Walkin' in Memphis

We spent this past weekend in Memphis doing our best to make sure Alex got married. Luckily, he made it all the way to the alter with minimal persuasion! J/K!

Here's Alex with his roomie groomsmen, Parker and Rob, before the rehearsal dinner.



Alex's incredible groomsmen gift - a fancy camping pillow - made a great soccer ball for Robert and Parker after the rehearsal dinner.







We had so much fun seeing our Alabama friends at the wedding. I had no idea they were all going to be there and it was such a great surprise to get to catch up with Erin and Hallie and break it down on the dance floor with Anne and Rob.



None of the guys look happy in this picture - I think because it took me four tries to take it.


Robert's mom and dad drove all the way to Memphis for the wedding. It was great to see them. We had a lot of fun touring downtown Memphis. I'll have to post the pics we took on Dr. Adams' camera so you can see all we did Saturday afternoon.



Mr. and Mrs. Alex Ransone!


Hanging with Erin and Hallie post reception.

Ultimate Frisbee Tournament

Robert played in an ultimate frisbee tournament on Saturday, and now that our camera is fixed I got to go out and get some pics. He played with the BE&K team that he plays pick-up games with during the week on his lunch break. Luckily, this time they played on fields 10 minutes from our house and not in Talladega so it was a lot more convenient --- but still extremely HOT! They ended up losing but Robert played well as usual and had a fun time.







My mom came out to see Robert play. We watched and cheered for a while and then went fabric shopping while Robert played the rest of his tournament. Rob and I both enjoyed spending time with her. Thanks for coming out to spend your Saturday with us, mom!

Happy Birthday Robert

Robert turned the big 25 on August 3 and we celebrated with a fun party at the house. It was great to have a place big enough to host all our friends. We had about 30 people over - most of the families from our small group at Faith Church, college friends who are now in Bham, and friends from work, supper club, etc., that we've made since we've moved here.

The theme of the party was "Come Help Us Celebrate Our New Discount on Car Insurance!" (What else is big about turning 25?!?!!??) We had a great time entertaining everyone. We ordered pizza and then Robert helped me make pigs in a blanket, Bruschetta, chicken nuggets, tortilla roll-ups, and a veggie tray. We also had ice cream and cake from Savage's, the local Bakery in Homewood. But we both liked Mrs. Wright's cake better (She's the friend of my family who make our wedding cake.), so from here on out we're ordering her cakes for all special occasions. It's totally worth the drive to Center Point to pick it up.

Here's Rob blowing out his candles. His cake was decorated with Hot Wheels cars, money signs, and his insurance card!





Anne and Rob - great friends from UA.



Megan and Austin Dalgo - more great friends from college. I lived with Meg for two years and Robert lived with Austin. They been married two years and just moved to Bham from St. Louis where Austin attended seminary. Austin just started med school at UAB and Meg will start teaching social studies at a local private school next week. We're so excited their in Bham and live only 10 minutes away!



These are some friends from our Small Group at church. Elizabeth Taylor, Philip Moss, and David and Sara Marsh (David and Sara are married but Sara was being funny and moved way far away from David when I took the pic.) Philip's wife Renee and son, Little Philip also came. So did Keith, Jennifer, and Jackson Cooke and Jimmy and Laura Lee Goree.



Robert and Eric Skocelas, whose also in our small group along with his wife, Sarah, and little girl, Emory.



Thanks everyone for celebrating with us!

Our Weekend

After arriving back in the 'Ham Friday night following our vacation in S.C., we basically crashed. We spent Saturday unpacking and whacking away at the brush and weeds in our yard. You can tell the yard has been cared for in the past, just not recently, so we had to clean out some flower beds and get rid of this crazy vine growing over our fence in the backyard that was about to take over the nice ivy we have growing there too.

Robert trimmed up some shrubbery in the front and back and managed to dig up an incredibly long root system from a sweet gum tree that was cut down but whose roots have still set up residence in our lawn. I think he was able to uproot them with special vigor since once of them was the culprit for tearing up one of his lawn mower blades.

We've discovered the mosquitoes around our house are especially vicious. I was working in jeans and a long sleeve shirt to avoid bites. We're hoping to rid ourselves of them once we get rid of all the old stuff in our flower beds. (If any of you were bitten an abnormally high number of times at our 4th of July cookout, please forgive us!)

After our yard work on Saturday we went to Kyle and Megan Manley's for dinner. We had a blast hanging out with them and especially getting to know Megan better. I'm so glad they're in Bham and look forward to having some fun couple times with them.

We kept the nursery at church today and had to jointly manage NINE 2-year-olds!!! Talk about crazy. I think that's about the best form of birth control we can get. The children were good, but still, that's a lot of kids and craziness all at once. We were both so tired afterwards. I think we've been sleepy all day. After a week with Tallon and then this nursery experience I have a much greater respect for parents and their strength, patience, and stamina.

UAB Bound

We found out this week that Robert was accepted into UAB's MBA program. He'll start classes August 22, and can no longer joke with me about being a Blazer because he'll be one too now. He'll likely just take two classes two nights each week.

We're both really excited about this opportunity. Everyone we've talked too and everything we've read tout the engineering/MBA combo as really the way to go.

I'm also planning on grad school and will likely start a master's degree in public administration in January once I've been a UAB employee for 6 months and they'll foot the bill for my education. Hopefully we'll end up with classes on the same nights.

We're both excited about this phase and especially the opportunity to continue our educations, but it's really tough to think about going back to school. It's crazy how quickly you get out of the swing of things. But it will be neat to meet new people in classes and learn new things. It also helps that our new house is all of 10 minutes from UAB.

Vacation

Robert and I just returned from a great, week-long vacation at his family's lake house in South Carolina. We really enjoyed relaxing by the lake and spending time with his parents, his Nana and Papa, his older sister Rebecca and her husband Reeves and their little boy Tallon, and his younger sister Liz and her husband Mike. Tallon was especially fun and already LOVES the water, boat, jet skies, and everything wet. He's not even 2 yet but has definitely graduated to the big boy toys.

My sister-in-law took some great pics that are posted on her blog, along with some cute videos. Be sure and check them out.

Some highlights of the trip:

• Actually getting up on one ski, albeit not for very long.
• Realizing I'm finally getting the hang of the Adams family's famous Shanghai card game.
  
• Nice, long boat rides cruising Lake Marion.
• Fun with our little nephew.
• Mimi's and Nana's wonderful cooking and Papa's fried fish.
  
• Listening to Seabiscuit on tape and having the 6.5-hour drive up and down fly by.
  

Now, if only we can get up for work tomorrow.

If Only the Cameras Worked...

Both of our cameras broke this past week, so it's been a little hard to blog about the new house and the different events we've hosted since we moved it. After Robert's camera kept giving us the memory card error message I decided to dig out mine only to discover the screen went out. Luckily, I "purchased" a 3-year warranty that expires next month from the Sears sales associate back in college. This young guy definitely finagled the whole deal to "get me a good deal" and then wrote his name and number on the receit "in case the camera broke." So I guess it sometimes pays off to have guys flirt with you in college because now we get to get the camera fixed for free. It was a mess though trying to take the camera back to the retail store only to be told to call Sears and then getting the runaround on several phone calls before realizing we just have to drop it off at the repair store - conveniently a quarter mile away. :)

After moving in the new place, we hosted a 4th of July party for friends and family who had to bring their own lawn chairs because we don't have any outdoor furniture yet! Thanks to everyone who brought food and helped us have a great time. My parents brought their grill so we grilled out hamburgers and really had way too much food. But were were all happy and full by the time we made our way to downtown Homewood to watch the fireworks over Vulcan. Jake let us park in his driveway and then we set up lawn chairs in the street and watched the show with the rest of the block party. I'll try to see if anyonce took any pics and post what I can dig up. I do know Dad took a lot of video. (Most of it embarrassing stuff of us standing in front of the house while he's yelling to the neighbors walking their dog that we're "First Time Home Owners!") I'm sure it's pretty funny. The lady was actually cool about a potentially awkward moment and yelled back a "Welcome to the Neighborhood."

We've been able to meet both neighbors and then a couple across the street. Everyone is so nice. It really is like Americana with people out running and walking their dogs and saying hey to you in Publix. We even had a neighbor bring us cookies. I've enjoyed jogging through different parts of Edgewood and looking at how people have landscaped as we think about ways to fix up the yard. Robert's wants to cut the grass every three days or so because he loves the lawn mover so much. We've actually had a lot of rain lately so he hasn't been able to cut it a second time, but I think he's planning to get to it tonight.

We've really enjoyed entertaining. We had Parker and Ashley over for dinner this week and then hosted our small group last night. It's nice to have room for everyone, especially with the three children in our small group getting bigger and louder, and share what the Lord has blessed us with.