Happy Birthday, Karl

We've been celebrating Karl's birthday all weekend. We've been to Chattanooga, to Bass Pro Shop, and out to eat several times. Tonight was the Family birthday party. We had Karl's favorite meal, Hamburgers!  He also requested Angel Food Cake with strawberries, because it's not too bad for you.

The Birthday Cake

The official birthday candle lighter, Shek, doing his job.

Blowing out the candles. Jolie is excited about birthdays, she knows hers is next...she wanted to help daddy blow out his candle, but just after supper and before the cake, she rubbed her eyes, looked at daddy and said, "Daddy, I'm sleepy." She crawled up in his lap and went to sleep, and missed out on her favorite part of birthdays, the CAKE.

Fire's out.

Happy Birthday to the sweetest hubby on the planet. Hope it's the best birthday ever.

Spur of the Moment Trip

Karl and I had been talking about taking a quick day trip. We said we were just going to get up one morning load up the kids and not tell them where we were going till we were well on our way. We had wanted to go to Savannah, but there was a tropical storm brewing and we decided to go  the other direction and went to Chattanooga instead. Karl had a coupon for his birthday at his favorite BBQ place in Chattanooga. We did load up this morning and take off, but we did give the heads up to the kids last night. Everyone was excited.

Karl enjoyed his free birthday ribs...and the rest of us enjoyed a splurge too.
We enjoy walking around the downtown area of Chattanooga and always end up at the riverfront.

Jolie and Shek were anxious to wade in the water...

Look at my sweeties. Aren't they cute?

Someone was leaning over my shoulder while I was scrolling through the photos, so I snagged our photo while she was hugging me.

Someone had wet feet, and big bro. didn't want to get those wet feet on his shirt...so this is why he's holding her at an arms length.

My girls sitting by the river.

My crew sitting by the river in the hot boiling sun...everyone needs shades.

Standing by the river's edge, Shek was a little nervous.

My two oldest...only 3 years apart in age...

The kids love to visit Chattanooga cupcakes before coming back home. Shek had the domino cupcake, the girls got key lime cupcakes. I just had a taste of their cupcakes.

I think Shek's photo could make a great advertisement for Chattanooga cupcakes.

We thought the mellow mushroom sign was really cute.

 Here's a photo of me and the KARL...

Jolie really loves flowers and we saw these beautiful pots of flowers along the sidewalks of the downtown area. Maybe she will have a green thumb, and help us grow beautiful flowers like these.

TODAY was a really pleasant day for a spur of the moment trip...

my baseball boys

There has been a lot of ball practice going on around here. It's become the hobby of my boys. Every chance they have, they are outside, throwing, catching and batting the ball...even I have joined the fun. AND we all know that God didn't put much athletic ability in my bag.

My boys

Shek loves to practice ball in the yard.

Don't you love the quality? Sorry all I had on me was my phone

All that practice paid off...Shek gets the game ball at Mondays game. 

He caught a ball and saved several runs.

Shek was excited...we celebrated with a little mexican food after the game, his favorite. AND karl and I discovered grilled chicken fajita salads...good food choice for us.

Em's new do...

Em was beginning to look like the Shaggy D. A.

SO

I found a new groomer...

we loved her quality work and her prices were pretty awesome too.

Em loves getting her hair done...well, actually she likes to priss around after the fact, because she knows she's cute...it's the going to the groomer that's not her favorite.

I think she is lookin' pretty sweet with that little pink bow in her top knot...

Now wonder how long that bow will actually stay?

tu tu cute

Jolie found her tutu today and had to wear it. This was her fashion statement for the day and she was pretty serious about wearing it everywhere we went today.  Finally around lunch time in a restaurant she was ready to give it up for the day. She was tutu cute, don't you agree?

Mother's Day~Baby/Child Dedication

This past Sunday on Mother's Day was Baby/Child Dedication at our church. We've been home with Jolie a little over a year and had not yet participated in a baby dedication at church. SO, when we received the email from our church inviting us to participate in the Mother's Day baby dedication, we jumped at the chance to be apart of that special dedication service. Jolie is the 4th baby we've had dedicated at church. This was a very special baby dedication as the church went above and beyond to make the dedication a special one for all involved. First we were greeted with a muffins,juice and coffee breakfast, a photo with the pastor, a sweet little photo of each child was placed in the bulletin and each child received a packet with a Bible, and 2 letters from the Pastor one for the parents, and one to be saved and read by the child on the day that they accept Jesus into their hearts as their personal Lord and Savior. It was an awesome day!... Here's some photos from the day...

Dad and Jolie waiting at the breakfast

About to head up the steps as our names are called out...

me and my kiddos

The Whole Berry Crew

My mom aka Gam with all her descendants...

It was a great mom's day

Shek's field trip Adventure...

As many of you know we homeschool around here. There are many reasons why we started homeschooling so many years ago, ONE being that God just opened up the HOMEschool DOOR and shoved us right on in. Sometimes, I need a little push...lol

We continue to homeschool for some of the same reasons we had when we started, but have added a few other reasons along the way as well. One being, I just like being with my kids. Yes, we have moments when we get on each others nerves. There are times when I am TIRED of helping with school work and tired of School in general, usually the tired of it attitude sets in around this time of year, and I think all school goers deal with it(teachers, students, all involved). But all in all, I like being in control of curriculum, making sure its Christian based. etc...

Shek has been wanting to go on a field trip all year, and I finally put a field trip on the calendar about 6 weeks ago. He helped me check the calendar and  we penciled it in. We went on the field trip last Friday and made a family affair out of it...the grands went, college boy went and both girls went too. Daddy missed out, he had to work.

Our long awaited field trip was to tour the Braves Stadium at Turner Field. Shek is a hands on learner and we have done a lot of unit studies over the years. My philosophy is if it's not fun and engaging, then we are not doing it. SO, we keep our sanity by doing unit studies. It engages us, we have fun, and we all learn something and retain it. He is really in to sports, and begged to do the baseball unit study by  Amanda Bennett. We've used many of her studies over the years.

He was  excited and ready to do school each morning when baseball was the unit study. He willing wrote letters to all of the ball teams requesting a fan pack. He usually hates writing anything, but he wrote so many letters that I ran out of stamps.

  So to tie a ribbon around our last study of the year, we went to Turner field. There were lots of schools there last Friday as well. I thought we had chosen the wrong day to come, but, because we were a small family group of 7 we had our own little private tour. AND it was totally awesome. If you're ever in the Turner Field Area...take the tour, very worth it and fun.

 Shek posing in the museum by Smoltz's jersey and such. Smoltz is one of my all time favs.

 Jolie on the train...

Some more of my favorites...

 With Hank Aaron

 Posing with the mac-daddy award...

 Need I say more...

 These cannons blow at homeruns...

 Mowed twice a day...

 The Atlanta skyline from the top of the stadium with a glimpse of the old stadium's wall.

 Fancy coke bottle all digital or something fancy like that...

Loved the quote.

 I still love this photo of the Braves

 Karlie and Pop wait for our tour to start while sitting in the museum dugout

 Gam and I always have our cameras...just call us Mable Lane (family joke)...

 Shek at the desk...he's such a sports commentator at home.

 Painting the tomahawk...

 Our great tour guide, Dave.

 The Skip Carey Room

 Yes this is our glimpse of the locker room...and those are Heyward's jeans hanging on the hook.

 There was a security guard that would not let you go up in the room...you could only peer in at the door, but hey that's still pretty cool and close...

 The hallway going toward the locker room.

 Sitting in the duggout...how cool is that?

 All of us in the dugout.

When we got home, Shek had received his very first fan pack in the mail from the Braves. He received a letter, a photo, a schedule, a sticker, and a pack of dirt that was scooped up on the day of Bobby Cox's last game as manager. That fan pack in the mail, was just icing on the cake for his special day. Isn't God so good to be in the details...like that...amazing!

Next time you're in Atlanta...stop at Turner Field and take  a little tour.