CiCi's 12th Birthday

My sweet dog, CiCi, just turned 12 years old! I have had her since I was 15, and she is one of our greatest joys. As you can see from the photo, she had to take a nap after playing with her birthday gifts...a fun beaver puppet, a doggie martini glass, and a new bone!

Please Pray

Please keep our nephew, Walker, in your prayers. Walker was born in May and has a cleft palate. We knew he would be born with one, and he and his family are doing very well. He will have his first of many surgeries in a few weeks. Please keep Walker and his family in your prayers as they travel this journey.

You can visit Walker's Care Page at:

http://www.carepages.com/ServeCarePage?cpn=WalkersJourney&ipc=pinviteemailtemplate


For those of you in Tupelo, you may know about this, but I wanted to get the word out to everyone. Please pray for Will Hodges and his parents, Frank and Kim, and younger sister, Mary. The Hodges attend our church, and are very sweet, special people. Will was recently diagnosed with Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma, and is at St. Jude's. He is five years old, and would have started Kindergarten in August at my school. Frank, Kim, and Will are living at the Target house in Memphis, and will be there for the next six months while Will undergoes chemotherapy. Mary is at their home in Tupelo, with her grandparents. Frank is commuting to his orthodontic practice in Tupelo each morning, and back to Memphis each afternoon. The discovery of Will's cancer was somewhat sudden, and his family needs as much prayer as we can offer. Go Big Orange!!!

You can visit Will's Caring Bridge site at:

http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/willhodges

Vacation/Summer!

Last week, Jason and I traveled to Farmington and St. Genevieve, Missouri to visit some of the largest wineries in the eastern region of the US. The areas we visited were absolutely beautiful; vineyards for miles! We learned so much about wine, and enjoyed sampling many different wines made in the area. We had dinner one evening at Tiger Ridge, a restaurant overlooking a tiger sanctuary. One of our other favorite meals was at The Anvil restaurant, where we ate the BEST onion rings we have ever put in our mouth! Our last night there, we saw a Summer Stock production of Cabaret at the Orris Theatre, which was wonderful.

It was a fabulous week of relaxing, eating, and wine tasting!

This past weekend we enjoyed seeing our cousin Allison, her daughter, Taylor and her brother, David. They stayed with us on Saturday night for something Allison had to attend in Tupelo. Matt (Allison's husband) didn't make it on this trip, but hopefully we'll see them again soon! We also enjoyed Morgan Dawson and Josh Abraham's wedding and reception on Saturday night. We're so happy for them and Josh's new position as head baseball coach at Warren Central in Vicksburg, although I will greatly miss Morgan being my Kindergarten neighbor at Joyner next year!

Summer is about halfway over for us...I have begun working a little in my classroom, and will post pictures when I get more finished. Jason finished his week-long Physics class a few weeks ago at the Rainwater Observatory at French Camp. He learned so much about Astronomy and Physics! He had his first SHS coaches' meeting tonight, and has a coaching clinic in Jackson coming up in a few weeks, plus one more week-long Biology class at the end of July. We are walking and hiking a lot, and Jason swims three mornings a week on the Tupelo Aquatic Club league-at 5:30 am! I swim a few days each week at Mom's pool at her condo...well, mostly, I float and lay out. :) Lots of yard projects are also keeping us busy...hopefully I'll have some before and after photos of that to post soon. Oh, and I had an early birthday present today from Jason-a fabulous spa day!

Music, Monet and Margaritas

Tupelo Community Theatre's Lyric Krewe held its fifth annual summer fundraiser, Music, Monet and Margaritas on June 14th. We had a wonderful turn out for the event, which was exciting after setting up for our street party during a few rain showers...we weren't sure if the weather was going to cooperate or not!

Jason and John Curlee were the masterminds behind the bar, and I helped with set-up and decorating. The Jam Band provided us with great dance music for the night, and the theatre's own Suzanne Oakley took the mic later in the evening to sing with the band! We had a taco bar donated by Casa Monterrey, along with other Mexican foods, and many local artists donated a piece of artwork for sale in the silent auction, which also helped raise a lot of money for the theatre.

A very special part of the evening was when Eric Emig, a Tupelo artist, unveiled his sketch of the late Jess Mark, whom the TCT stage is named after. Jess was a major supporter, believer, and friend of the theatre. Missed by all of us involved at TCT, Jess's family was present for the unveiling of his portrait, and we know he was smiling down on the evening.

As you can tell from the photos, workers and Krewe members all had a great time!

Girls' Trip!

On June 5th, a group of us headed to Jackson to celebrate Suzanne and Courtney's birthdays! We had a great dinner at Julep, and then saw Sex and the City-The Movie at the fabulous new theatre in Madison. We stayed overnight at the Cabot, where we enjoyed their famous "pink drinks." We had a blast dressing up for a night out, which was followed by too much shopping (is there really such a thing?) the following day!