G-Day, Girlfriends, and Gymnastics

These last few weeks of April have been very busy. Last weekend I got to go on a girls trip with two of my very best friends from college, Lauren and Kathryn. I got a 6 and 1/2 hour drive (round trip) in the car, by myself! There was no one screaming, throwing things or fighting in the backseat. It was heaven, and the reunion with my girlfriends was pretty fun too.

Our girls weekend to Athens included a dinner at Last Resort (one of my favorites,) and of course the Georgia practice game (G-day game.) I have never been to the spring practice game before. Since Kirby Smart was hired as head coach, Kathryn, Lauren, and I felt that we really needed to go support him. Along with the 93,000 other people that had the same idea. Kirby was a great friend of ours in college (he dated another one of our roommates from college, who was not on this girls trip. Clearly, that relationship never panned out, but we all continued to love Kirby and hang out with him in Athens before he left for his coaching gig. He was always such a great guy. We already know he's a great coach, and we have no doubts of his abilities to lead our Bulldogs. I do admit, I am so nervous for him. I can't imagine the pressure of returning to your alma mater and being the head coach!

This weekend has been gymnastics weekend. Last night was Ellie's exhibition, and this morning was Emma's carnival. The girls are doing so well with their skills. Ellie has 1 bar skill to master before moving up to level 3, and Emma will officially move out of the preschool class and be Level 1 after her birthday on May 4th. They love it, and I have to admit that I am one proud mama!

Kathryn, Lauren, and I before our Friday night out. No, we did not plan all the blue, but it was pretty funny!

At Trapeze Pub in downtown Athens eating lunch before the game Saturday. I highly recommend this place if you've never been and you are in the mood for slightly eclectic pub food. It was awesome!

The stadium was packed!! This was just a spring practice game! I can't fathom what it will look like for that  first home game. 

My view of Ludacris - who was the opening act to the game. We were so pumped about seeing him! The sound quality for his performance was terrible. Somewhat disappointing. 

I had a better visual on the jumbotron.

Ellie walking out on the floor at her exhibition.

So serious. 

Floor work. 

Front walk overs

I couldn't get great pictures because we were so far away, but she did really good! 

At gymnastics events, there is a lot going on. Worth and I were so distracted, this is the only picture I got of Ellie on the beam. She's doing her round off to dismount. There are only 10 blondes in her group and her father and I have terrible eyes, so we missed most of the beam routine because we didn't even realize she was up there. 

Emma pushed through the crowd to the front wall to get a better view. 

Ellie saluting. 

The gymnastics carnival is for the preschoolers and is just a fun obstacle course for them to go through and have their skills checked off. 

Another very serious child

Always a favorite - the pitt. 

floor work

Here is a little video of Ellie's intro to her floor work:

Jacksonville Zoo

Last week was spring break for us. We didn't do much, but we did decide to visit the Jacksonville, FL zoo last Wednesday. I knew Kate and the boys were in Tifton, so I invited them to join us. We had such a good time!

We normally see them on holidays or during family gatherings, but the kids are so crazy and sugar loaded during those times, I just don't get much quality time with those sweet boys.  I'm so glad Kate (who is pregnant with her 3rd boy by the way,) was such a trooper to bring herself and the boys to spend the night with us, and then head to the zoo Wednesday morning.

It was a beautiful day and the I think the kids had a really good time. I didn't think Mack got much out of it until I heard him talking to a sweet lady that goes to our church. He was telling her he went to the "jax zoo" and saw "ewephants," "awigators," and "dinasars wif Bo and Banks."

We only had one incident where we almost lost a child. Mack decided to jump a fence and chase after some sort of duck/bird animal.  We did have one bloody nose as well, at about the 20 minutes to home point in the car, Kate looked back in the car and Emma had blood ALL over her. Poor pregnant Kate crawled in the back of the moving vehicle and cleaned her up. I felt so bad! Kate was blaming it on Bo, but Emma is a frequent nose bleeder., so I doubt Bo was responsible for it. Also, Emma never said a word. We have no idea how long she sat in it. There was blood all over her, her booster, the seatbelt, her clothes. Good times! All the kids were really great though, and I know they enjoyed being together. I attempted some group shots of them, but I was not very successful.