Bama vs. Arkansas

The Bama/Arkansas gave last weekend was a swamp, literally, due to the crazy rain downpour we had right before kickoff. Luckily, the weather cleared up just in time to head into Bryant Denny. We had a blast tailgating with Shelby's family and lots of Clay-Chalkville folks. We didn't take too many pics (I think six totally between mom and me) because of all the rain, but I wanted to post a few of them here.

As you can see from the background of this pic, we had quite the feast. Shelby's mom was a great host and we had tons of yummy food and all managed to stay pretty dry between the tents and our ponchos. This game the tailgating crew stepped up the tailgating experience with the introduction of the tiki bar - built the night before on the quad! I didn't get a good pic to showcase the true craftmanship, but let's just say it's pretty nice.

Dad and mom manned the grill and everyone had full stomaches before we watched the Tide roll over the hogs.

Sweet Victory for Dothan High

This past weekend we headed down to South Alabama with our good friends Rob and Anne to watch the Dothan Tigers take on #6 ranked Opelika High School. Robert's roommate and one of our good friends from College, Jake, is teaching at Dothan High and Offensive Coordinator for the football team. We wanted to make sure we could go to one of his home games this year, and it turned out that last weekend was about the only weekend we had available. Knowing they were playing a really really good team, we pretty much went down there expecting a loss. Boy were we surprised.

As the scoreboard shows, the home team beat one of the best teams in the state with a come from behind win. Dothan got an early jump but then fell behind. Late in the fourth quarter they turned things around, scoring 15 points in 2 minutes to take the lead - with Jake calling the offensive plays that secured the victory. It went something like this.

• Play a decent first quarter, with defense and special teams scoring early points
  
• Play not so great second, third, and early fourth quarters - narrowly avoiding something like 8 interceptions
  
• Drive for a touchdown late in the 4th
• Go for two and make it
• Recover a perfect on-sides kick
• Drive again, nearly throw an interception, score a 40-yard rushing touchdown on this beautiful screen pass you almost didn't get the chance to throw because the play before should have seriously been an interception.
• Relish in what everyone told us was "the best Dothan victory in 10 years!" (See pic #1)

Granted, Jake called some pretty good plays, but I personally think our all-out Dothan attire played a significant role in the victory. Jake left all his Dothan shirts out for us so we could represent. I think they were clean.

Here's some more pics from the game and some very blurry ones of Jake coaching on the sidelines which I took from far up in the bleachers. I thought about going down close to the field to get some good, close-up shots but decided our friendship might be compromised by my paparazzi methods.


And, as an added bonus, I got to see my sweet friend Leigh from college who I haven't seen in over a year. We were roommates together when we studied abroad in Italy the summer before our senior year and bonded over countless scoops of gelato eaten while window shopping along the streets Florence. Leigh now teaches at Dothan Middle School. It was so so good to see her and catch up!


Here's an article from the Dothan Eagle about the win:

Dothan High football win generates local, state attention

By David Mundee
September 15, 2009

For the first time in a long while, Dothan High football was the talk of the Wiregrass and the state last Friday night and Saturday morning.

The Tigers earned their biggest win in more than a decade, stunning sixth-ranked Opelika in a wild one at Rip Hewes Stadium, 45-41.

Dothan rallied with two touchdowns in the final 1:10 to claim the win.

The win was the first for Dothan over a ranked team in nine years since beating No. 2 Cairo (Ga.) 20-13 on Sept. 22, 2000. It was the first win over an Alabama-ranked team since the 1998 season opener over Class 5A No. 7 ranked Greenville, 24-6.

Dothan improved to 2-1, its best start after three games since beginning 2004 at 4-0.
The Tigers have already matched their win total of the last two years combined (2).

It was Dothan's first win over Opelika in 37 years, back to a 27-12 win in 1972. Opelika had won 11 straight in between.

The Tigers earned a region win over somebody other than Russell County for the first time since beating Smiths Station in 2005, breaking a streak of 22 losses to region teams other than the Warriors.

The 45 points were the most for the Tigers since scoring 48 against Jeff Davis in the 2004 season opener.

The 41 points allowed were the most ever in a Dothan victory, surpassing the previous high of 35 set by Fort Walton Beach in 2005 and also by Auburn in 2001.

The combined 86 points between Dothan and Opelika were the most in a game involving Dothan, surpassing the 83 points from the Tigers' 49-34 win over Bay (Fla.) in a 1997 game in Panama City.

The total points were also the most in the 45-year history of Rip Hewes Stadium, surpassing the 77 points in Dothan's 42-35 win over Auburn in 2001.

Le "grand" finish: Quarterback Jay LeGrand delivered a grand finish for Dothan, directing the last two drives with touchdown passes to help the Tigers rally from 11 down in the final 1:10.
The senior, who threw for 273 yards and four touchdowns in the game, was honored as one of the top performers in the Alabama High School Athletic Association Prep Spotlight.

LeGrand threw a 2-yard pass to Fontaine Stratton and a two-point conversion to Benard McGhee to cut the margin to 41-38.

Then after a successful onsides kick recovery by Dothan, LeGrand lofted a pass to Brandon Knight, who weaved his way downfield for a 48-yard TD pass to give Dothan the lead with 39 seconds left.

LeGrand wasn't the only Tiger in this week's AHSAA spotlight. Kicker Ryan Mullins was honored after hitting three field goals and four extra-points in the win over Opelika. Mullins hit field goals of 27, 35 and 32 yards.

Bama/Va Tech Game

We had the best time in Atlanta for the season opener against Virginia Tech! It was so great to see so many good friends from college. A big thanks to Amy and Matt for being such great and gracious hosts to 20+ people only two weeks after moving into their new home! Here are some pics from the weekend. I'm definitely going to miss the season opener in Atlanta next year. Each time we've made the trip it has been so fun and exciting.

Florence, S.C.

This past weekend we traveled to South Carolina to visit Robert's family. We hadn't seen the Adams crew, including the niece and nephew, since Mother's Day last May, and boy do kids change in three months! We were amazed at how big they were. Tal was riding his bike without training wheels and looking more and more like a little boy and Tess was crawling! We had a great weekend with everyone and of course ate like kings off Mimi's and Nana's wonderful cooking! We left on Sunday loaded down with yummy leftovers (didn't have to cook Monday!), fresh veggies from the garden, a super cute bag Robert's mom made me (to be featured in a later post), and even a cactus Papa's potted for me!

Here's Miss Tess, now nine months old, in the beautiful dress MiMi made for her.

Tallon loves cooking with Mimi and his mom and likes to help in the kitchen. He's a pretty versatile chef - frying squash and adding sprinkles to cupcakes!

He's also quite the talker. Can't remember what great story he was telling us here but look how into it he is! Kinda looks like he's trying to sell us a ponzi scheme! Who could resist from a kid that cute and persuasive???

Tal and Tess with their daddy, Reeves.

Miss Tess loves her Mimi!

Robert got a new gameday shirt for his birthday! He will definitely put that to use this fall.

It was so good to see Robert's Nana and Papa. As usually, we brought PaPa some of his favorite Conecuh sausage out of Evergreen, Alabama which he can't get in South Carolina. It's our standard peace offering to ensure we get some of his fried fish each trip home.

Here's the big boy on his bike...

We had a great visit! Loved seeing y'all!

BEACH!

We had a great vacation with my family in Destin last week. We celebrated Robert's graduation, his 27th birthday, and not having to go to work or school or worry about anything other than sleeping, eating, outlet shopping, and laying out for eight whole days. It was wonderful! Thanks to my family for a great time. The boys got to play some golf, we had lots of fun just chilling at the beach or by the pool, and we ate some great seafood.

One day we headed over to Lilian, Alabama to visit with some of our family on the Summerville side, including my dad's older brother, Uncle Richard, and his sons and their families who live there. Check out the slideshow of pics for their super cute kids: Alex, Erin, Bella, and Jack Summerville. We'd hadn't seen them in forever!

Kyle and I got a kick out of my cousin Wes and his wife Jenny admonishing their cute and mischievous little boy by using his full name with a phrase like, "Jack Summerville, you come here!" Out of my dad and his six siblings, my brothers are the only male Summervilles aside from my cousins Rick and Wes, so we're not used to hearing that name when it doesn't refer to us. My aunt Cathy and cousin Christina and her husband and sweet boys were down visiting as well, so we had a full house. It really was a great time with family.

Here's the view from our balcony and the pool area.


Some more pics from the week are below. For the full album check out the slideshow at the end of the post.