It's Great To Be An Auburn Tiger

It's been a while since I participated in "Show Us Your Life" at Kelly's Korner, but the topic this week is your favorite college traditions, so you know this immediately sparked my interest. Having had grown up in South Carolina and now living back in South Carolina again, many have asked me why I decided to go to Auburn. I didn't grow up cheering for Auburn or any other college team for that matter...the reason I decided to make a college tour of Auburn was for my major...I know, boring. But the day I made the decision to go to Auburn was anything but boring. My mom and I made the trip with her best friend and her daughter (Candy) who both bled orange and blue. As far as I know Candy had applied to no other schools...and honestly, her parents may not have allowed her to attend a different school...which may be my response to Ruth Ann if she announces she wants to go to the University of Alabama. Anyway, Candy's family secured us 4 tickets to the Auburn vs. Alabama game in the fall of 1995. I know everyone thinks their rivalry game is the best rivalry game...but get real...no game matches the Iron Bowl, period, end of discussion. We watched Auburn beat Alabama and at the end of the game the sun began to set causing the sky to turn orange and blue. My mom turned to me and said that was a sign from God that I should attend Auburn...and so I did! I think it's also proof positive that God is in fact an Auburn fan!

One of the things that makes Auburn special to me are all the traditions...my mom thinks any time you do something twice at Auburn it becomes a tradition! Here are some of my favorites...

Tailgating with friends is always a fun way to spend the afternoon before a game. I also love seeing all orange...even if it's not the best color for my complexion!

So I'm not wearing orange, but I love this picture and shamelessly post it every chance I get!



The walk into Jordan-Hare is always exciting...I love the anticipation of seeing Auburn play!


(I can't believe how young Spencer looks in this picture!)

I also LOVE to hear the band play...as I'm typing this I'm humming the fight song..."War Eagle fly down the field. Ever to conquer, never to yield." I also love participating in the cheers..."Everybody get your hands up for Boda-Getta!"...you would have to have been in the Auburn student section at some point in your life to understand that last tradition!



I also love the eagle soaring around the field before kick off...I just got chills thinking about it...I couldn't find a picture on the computer to share this, but you know what I'm talking about, right?

I also love that anytime I wear something Auburn related I can count on hearing "War Eagle" at some point when I'm out in public. I love when I'm far from home and I hear those sweet words. It's like a secret hand shake or knock that means we're all apart of the same family!

And last, but definitely not least, rolling Toomer's Corner after an Auburn victory...





Beautiful! In the future I hope this little girl learns to love Auburn as much as I do. I left for college scared of not having any good friends there and living so far away from home. But what I discovered on The Plains was a home away from home and friends that became like family. I want all those same things for Ruth Ann one day ...but I just don't want those days to get here too fast!



We're heading to Auburn on Wednesday, so there will be lots of tailgating and Auburn themed pictures next week! I need to start deciding what she'll be wearing to her first (of many) tailgates!

Oh, and one more thing...WAR EAGLE!

Julianna's Birthday

While Mandy visited this week we celebrated Julianna's first birthday...

Here is Ruth Ann with her friends...



Julianna with her cake...



Every 1st birthday I've been to this year has ended this way. I've decided to buy 6 cup cakes the week before Ruth Ann's birthday and practice with them the week before her birthday. We'll see if it makes a difference.

Ruth Ann loved the gifts...I think she'll handle this part of her party just fine!





We bought Julianna some cute Pediped shoes...per her mom's request!





I can't believe we'll be celebrating her birthday is just a few weeks!

One of the funnest days...

So I know "funnest" is not a gramatically correct word, but really...today was the funnest day!

My Kate made a surprise visit to Lexington and invited Ruth Ann & I to join her and her friend Regan for a morning at the Harmon Pumpkin Patch...aka, the Harmon Tree Farm. I went out there expecting pumpkins only, but there is so much more going on out there! We wandered around snapping lots of pictures and enjoying each others company.



Obviously Baby Natalie is very excited to be pumpkin shopping...



And you know I had Ruth Ann posing for some Fall pictures...













And here's one for Grumpy to enjoy...Ruth Ann's visit time on a tractor...



Amelia and Greer had a fun time too...











And we tried to get a pictures of all three girlies...here's the best I could get...



I think they're all looking at Kate, so maybe she got a better picture!

While we were playing on the playground, I spotted one of these...



A reminder that Christmas is just around the corner!

Then we loaded up on tiny pumpkins and headed over to my friend Mandy's lake house to visit with her and her girls while they were in town from Alabama. But before we left, I spotted this sign and had to take a picture for Arch...I still can't believe a teenager lives in this house...



Here are Mandy's sweet girls...





Then Ruth Ann went on her first boat ride!



Doesn't Ruth Ann look giagantic in this picture with Holly??



And we attempted to get a group picture...you decide if it was successful...







Not very sccessful...but I plan on trying over and over until we get the perfect picture of these little girls!

10 Months Old

I can barely wrap my mind around the idea that my baby girl is 10 months old...which means her birthday is right around the corner.







Ruth Ann is still committed to the crawl as her major mode of transportation with zero interest in walking. She pulls up only to her knees, but will stand temporarily when we put her that way next to a piece of furniture. Although she crawled on schedule, I think we are months and months away from having a walking child in this house. She's still eating all baby foods, but I have tried introducing real solid foods here and there....she's not too fond of this idea, so this may be a slow process too. She is constantly chatting with us...but there's no Rosetta Stone to translate what she is trying to say to us, so this month I've started Baby Signing Time videos with her. Children can communicate with signs before they can communicate with speech and I've seen first hand how successful children can be with signing when these videos are used. My friend Jeannie used them with her girls and they ended up with an huge signing vocabulary...I can't wait to see Ruth Ann start to pick up some signs. Also, signing is suppose to add to a child's IQ score and I think we all could use a few extra IQ points. We didn't take any big trips during September, but we've got some traveling ahead of us in October and November. We're headed to Montgomery in 2 weeks to visit Ms. Erin & Baby Kate and then onto Auburn to see Aunt Andrea and Anna and also to meet up with Ms. Candi, Reagan and Landon in Auburn. Then back to Auburn in November to celebrate Anna's 3rd birthday and then to Walhalla to celebrate Ada's 2nd birthday. And somewhere in all that traveling I need to go visit my Aunt Jill and my Granny in North Carolina...maybe I should just keeps our bags packed for the next 2 months!

Ruth Ann continues to be a complete delight and somehow I seem to love her more and more every day. I'm so thankful to have this sweet baby girl and could not imagine a more perfect addition to our family.

Fall has arrived

Fall and I have a love/hate relationship. I love that the humidity is decreasing but I hate to see the warm summer nights ending. I love that football season has arrived but I hate the annual reminder of how many years it has been since I was last a student on The Plains (for you non-Auburn folks, that's another term for my beloved Alma Mater). I love getting out clothes I haven't seen in months but I hate when my jeans seem tighter than they did last year. And I hate that it's dark when I wake up in the morning but I love that I can get in my pj's at 7:30 because it's getting dark which grants me permission to get ready for bed. I hope everyone else is enjoying the beginning of Fall.

Here's a picture from bath time tonight. I think it's super cute...Arch felt like it was not appropriate for public viewing on the blog, but guess who does the posting?? Besides, I think I protected her modesty with good camera position....

Bigger & Bigger

What's that saying..."The Bigger the Better"...I obviously am a believer.

Here are Ruth Ann's latest bows...they're huge, I know.







But I can't seem to stop myself. She's only 9 1/2 months old and should probably still be wearing the little tiny baby bows, but I can't seem to help myself. Every time I log onto Ebay the first thing I start searching for is bows...and because I now have every imaginable color in small bows, I've moved onto the big girls bows...bigger is definitely always better!

And a funny picture, just because. I've been trying to teach Ruth Ann different "tricks"...here's Ruth Ann's response to the following...

"Ruth Ann, where's your tongue?"



Have a great weekend!

The first of many...

One of my favorite memories from childhood is my mom picking me up from school and taking me to The Shoe Box in Lexington for a new pair of Keds (if you read my blog and are from Lexington I'm sure you bought all your Keds and Westies there too...unfortunately it closed many years ago, so I can't take Ruth Ann there too). I could not begin to tell you how many pairs of Keds I wore during my childhood...now I'm passing this tradition on to my baby girl...she got her first pair this week!



Is there anything better than a pair of fresh Keds??



Here's Ruth Ann inspecting her new tennies...





Since Ruth Ann seems content with crawling and has no interest in cruising or walking, I feel the bottoms of these shoes will never touch the ground and will look just as shiny and new when she out grows them!

Just cute

I made another really cute shirt for Ruth Ann and she just looked so cute wearing it that I had to take a picture...



I do love to put her in pink, but I think blue is her color...she always looks great in blue!