Memory Lane is OPEN While Celebrating Jon's 32nd!

(disclaimer on this post: the sap level comes close to bypassing the level of sarcasm... just this once, I promise. wink)

So his royal hotness.. aka, the hubs turned 32 this past Saturday.

I made this fancy collage for him and had a blast digging up all the old pics. I'm such a picture junky anyways. I literally time warp back to the place and time as soon as I glance at the still frame.

It's fun to look back on memories and times past, especially great ones... to see how your looks change, for one, but also just to remember back to how you felt at those moments compared to how things are in the present. The ebbs and flows and the occasional roller coaster rides.. ha

I think its healthy in a long term relationship to revisit your past moments together. In our case we have some dysfunctional spots, but the great by far outweighs the gray.

:)

This next picture is one of many, MANY from this trip that I cherish, but this particular one tugs at my heart strings. We had taken a Catarman in St. Lucia to visit the magnificent Pitons. The still air, the sun, the swaying of the water to the island music.. I caught a glimpse of this man in my view finder and lost my breath for a minute. Once I realized it was MY husband that I was there sharing this with, I couldn't help but smile and think how blessed I am to have him in my life. 

In fact, unbeknown to him I giggle under my breath often when I get those moments of 'how in the world did I ever sucker this guy into marrying me??'

:) :) :)

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For the rest of this post I sporadically grabbed some saved images and what you see is what I snagged from the files. It's just a mix of some different time stamps we have together. 

This one is Florida with my parents last Summer. Had my son at the beach for the first time along with my parents and THIS guy.. that trip will always be tops on the 'best' list for this girl.  

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Here is one from several years back.. Destin trip with Jon's bff Clay and Racheal, our good friends. Pre- kiddos for either of us... is that enough said ?? :)

Great people and fun times.

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Negril, Jamaica

Our Couples Swept Away trip stands alone on its very own pedestal in both of our minds.

Maybe it was the new love in the air mixed with the romance and amenities of this resort.. who's to say.. but we both hold this trip close to our hearts.

We realize our 'adventures' are small scale compared to many, but to us, they are OUR own.. and honestly it could have been Paris, Venice, Greece, or a nice part of Jamaica and we wouldn't have cared. It was a week to live as King and Queen and that is exactly what we did!

Here we are snorkeling, 'little mexico' off the coast of Negril.

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Oh and then there was our Cleveland trip.. This one was probably our 'flawless' trip. Heck if you take away the fact that our rented Jeep kept routing us around a 10 block radius for over an hour to try and side swipe the downtown road construction and find us the Hard Rock Café.. this trip was perfection! 

it was decisions, decisions.. do we go see King James in all his glory or do we watch T Hunter in all of his.. Well baseball won out. Sandusky does in fact have some amazing roller coasters and if you are a RC junky like we are then do yourself a favor and find Cedar Point on one of your next travel agendas. GREAT park.

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The Ocoee River was a wet and wild ride. We got our moneys worth on this rafting adventure. First time for both of us. Would go again in a heart beat. The 2 story enormous cabin we rented out like we were big ballers, was fabulous, don't get me wrong. I mean who doesn't love an outside hot tub in the middle of the woods... but showing up in the dark and being spooked the entire time was nuts. The morning coffee on the balcony overlooking a skyline of trees and purple sunset made up for it though.  

\

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We went out to eat with my parents at Catfish Johns in this next one..

One of my special birthday memories is when I came home from working overnight at 'JB' and Jon had stayed up waiting on me, he had a cake with candles lit on the counter along with flowers and a card.. It was like 515am, still dark outside and the room was dark except for those bright glowing candles on that little cake.. Just enough glow to see that perfect smile waiting to greet me, and make my birthday so special.  sigh

This was during the 'boyfriend/girlfriend' stage. When you start forgetting what night of the week it is or caring what your friends are out doing..  I realized this stage suited me well ! :)  

 

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Can you tell we have been cruising it up for a couple days ?

Did the red faces or glazed eyes from long sunny days give us away ??

 

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and another from Destin, night swim at the hotel.

Pre-Kellen we really didn't stay at a hotel without trying out their pool at night time!

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and we've circled back to a picture from our beach trip with my parents.

This seems like more of an anniversary post, then a celebration of a birthday, but I felt the need to make sure my man knows he holds that number one spot in my heart

You can 'choose' who you spend your life with, but you can't fake undeniable chemistry or force true happiness with the wrong person.

I am amazed at how much we still want to be around each other.

Besties for life, sweet man!

Happy Happy Happy!

 

Whoever Wins Gets to Win! and Go Hogs Go!

 

"Whoever wins gets to win!" - KPD

When he was a baby I called all of these fun things he says 'kellonisms'  and he spoke his own language of 'kelloneese'... Now I more or less just smile and enjoy every minute of his quirky sayings. Considering his favorite thing to say right now is 'oh poop' (thank you Despicable Me.)... sigh  

I don't care a great deal for my chicken scratch hand writing when I'm scrap booking, so I've been trying to add text to pictures more often. That is what these are actually for.

...and what do you think about the backdrops??

I snagged some fun new toys/photo props last month and my little model here has been helping me get used to them. It never hurts to have indoor options available until that magical day that I own a studio with my name on it. sigh again

 

 

 

 

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How bout them HOGS ??!!

 

 

And even models have their off days.. ha

He was NOT feeling any quick backyard pictures for the scrapbook!

 We'll just say he had his 'game face' on.

 

 

We took him to his very first Razorback Stadium experience the first game of the season.. Enjoyed it and despite the heat (smoldering actually). Just like every other sporting event he is less interested in watching the game and more interested in asking when he can go on the field and play with 'the guys' as he calls them.

I was pleased with how well he did.

Granted we spent many dollars on numerous cold beverages and popcorn!

He smiled while everyone called the hogs, but wouldn't join in.. but once we got to my parents house after the game, he started up.

Whewwwww, PIG SOUIEEEE

I still remember him calling them 'bazabaks'

when he was one..

sigh  

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So Brittany caught wind that you could write a letter to Disney characters and they would 'write you back'..  

 

 

So she helped Kellen write a sweet little note to Lightning McQueen himself.. and Zander wrote his to Mickey Mouse. She had them sign their names, the whole nine yards.

It was cute..

We're awaiting their replies....

hoping to hear from them any day now...

tick tock 

lol

love my niece :)  

 

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Mighty MIGHTY Fishermen!

This picture of our nephew Reece spells out Summer in a nutshell...

Rope swings, hot days, playing in water, and big 'ol happy smiles on a kids face. The only thing missing is the Popsicle on the boat dock with the yellow lab sitting and wagging its tail...sigh

S-U-M-M-E-R

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Before I tell the tall tails of our fishing stories over the month of August, let me show you our ninja turtle crime fighter. Jon and I snagged him these fun new pj's while he was at Gramma's for that sleep over I mentioned in the last post. He takes this crime fighting thing so serious.

The sleepover was a success and the new jams were a hit.

SCORE  

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On to fishing news...

The month of August included a few fishing trips and I'm sure I would have done the individual stories more justice had I had time to blog on each one.. but let me sum this fishing business up.

I thought it fitting that Dana's pic of her FIRST fish ever be the first pic of the post. Considering she caught the first fish of the day! Go Dana with your bad self and your 2 inch long fish. Just tell people it was 3 feet long, they wont ever know the difference. and leave out the part where you thought you knew where your friend lived and we all ended up parking in some strangers drive way and fishing on a strangers dock in a strangers pond only for them to come home and run us off! LOL

(technically we were across the street from the correct spot, but I probably wont include that part in the details of telling this story.)

The Paul boys were on a roll reeling in their first fish. With a little help from Uncle Jon they had this fishing thing down. and loved it. and I did not know fish ate cooked corn ?

... and check out Uncle Chris with the 'catch of the day' on his line.

is that a Superman fishing pole Chris ???

The things we do for kids!

:)

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The next day it was more fishing time, except this time with Mimi and Pops along with us..

Crickets were on the menu for this trip.

It was a hot one on the dock and the crickets were in the shade with the company of Kellen most of the day.. ha

Though when he did fish, it was entertaining as always.

He has the casting thing down pretty well. He's just not one to set and watch the bobber. He thinks he needs to reel it in and keep going through the motions.

Half of the time the bobber and bait is out of the water and he'll be sitting there thinking its taking forever to catch a fish..

sigh

 

Pops is giving him some pointers and he is listening intently I am sure of it! 

Mimi did do more fishing than Kellen did, but they were both more interested in bubble gum, drinks, the crickets, and the shade.. lol 

He had my moms camera at one point and asked if he could take some pictures of the water and she said yes, so he took about three pictures of the lake and then looked at them through the view finder all serious-like and then said, ' we need to save those and put them in the scrapbook.'

LOVE him

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The Jaxsonater got to join us for our 2nd fishing trip with the Paul's this month.. This time we discovered a rope swing on the property and the boys loved it. Only had my iPhone with me this time.

This time the Davis crew sealed the deal on catching the fish.

This is Kellen's first fish! I think his face says it all. He is pretty stoked 

Jaxson snagged him a doozy as well.

Talk about some might mighty mighty fishermen!

 we have here! First it's puttering around in the pond and next it will be deep sea fishing!

We LOVE our simple life.

God is good

:)