Happy Birthday, Pixie!

Today we are celebrating the birthday of our fourth child.

Pixie has brought the trio (and all of us) so much joy, and she really is the sweetest little dog ever. In addition to her three siblings, with whom she thinks she shares equal standing, she has a best friend named Kami who lives across the street, and they have a very Secret-Life-of-Pets existence. In fact, Kami is a Jack Russell, and Pixie, like Gidget, can be a little overbearing.  We think Pixie has a very good life, and we sure love her to pieces.

To celebrate all things Pixie, here is a walk down memory lane:

Pixie's arrival and her first Christmas with us

Puppy Pixie

Lauren's description of the BFFs

From this chair, Pixie can see Kami's door and will "ask" to go out anytime she sees Kami leave her home. 

Another Puppy Pixie, enjoying a story

Pixie's physique reveals her show dog heritage

Pixie really thinks she is the 4th child

Lauren with Pixie

This is one of my favorites, and we need to have it framed.  

We play "bear" often

Another favorite

Pixie loves to ride in the bike carrier! 

She also loves to go for walks

She even patiently wears various costumes and clothing

We love this little doggy.  

ARRRGGGGHHH!

William George's 5K class hit the ground running this year. They have already had a field trip to Children's Theatre (to see The Little Engine That Could), and they had a "Pirate Party" recently. 

The party consisted of two phases... first, they had a water party with a water slide.  

Afterward, the class quickly changed into pirate gear for the Pirate Party! What type of superwoman teacher coordinates the equivalent of two parties in a four-hour span of time? The famous Mrs. S! Feats like these are the making of her super-teacher reputation.  After donning their pirate attire, the class completed their center work efficiently and were ready to celebrate.  

William George will make ye walk the plank! 

ARGGGHHH!

I should mention that we had a costume debacle on the morning the party. Skip slipped out at 6:30am to go to Wal-Mart and then Target to procure the above replacement. Hooray for Dad! 

I wish I had photographed the food! The fare included popcorn shrimp, hot dogs with adorable pirate flags, a watermelon carved into a ship and filled with fruit and many other goodies.  

As a local plug, we ordered the adorable pirate cookies from Cakes By Elise, a new shop in our area, and they were awesome. 

Skip was even able to carve out a lunch hour to surprise George at his party. When George saw him, he yelled, "DADDY!!!" Then he ran and scaled him with a quickness.  

The class even charmed us with a  couple of songs.  

After the entertainment, William George greatly enjoyed himself for lunch, all-you-can-eat-buffet-style. When he  had finished ALL of his food and had eaten his cookie, he was carefully "eyeing" his cupcake. Skip wondered if he would be able to eat it, and I assured him that cupcake was totally going DOWN.  

And it did.  

George is having such an amazing, magical time in 5K.

PS: I'm not sure why my video is out of focus, but here is the Pirate show: 

George's Pirate Party 5K from Cathi Lindsey on Vimeo.

Weekend Update

Happy Monday, friends.  How was your weekend?

School is well under way now. In fact, the duo are halfway through their first grading period. Although there hasn't been much homework, we are spending a lot of time studying and reading, and the trio are starved for play time. So after studying Friday afternoon, the trio played as if they were on a weekend furlough. Plus, I think they miss being with each other during the day, as they were over the summer. Mind you, that doesn't prevent them from arguing, but they definitely miss one another.

Saturday was super low key. We ate lunch out, ran a few errands and then watched some Alabama Crimson Tide football. We turned dinner into a football theme by having pizza night, and George and Gracie wanted to stay up all night watching football. Speaking of, George now wants to watch football every night of the week (like our Olympics schedule), and I can only blame myself. In addition to watching football, William George runs around in a uniform and clutching a football. He often makes touchdowns but sometimes tackles himself to keep things realistic.

They girls served as acolytes at church Sunday. Our church has started a new children's ministry program during the traditional service wherein they invite any children in the congregation to stand and go to children's worship. (Children's worship has a large group during the contemporary service, but is adding a second children's worship.) Anyone who knows George knows that he was not completely on board with standing up in front of the entire congregation, but I went with him so it was less intense than it otherwise could have been. Of course, he had a blast, and the girls did an excellent job in their roles of acolyte.

After lunch, the trio alternated between playing and watching football.

William George also had the honor of bringing home the book that his class made about manners. Each student contributed a page to the book, and the theme is "good choices". We read the book a dozen or so times, and I can confidently say that his class is full of promising authors.

We loved it.

Have a fabulous week!

Billion Dollar Ball

One of my summer reads included Billion Dollar Ball, kind of a literary expose on the money involved in college football. Because we live in a state with one of the most prestigious football programs in the country, the economics of said programs are fascinating to me. We also happen to have a football program that was recently dismantled, became the subject of much controversy/debate and is slated to return in the future. Pulitzer Price winner Gilbert Gaul explores the economic realities of both the underperforming programs as well as the powerhouse, elite programs.

In addition to just the sheer amount of money made and reinvested in the athletics department, Gaul explores how all of the profits remain tax-free. The tax policies were put into place decades ago, when very little money was involved. Since then, television deals have been made, merchandising has exploded and stadiums have expanded, commanding four digit donations for the honor of being placed on a waitlist. These policies are not likely to change any time soon. If you think about it, how popular would elected lawmakers be if they challenged the system and suggested that athletic departments pay taxes on their profits... say in Texas, Oregon or Alabama?

Speaking of waitlists, get your donations in early.

For my friends who are on the waitlist for season tickets for the Alabama Crimson Tide? There is a wait list of 26,000, and only 40 tickets become available each year.  

I talked with Besanceney [who oversees the season-ticket plan at the University of Alabama] in 2013. That season just forty football tickets turned over at Alabama, usually after someone died or moved away. Forty works out to 0.0004 percent of all the seats in 101,000-seat Bryant-Denny stadium. "To put it in perspective," Besanceney explained, "we have a waiting list of 26,000. Those are the fans waiting to get a season ticket at Bryant-Denny."

Be patient, friends.

Pixie, the Scavenger

Sometimes I go through bags in search of gum and breath mints.  

Weekend Update

Happy Monday, friends!

I was given a friendly reminder by Ralph (my father-in-law) this weekend that the blog is overdue for an update. With school resuming, Skip's travel, his recurrent allergy incident, all extra minutes in the day have been claimed. In the hopes that things are settling down, we will try to get back to the business of updating our comings and goings here, starting with the weekend.

We decided to stay in town for Labor Day this year and spare ourselves all of the packing/unpacking/commuting that marks family travel. Instead, we had a nice dinner Friday night at home. We joined Skip's parents for lunch Saturday and enjoyed grilling out, and we followed that up by watching the Alabama Crimson Tide. Since we never want to say anything to anger the football gods, I'll simply say that it was a good game against USC.

After church Sunday, we went to my mom's and ate lunch with my brother, David, and his wife. The trio had fun playing basketball outside, and Skip and George never miss an opportunity to throw the football around. After being gone Saturday and Sunday, we stayed in Monday. We grilled for lunch and dinner, Skip's parents joined us, and the trio played until they were exhausted.

It's been a great weekend.