Happy Birthday, Zachary!

Today, Zachary turned 19. Can you believe it? I sure can't. To me, he is still that 6-year-old boy who carried our ring pillow down the aisle, or the 8-year-old who bet me that he could beat me at arm wrestling and lost...only to have to try broccoli and like it! We celebrated early on Sunday at Carrabba's, and I hope he enjoyed the time he got to spend with us and the grandparents. George, who was so happy to sit next to Zachary on his birthday for the first time in years, took some pictures of our birthday boy.

Highlight? Opening the burping penguin card from Danny, complete with two underarm farts.

Danny stayed on hand to help with the present wrangling.



We love you, Zachary, and we hope 19 is a wonderful, and considerably less stressful year than 18 was. We are so proud of you!

We're almost ready to go back!

Megan and Danny got their new backpacks from L.L. Bean today, and they are so excited!

We love L.L. Bean backpacks as they are durable enough for the kids to carry them for multiple years, and stylish enough for them to agree to carrying them for multiple years. :) I made the mistake last year for buying Megan one from Target, and while she liked it, and while it was more durable than ones we have bought in the past, it does not even compare to the Bean.

Our summer week...

This week was busy, as usual, but we had some fun. The kids got to try their first Whataburger hamburgers and chocolate malts.

They had never had Whataburger before, and Danny had been watching the commercials and begging to go, and I finally decided to take them. They absolutely loved it! We now have two more Whataburger fans in the family.

Friday, George took me out to breakfast at Cracker Barrel, and then dropped me off at work. He then took this photo as he was pulling out of the parking lot and sent it to me to brighten my day.

How sweet is that?

Saturday morning after karate (Danny got his last stripe and is almost ready for his purple belt test!),

we decided to take a road trip up to Thomasville for some South Georgia fun.

We were hungry when we got there, and we just happened to park next to Jonah's Fish & Grits.

Not having been there before we decided to try it, and we're so glad we did. We started off with a shrimp appetizer

and then had some of the best grouper and cheese grits (I had a sandwich) imaginable. The mission of the restaurant is to provide a good, Christian alcohol-free environment for people to take their families to eat. And do they succeed...we got the last open table, and folks were waiting in line to get in the whole time we were in town. We highly recommend it if you're ever in Thomasville.

Then, we walked around downtown for a while, stopping into Sweet Grass Dairy's cheese shop,

Firefly gift shop, Loli's, and lots of other little places. For a dessert treat, we went into Savannah Moon Bakery & Cafe for some chocolate cream pie

and some tin roof pie.

The kids were in heaven.

We grabbed some of their delicious key lime cookies to go and headed back to the car...George had had enough of the gnats outside. In all, it was a very pleasant Saturday afternoon outing, and I hope we do it again soon!

Have I told you lately...?

OK, so I know I'm biased. But, I just have to brag on my husband a little bit. He just found out that, one month before he gets off probation from promotion to sergeant, he will be moving to the Target Enforcement Squad, a city-wide squad that focuses on intelligence-led policing tactics.

George, you are an awesome sergeant, an awesome father, and I am happy to say the best husband and friend I could ever dream of having. I am so proud of your success in your career, but even more proud of your success in spiritual growth and commitment to our family.  Oh, and it doesn't hurt that you're hot! :) I love you!!!

Thank you, iCarly!

One of the kids' favorite shows is iCarly, a Nickelodeon show from a few years ago about a teenager with an online variety show. Their favorite character is Spencer, older brother and guardian to Carly and chef extraordinaire. One of Spencer's favorite dinners to make for Carly is spaghetti tacos, and since the kids love the show, they have occasionally asked me to make them, but I've never had the makings when asked. It seems they also got a taste for them when Grandma Gilbert made them spaghetti tacos on their trip to Jacksonville. So, this weekend, after making spaghetti for Sunday dinner, I had some leftovers. I bought some Ortega taco shells (the sturdiest and the tastiest brand of hard shells I've found), and last night we finally had spaghetti tacos.

Man, were they good! Thank you, iCarly, for giving me a great idea for making leftovers fun!