pictures...).

Today, we went over to the Terry's house to eat lots of junk food and play Rock Band! We got rained out of doing anything outdoors so this was our solution! Ben did pretty good (for a 3 year old) on those drums! I hope to have a musician of some sort on our hands! (There was even a tornado warning in the county the Terry's live in, Ryan and I stood outside and listen to the sirens going off, very eerie sounding, at the high school nearby. It was in the western part of the county though, so luckily we were not affected!)

Band name suggestions include "3.5" and "Little Benny and the Big Kids"

Well, goodbye summer time. Goodbye swimming pools. Goodbye splash parks. We have had a pretty fun summer! Fall is creeping in, the leaves are starting to change. And today, with the storm it just felt like all of a sudden Autumn has crept in. Which, I'm pretty okay with. As you all know, I LOVE the Fall. I love everything we get to look forward to in the coming months. I hope that Ben had a good summer. This seems to be the first year that he'll probably start remembering things, and I hope it's been good for him. Here's a recap in pictures.