Because my mom never would!

My sisters will appreciate this blog. Our Uncle Al had a trampoline, and it was the coolest thing ever. It was rectangular (remember those?) and never thought about having an enclosure attached to it (bunch of weenies that we are today). So my mom never would have agreed to get us one, so I had one of those motherly moments where maybe this purchase was more for me than my kids. (Not that they wouldn't enjoy it). We tore down our swing set this summer, and I told the girls that we would eventually get a trampoline. So after the garage sale, we picked it out this weekend.

Here's Mark getting the box out of the truck. I can't believe this box held everything for the trampoline AND enclosure:



Putting the trampoline together was actually quite easy. I timed us, and it took exactly an hour for the two of us to get it together:



A little help from Emma:

And here we are, jumping on our newest toy!

Love this picture, kinda High School Musical - ish, huh?

.... but the enclosure... well that wasn't so "easy". Two hours later, and yes, its now dark outside, we are still trying to get it put on.... but by 7 pm, it was all done. The girls jumped into the night (didn't really get any more pictures of that) and got up before light to jump again Sunday morning before Church!

Here's Mark putting on the finishing touches:

Oh, and since this WAS part Missy fantasy.. I did jump on it a little bit, and it is a "darn" shame how winded I get with just a few jumps on this thing. I was showing Emma some of my "moves" from grade school, and I did a few jumps and had to sit down. (now that is pitiful!).

Dedicated yellow jackets

What's the time on that clock? Does it say 5:45? Is that the time I got up Friday morning? No, that is the time the entire Carroll family left the house Friday morning to be part of the WAFB game day pep rally at school. I got up at 4:45!!... and the girls got up at 5:15! It was a long day!

Here are the girls ready to go about 10 before 6 am! (I couldn't help but think that the only real reason we should be leaving the house this early is if I'm on my way to see "the Mouse", if you know what I mean. (and if you don't, then you don't know Missy!)

I was worried that a lot of people might not show up, and it would be embarrasing on TV... but just the opposite. The gym was packed! Its hard to tell from this picture, but our parking lot was pretty much filled. They invited the community to come, and lots of them did:





I just couldn't resist this picture of the field that morning. It was like the "calm before the storm"!

... and this is what we were met with when we walked in the gym. It was overwhelming. The entire Hornsby gym was packed! I got a little choked up when I saw it b/c it made me glad I teach in a real one high school community! I'm getting little goosebumps as I write this:

here's the other side of the gym. (and I must comment here, that Catholic High was on the morning before ours b/c they played on Thursday, and they only had one side of their gym packed - sorry Bears!!)

Here is Diane Deaton (aka, Juju's twin) interviewing our coach and players who were "in jail" to raise money for MD. They had to be "bailed out" in order to play that night. The bail money was to fund raiser for one of our clubs:

Daddy and his "little buddy":

Katie and a bunch of her friends who either have siblings at school, or other teacher / coach's kids:

Emma in her element with the dancers and cheerleaders:



Hanging out watching the pep rally:



Juju, oops, I mean Diane Deaton telling us how awesome we are!

Katie that afternoon. She fell asleep on a Barbie bed while she and Emma were playing. It was a long day for all. By the way, we ended up beaing Live Oak by like a million points! GEAUX JACKETS!!

Don't forget the memory card!

So this weekend was quite eventful (again). It was homecoming at school, so the week was a little crazy. My friend Julie has a 7 month old daughter named Sarah, and since she works the gates for our football games, she asked the girls and I to watch Sarah for a little while until we went to the game ourselves. I ended up having to delete some of the pictures b/c when I went to take more pics at our game (for very good reason, see below), I realized I had forgotten the memory card and only had my internal memory (which doesn't hold a lot). Here are the few pics I got:



Emma enjoying baby Sarah's Bumbo (that little tiny heinie!):







Emma holding baby Sarah with her "peek a boo" smile:






But the real excitement (for us) in the night came when we got to see our favorite babysitter, Tiffany (see previous blogs) on the homecoming court. Of course, we always knew she was "royalty", but now we have proof! Here we are before the halftime festivities:






And it just so happens, that a little bird (aka Julie) found out that Tiffany was going to be the queen, so after I teared up a little bit (sniff, sniff), I got to get a great picture of her reaction when they announced her name. Here she is with her dad as she finds out! I know her parents must have been looking at me snapping pictures and wondering "Who's the stalker?" I mean, I've met her mom once, but maybe she didn't remember me.





I mean , lets be honest, being the smartest kid in school is great and all , and if Katie gets a basketball scholarship to UConn (not likely), outstanding, or Emma gets a full ride to Diesel Driving Academy we will be so excited, but everyone wants to be the homecoming queen!! Its so great to see the "nice girl" finish first! We are so happy and feel like little adoptive parents!






Lastly, Katie's friend Jesse (who's mom happens to teach with Mark and I) spent the night Saturday and we walked down to the "blow up guy"'s house to see his Halloween decorations. Here is Katie, Jessie and Emma. Strangely enough, they all played well together:

And this "blow up" is an ode to the eighties for all of you old folks out there:

The weekend activities

This weekend, as in most weekends at the Carroll house, was jam packed with activities. When the yellow jackets and the Tigers play at home, I feel like we really go non stop! I took some pictures at our DS game Friday night, but I am letting Katie use those in her blog, so check out that when you get a chance. It should be updated soon.

Saturday morning, Mark had a fundraiser for the baseball team selling, of all things, mattresses. The football team had done it previously, so he gave it a try. The Carrolls also picked out a mattress and here is my manly husband lugging it home. I picked it out before Nutcracker pratice for Katie and then he brought it home later. It sleeps pretty well - nice pillow top, which we have never had.

My He-man!:

Mark raced home after the sale, and we all went to the LSU - McNeese game. We didn't get there until the end of the first quarter, but the weather was nice and the girls had a good time.

I title this picture... "they look like they like each other!":

Daddy and his girls:

Look, Mama is actually in a photograph... just to prove I am behind the lens at most of these blog events:

Daddy and his "little buddy":



Sunday afternoon, our Jackettes dance team had a kids clinic in the gym. Katie wasn't interested (for some reason), but Emma was 100% b/c, of course, Tiffany (the best babysitter ever... see previous posts) was going to be there. Emma really worships the ground she walks on, and she is a super role model!

Here is Emma with Tiffany (on the left) and Baleigh (also one of my former students) at the clinic:

Here they are practicing before the parent "watch" time:

I think Emma is smiling at some other lady in this picture b/c even before I took this picture she was smiling (... strange!):

... and here is her group performing their "Halloween" themed dance:

She had a great time!

The garage sale!

So the morning of the infamous garage sale finally arrived, and Jovi was excited!:



Yes, it is dark in these pictures, b/c evidently crazy people show up at your house for a garage sale at 5:30 am! Mark let Jovi out early so she wouldn't have to go when people were at the house (she was going to the 'spa' later that morning), and someone pulled up at 5:37! Really... I looked at the clock. Mark promptly told them to come back at 7, and we went in to have coffee.

I didn't actually get any pictures of the garage full in the daylight, so here are my 6 am pictures:

(notice the nice bar of clothes... Paw paw rigged that one up - so Francis like!):




Now, did I say my kids had every toy? (refer to last 'issue' of my blog):



There are no "during" photos of the blog - too busy, and didn't know if the shoppers would appreciate their photos on my blog (not that I profit from this!). Anyway, it was fun, busy, eye-opening to say the least. Garage sales bring many "types" shall we say to your home. We had normal types like Julie, Mr. Andy and baby Sarah or teachers looking for treasure chest treats to the not-so normal types (to put it nicely). We did quite well, and even had a mad dash of visitors about 10 minutes before we picked up.

This is all we had left. Here Mark and Paw-paw pick up:



Then Mark and I bagged the rest:

We made over $400, so I was impressed. Not a bad day for cleaning up the attic! We can actually walk in our attic, and this will make getting to the Christmas decorations much easier.

I could not have done it with out Juju! She is really an expert at these things, and I'll be happy to give you her number.... for a small finders fee!

Katie the cook!

Well, good news! Katie will be appearing in the Baton Rouge Ballet's Nutcracker ballet again this year. She really enjoyed it last year, and it was just the right time commitment that I didn't think it would be too bad. Here we are standing outside the Dancer's workshop, waiting to go in for tryouts last weekend:



Here she is with her letter that we just got Saturday saying she got the part of a cook. She was a cherub last year, so she is glad that she gets to do something different (so is Mama). These outfits are cute and don't involve an ugly yellow wig!


Here's our cook!



Congratulations Bug! We are very proud of you!

Children who have truly suffered (sigh)!

So, I finally set out to do something I have been meaning to do for a very, very, very long time: have a garage sale. Basically, since my kids were born, I have kept every scrap of clothes and toy they ever had. And as Mark and I started going through this stuff (to put it G-rated) last Christmas holiday, I realized how badly we needed to try and actually profit from this. So I arranged to have Juju (my stepmom) help me organize a garage sale. Next weekend is D-day (or should I say, G-day).

Here is the problem with trying to do this with children in the way. They want to play with everything you pull out! Including every baby and toddler toy. If I had a nickel for every time I heard, "I remember this..." or ..."this was mine", I could forget the garage sale, put it all out by the curb and book my spa vacation!
For example, see pictures below:

In this picture, Emma is sitting in the rubbermaid container of beanie babies (yes, I went through this phase...) Oh, and this wasn't the only container or the little collectibles.


And this picture, shows how truly deprived my kids have been, and how they never got anything they ever asked for. And, by the way, this isn't even everything we eventually got down from the attic. This was Saturday afternoon, and Mark and I got more stuff down Sunday morning.

At least the weather was amazing for this. I actually enjoyed sitting outside and going through this. The only problem was my aching body after climbing up and down the attic stairs. (...so out of shape)

Here is what Jovi thought of the whole ordeal:

Lets hope it goes well next week! Come on by. If you need some toddler toys or car seat, I've got about a thousand! (Buy two things, get a beanie baby free!)