Praying for a Miracle this Holy Week

One of the funniest people ever to go through CHS is battling for his life. Cancer has overtaken Shane Richardson. He was a few years ahead of me in school, but his personality is legendary. Coach Frank Mills, the greatest teacher ever to grace CHS, loves to tell the story of how Shane fell asleep in history class one day. So, Coach Mills, trying to surprise Shane, boldly asks "What happened to the Maine, Shane?" to which Shane instantly replied "It sank, Frank".

He is a devout man of God and he and his lovely family are an example of living in faith and love of our Holy Father. Shane gave a sermon approximately 1 month ago at his church, and it is absolutely moving. I do not know I can live as faithfully as he does in the face of such adversity. Please copy/paste the link below to hear his sermon.

http://vimeo.com/10315449

Beauty and The Beast

CMS Middle School performed Beauty and the Beast this weekend...it was so good. Draik was a fork...actually, she wanted to work behind the scenes but she was made to be a fork. There has been much harassing from her dad concerning being a fork...Hope was a napkin.Be Our Guest, Be Our Guest...

Put Our Service to the Test

End of Be Our Guest...after Saturday's performance, Draik went to the cast party at the depot...
I asked her what she was changing into, and Adam says "A Spoon...."

Anna Banana came to support Draik and Hope...Anna is an
accomplished artist and helped design and build the set

Swinky Dink came out with Anna Banana to support Draik and Hope

The girls and the Baker

The girls and Belle, a.k.a. Gianna Funes

The girls and The Beast, a.k.a. Draik's Debate partner, Adrian!

DRAIK- NOT-SO SECRET LIFE OF AN AMERICAN TEENAGER

-Consists of Savannah Swink, Hope Ankey, and Anna Blalock
-Consists of approximately 10,000 text messages per month
-Amazingly, does not consist of any used minutes from our cell plan
-While makes great grades and does awesome academically, does not consist of any athletic skill whatsoever
-Also does not consist of any organizational or cleaning skills
-Consists of lots of purposely mis-matched socks
-Consists of bi-weekly movie nights with good food and a trip to Target to embarrass herself in the toy section
-Consists of much laughter, usually at the expense of herself

Draik and Hope hanging out in her extremely purple room

There are 2 things wrong with this picture (1) Draik and Savannah are duking it out and
(2) they are duking it out in Riley's room

I believe this was meant for 10-year olds...

The girls and Buddha...

Draik, Savannah and Anna after their win at the treasure hunt, again,
aimed at 10-years and younger...

Draik, Savannah and Hope hanging out with a wooden monkey

Hope, Savannah, Anna and Draik with a beautiful...goat

Savannah, Draik and Anna at Applebees, after some sappy movie...

Too much caffeine, maybe?

Another Applebees shot...

CHATTANOOGA ZOO, PART DEUX...

Here are more photos, taken from the point of Draik and her friends, from Regan's Birthday Party at the Zoo. They got a lot of photos from the Zoo Tour (my camera died and I didn't get any photos from the tour).The day started when the Goofysillyboycrazyteengirls broke out of their cage at the zoo...

A very hyper and anti social Serval (African Cat)

Laughing Hyena...but he really didn't laugh.

Some type of deerThe Red Pandas were my fave

Some monkeys hanging around

Goofysillyboycrazyteengirls with a monkey

This was a leopard that was antisocial

Prairie Dogs

Yes, that's a real sign...

...and a real cougar

The camel

"Shoot Low, Boys- They're Riding Shetland Ponies" (I love, love, love Lewis Grizzard)

RILEY IS 15 MONTHS NOW!!!

And nothing special is happening...I just liked this picture of the cute booger. It is one of the last ones we took b.hc. (before haircut). I am horrible as I haven't taken any pics of him since the haircut and now it has grown back out...so, he still looks like this:) He is very smart...he knows how to get a kleenex and blow his nose (and he actually blows it), he knows how to feed himself (and doesn't make as much of a mess feeding himself than me feeding him). He tells us "bye" a lot...I think he's trying to tell us something. His PKU is under control...he eats all the time. His mild form of the disease allows me to even give him baby food with a little meat in it at this time. As he grows, he will be more vegetarian than vegan (yes, there is a difference). He is doing very well and keeps us laughing with his antics.

BA TURNED 60...with a surprise party!!!

Because Regan and Dad's birthday's are 2 days apart (for his 50th b-day, I got Dad a Regan), and because Dad stays in the dark and clueless 95% of the time, it was so easy to throw him a surprise 60th Birthday Party! My mom and his sister Margie hosted it and Dad didn't have a clue...why? Because he thought he was going to Regan's birthday party! Regan and Draik played the story of Regan's B-day party for 2 weeks...because Regan's whole class was invited, it was going to be held at a local club house (that should have been his first clue-duh). Then, when he pulls into the club house at party time, he didn't notice all the license plates from Polk County (where his sister and her family lives)...he walked into the club house and no one was in there but me (hello dad!!!). Oh, and all the black table cloths and decorations. He says "Where is everyone...where are the kids?" and I very quickly said "Oh, they are over there through that door in the kitchen...by the way, can you go in there and bust up some ice for me??" And he starts griping (while walking to the kitchen) "I'm not going to bust up ice blah blah blah blah" and he opens the door and everyone yells "Happy Birthday!!!!" The look on his face was priceless...Hey got the picture of his reaction (since I was standing behind him, all I got was his rump, hehe). He was very, very, very touched and emotional (well, emotional for Dad) that everyone through him a party. And he was very, very, very upset with his 2 bestest friends (Draik and Regan) for keeping it from him! Good turnout, good food (Adam made homemade spaghetti) and a great cake! And...he even got great gifts (and his very first cell phone)!

A VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY FOR REGAN

Regan recently celebrated his 10th Birthday...it seems like only yesterday that I was bringing the extremely tiny (5 lbs, 2 oz) fella home to listen to approximately 3 years of screaming and crying before he got used to being in the world. For such a special occasion, we had his birthday at the Chattanooga Zoo with all of his friends! We had a wonderful time, and Regan had a great birthday. Unfortunately, the batteries in my camera died not long after the tour started, but I did manage to get a few shots of the animals in the zoo.Regan and his friend, Brandon, hanging out with a turtle in the party room.Regan wouldn't go near the snakes, but his classmate did...you go girl!Ba became quite upset when they put him in the chimp exhibit (hehehe).This is a daddy monkey with his 1 month old twins (1 is beside him, 1 is on his back looking over his shoulder). I don't remember what this species of monkey is, but we were told that once moma has the baby/ies, the daddy raises them!

All of their feathered animals (from parrots to peacocks) were absolutely beautiful...very vivid coloring.

And finally, the zoo was putting their most dangerous species of animal into their van to transport to a circus for display...this species is known as Goofysillyboycrazyteengirls. They were an extremely wild bunch of animals and drove us crazy with their loudness and goofiness.