We're Practically BFF's

In every job, there are a few perks. My job gives me an endless supply of hugs and kisses.

Brody gets free rackets from his sponsor, discounted clothes and shoes, and his favorite perk: free lunches at the Men's Grill (yes-it's segregated-no women allowed). A few years ago we were able to go watch Andre Agassi and Andy Roddick play a tournament in Houston. His boss even got a trip to Wimbledon after all his years at the club. (hopefully we'll be around in 30 years for the same treat!)

Last night the club hosted a fundraiser for the Andy Roddick Youth Tennis Foundation. There was an exhibition but Andy got hurt at his last tournament so he just did the commentating. I missed that part, but Brody said it was hilarious. I DID however, make it just in time for this:

This is Mark Knowles who won the US Open a couple of years ago in doubles. He took Andy's place during the exhibition and did a great job from what I hear.

Both guys were really nice and down to earth. Brody was bummed that Roddick's swimsuit model wife wasn't there (ha!) but I think everyone had a good time anyway.

Here Andy is auctioning off some stuff-I don't know what it was because I tuned it out once I heard the bidding start at $2000.

Just another typical night out for us-schmoozing with tennis royalty. HA!

Today it was back to normal:

and I think that's pretty fabulous too!

The Only Thing Keeping Me Away From the Halloween Candy

In a moment of weakness (or PMS) I told Brody to buy the "good" candy for Halloween. And, because he's a good guy he not only bought the good stuff, he got it at Cost.co...meaning there is a HUGE bag of delicious chocolate right at my fingertips.

I decided I needed a project to keep me busy for at least a couple days until hopefully I would have the strength to resist. Here is our front porch:

I have to say that it looked worse before I bought the mums. It looks like a decent porch, but the bench was bugging me. Actually it was my mom that mentioned it might need to be spruced up a bit. In my typical fashion I was like, "yeah, yeah...blah, blah...I have kids to feed, laundry to do...I hate painting, so no thanks." Then some time passed and I decided, as usual, Mom was right. (aren't they always?! ps-remember this Scarlett and Clark)
So with the chocolate too close for comfort and a UT/OU game that was driving me insane I decided this would be the day to paint. I attempted to round up some helpers:

this guy claimed to have fever

(guys will do anything to get out of painting-ha!)

this guy had worked all morning and as evidenced here had a bag full of jalapeno chips and about three different football games on all at the same time rendering him too busy to be of any help

I asked my girl and she was all about helping me out as long as I called her Sally. (she is back on a Char.lie B.rown kick)

We washed the bench and right then it looked much much better! The next step was a light sanding....and I do mean light-you don't get these jello arms from elbow grease-it takes pure mediocrity to get them looking like they do. (sorry I don't have pictures of these steps...I kind of forgot I had the camera and Sally was busy running around with the hose chasing butterflies.)

Anyway...finally...I did a quick paint job. This will not win any painting awards. I think the right arm only has one coat because I got tired. And I used some spray paint on the tiny places I couldn't get my brush around. Thankfully, I don't think the painting police live in our neighborhood so I should be safe.

I think it looks about 10 times better. Now, I'm off to get a peanut butter cup :)

Easy Peasy Projects

OK, I'm almost embarrassed to show these projects, but sometimes it just takes looking at what other people are doing to come up with something creative yourself. So...here are two easy and CHEAP projects for Scarlett's room.

Last year, we went to Fredericksburg for our church Ladies Retreat. While shopping around we found a cute store with some fabric and other neat treasures. On one wall they had tons of embroidery hoops with fabric inside. Mom said that she had lots of hoops and they weren't being used so I snagged a few. Last week I made a trip to a local fabric shop and chose some for the hoops. I used to think if it didn't match it didn't "go" but now I'm a fan of everything just coordinating...so the more fabrics in a room the better!

Ta-da!

I actually have one more hoop, but only found 3 fabrics this trip so i may add another one later.

I was going to put the hoops along this wall (the one below this very long winded paragraph), but then decided they would look better along the wall with the bed-which left me with this blank space that I had intended to fill with my other project. (does that ever happen to you? you start one thing and then it leads to something else?!) Anyway, I had this leftover canvas. They came two to a pack and I got them at HobLob when they were 50% off. Scarlett loves to create, so I just let her at it. I helped her choose a background color and showed her how to get started painting it. Once that layer was done I gave her three choices of things I think she can draw pretty well that I knew would take up lots of space: a heart, a butterfly, or a flower. Then I showed her how to make dots with the back of the paintbrush. She did this whole thing herself. The heart is a bit off center, I would have spaced the dots differently, and it's certainly not perfect. But I love it!! Best of all...she had a blast painting. I can picture it with baby handprints, or a train for a boy, or an "S" for Superman...the possibilities really are endless!

Where's Waldo?

Seriously, I thought a trip to the Apple Orchard/Pumpkin Patch was for the kids. See if you notice anyone trying to get in all my shots. (it may be obvious to you but I had no idea that he was doing this)

Clark even noticed in this one...I was still oblivious.

Finally, I just gave him his own cut out. He can be such a ham sometimes!

Needless to say, whether young or just young at heart-everyone had a good time.