Trail of Tears Triathlon

The weekend of Emory's birthday my sister and Curt came in town to help celebrate.  The timing worked out GREAT because Ryan had his final triathlon of the season at Trail of Tears State Park.  It's only about 20 minutes from Cape and it is a gorgeous area....not to mention the temperature was in the 50's and it was AWESOME.  It felt like a real fall morning.  So we all loaded up bright and early and headed out to watch Ryan and Jason compete.

It was SO COLD in the morning...I can't imagine swimming in a pond.  Thankfully, they have wet-suits, so it isn't as bad, but holy cow...

Watching Ryan get out of the swim..

Is this not the most handsome hunk ever?  HA!  Curt is a pretty tall guy and he didn't bring any "cold weather" clothes with him because he didn't know it was going to be so chilly.  So he borrowed my Dad's old SEMO sweatshirt from 1980 and we could NOT stop laughing.

Jason was about a minute ahead of Ryan going into the run, but Ryan ended up passing him and beating him by 11 seconds.  These boys...they are always neck and neck!

Did Lindsey and I marry some studs or what?? HAHA!

And Curt likes to climb trees..

Heather Mayhew...this last picture is for you!  HA!

It was SUCH a gorgeous morning at the park and we had the best morning cheering on Ryan and Jason and hanging out together!!!

Fair Day with Cousin Charli

During the week of the fair we met up with Sarah and Charli (Ansley was in school) to let the girls ride a few rides together and enjoy more of the fair.  Brynn's been in this stage the last year or so where she's pretty scared to ride rides, so I was shocked when she jumped right on several things.  It probably helped that she wanted to be the "big girl" to her cousin Charli.  They were SO CUTE and it was really fun watching them ride the rides together!

There was a little "Pirate Ship" ride and Brynn didn't want to ride that, so Charli and I got to ride together.  (Sarah couldn't ride anything obviously because she was 9 months pregnant.  She has since had her sweet baby and I can't wait to share pictures!)

They thought they were so funny lifting their hands in the air every time they would come around.  =)

And then the next ride they got put on it with a little boy (no idea who he was)...who clearly wasn't enjoying being stuck with two loud girls in the flying puppy dog...HA!

We finished the afternoon with some fair food and headed home for naps.  So glad we were able to take the girls to do this!

Memphis - Beth Moore Conference

This post is totally out of order, but I just realized I never blogged about it!  Whoops!  Back toward the end of August I headed to Memphis with some of my closest friends to go see Beth Moore! 

We actually got to go to a Lifeway Leadership Conference a day earlier, as part of the Preschool Council at church.  It was SO GOOD!  Love these girls!

Me, Emily, Jennilee, and our preschool director (and friend) Christy

Christy should have won a big door prize at one of the Leadership Conference's opening sessions.  She was in the bathroom and you had to "be present" to win.  She literally walked in like 10 seconds after they called the next name!  But then in one of our sessions she won another door prize and we could not stop laughing...what are the odds???

We had YUMMY yummy dinner Thursday night.  Sometimes a fun night out with the girls is just what the doctor ordered!

Friday morning we got up and finished our Leadership Conference before a little afternoon break of shopping.  Then it was on to Memphis's Fed-Ex forum for the Beth Moore "Living Proof Live" conference...it was just amazing!

9000 women were there and it was just awesome!  So many of my close friends from church went and it was just a blast worshiping and learning together!  I can't wait to go again...if you ever have the opportunity to hear Beth Moore speak in person, DO IT!

FAIR DAY - Monday

A couple of weeks ago was the annual SEMO District Fair.  It just seems like it kicks off fall...the air was a little cooler (at least a couple of days) and we had a great time going to check out the animals and experience the good old fair!

On Monday morning the girls and I were out running errands and decided to stop by for an hour or so before lunch.  We walked through the animals and looked at some of the exhibits.  It was so fun!

The roosters and chickens were so loud...Brynn was standing at the edge of the tent!  HA!

My mom entered one of her embroidered Christmas stockings in the fair (that feels hilarious typing that...hello 1960!)  We were trying to find it and when we did it had a BLUE RIBBON!  It was hilarious...Brynn kept saying "I WON!  I WON!"  HAHA!

Later that day my dad was off work and when the girls got up from naps we decided to go walk around with Grandpa.  One of my favorite childhood memories is going to the fair with my dad.  Since he grew up on a farm he would always walk around with us and tell us about when he was a little boy.  I wanted my girls to experience that too!

I told Brynn we were heading back to the fair and this is what she put on...HILARIOUS!

Grandpa had lots of fun telling the girls about the tractors...

When we walked through some of the cows, they were milking them.  We got an interesting lesson from one of the dairy farmers about how they milk the cows and got to watch them empty one of the buckets.  WHOA is all I can say...

My dad loves to get pork burgers at the fair, so the girls got treated to a pork burger from Grandpa!

Thanks Grandpa for a fun day at the fair!

Fair Parade and Grocery Carts

A couple of Saturdays ago it was time for the annual SEMO District Fair Parade!  It used to be on a Monday afternoon, but they changed it this year to Saturday morning, which meant Ryan got to get in on the fun!  WOOHOO!

My mom went to the parade with us, and afterward Brynn wanted to go with Grandma to run errands...which meant Ryan and I ran errands (picking out even more house stuff...faucets, exterior house lights, etc.) with just Emory.  She is starting to be quite the handful at the grocery store...lots of loud noises and wants to crawl around everywhere.  At one point I set her down while Ryan and I were talking to a sales lady and the next thing I know she had pulled down a bunch of boxes of "urinal repair kits"...NO LIE!  Never a dull moment...

HAPPY SATURDAY!