Game Day

On Friday, we found out that we were going to have a couple extra tickets for Saturday's game...in a family as big as ours that doesn't happen very often. My father-in-law wasn't going to the game, due to some cracked ribs (he's fine, thank the Lord, but I'm not sure if his horse will be when he gets back on it! Ha) and one of my brother in laws and his family was out of town. This was definitely not a big game (the visiting team, was Florida International and the final score was 62-3).... Anyway, all that to say, that typically everything wouldn't have lined up the way it did for us to have a couple extra tickets on the day that it was a game like that.... (also known as a game that people take their kids to).... First, I have to say that usually I kind of roll my eyes (lesson here, not to say what you are and aren't going to do! Ha) at the people that bring their kids to the games... especially little kids. It's usually so hot and I can just imagine how miserable the little kids are, plus babies are a lot of work, and why would you want to do that to yourself???.... But on Friday, DW was telling me about the tickets and mentioned wanting Annabelle and I to go... My first thought was, "Have you lost your mind?!?!?" seriously?--- take our (almost) 1 year old to the game??? I figured it was just a "thought" and he wasn't too serious....but later we'd talked again about it and he really felt like she'd be fine, and when she got tired of it, we'd just take her out the car and walk around campus or something.... I'd decided if he wanted us to go, then we should go! After all, it was pretty sweet that he'd wanted us to!


So on Saturday morning, we picked up the crew (Adam, Lauren, & Kelsey) and headed to the game.... we stopped and got some takeout for lunch and headed for our parking spot.

After lunch, we were putting everything up in the car and I was packing a bag to take into the stadium for AB. I was standing at the back door of the suburban and everyone else was standing in the front waiting on me, when I hear, "Annie?!?!?" --- when I looked up it was Tamara! She said they were walking by and she'd recognized Annabelle... Tamara is actually our cousin on Devin's mom's side--- she and Tamra's mom are cousins, and we haven't seen Tamara since she was going to UF and came to Thanksgiving at Devin's mom's one year... I think that was before Devin and I were even married, so it's been a while since we'd seen her! (But she does have a blog and reads mine, so we keep up with each other that way, and I would have recognized her kids, too, from their pictures!) Her little girl is such a cutie and was wearing the cutest gator dress and when I told her I loved her dress, she told me she loved my baby! Too cute... Of course I had to snap a picture for the blog!

Tamra was walking with her husband and "BBug" to the stadium and then she and their youngest were going back to the car to hang out... Tamara, I wish I'd told you come back over to our spot at half time so we could have visited! It was good to see yall!!!

We made it to our seats and waited for kickoff.

Annabelle enjoyed all the action and people watching.

She was so good... I mean, really she is always good, but I wasn't sure how she'd deal with not being able to get down and being in the sun and all that.... but the weather was perfect and soon after the game started we were in the shade....

The gators were scoring left and right and Annabelle got in on all the high-5's,

so she was parched after all that hardwork....

Devin held her for most of the game, but we all took turns holding her, depending on who she was reaching for... she's pretty fond of jewelery and sunglasses, so she was leaning toward both her aunts quite a bit.

We made it through the first quarter and I was shocked.... she'd get a little squirmy, but I'd pull out the fruit puffs and she was fine (even when she'd eaten all she wanted she decided that throwing them was just as fun)....And when she'd had enough of those, we let Abby come join the fun!

AB was so excited that Abby got to go to her first football game, too! We made it through the second quarter and I couldn't believe it!

Then we even made it all the way through half time!

We'd decided that she'd probably had enough and Lauren and I took her out... we went back to the car and got the stroller and Aunt Lauren gave Belle the grand tour...she showed her where she used to work on campus and told her that Uncle Adam would come by and see her there, she showed her where Uncle Adam (and Daddy) had quite a few of their classes, and she even took us and showed us the "giant french fries"... On our "tour", AB spotted this and wanted me to take a picture, because when she goes to UF she needs one of these...

pink, just like this one, please, Daddy...

Devin, Adam & Kelsey stayed in the stadium until about 10 minutes left in the 4th quarter and then they came to the car, too, and we headed home... we were all pretty confident that it was going to be another gator win, so we felt we could leave a little early... Ha...

It was definitely a fun day and I was so proud of how good Annabelle did. Granted, I am sure it will be a long while before she goes to her next game! But she CAN say that she was in the swamp at a game that Timmy Tebow played in.... awwwww.... :)

~amw~