Wednesday, April 13, 2016

4H County Events

 

I was so proud of our club and the six participants we had in this year’s county events.IMG_3613

Of course, I was most proud, of my big girl! IMG_3608

Three generations of Levy 4Hers

Annabelle did a fantastic job giving her illustrated talk on Levy County Watermelons. IMG_3506She worked hard (the night before…because like mother-like daughter) on her display board. I cut out letters for her on the Silhouette and she glued them down. She cut and colored the bees and watermelons and it all turned out so cute.

My parents came over to hear her practice her speech that morning, and we all agreed, she’s amazing. Grammy took her afterward, to get clothes so she’d be in 4H official dress. I was going to let her wear jeans and my old jacket, but Grammy wasn’t having that. I was glad, too, because she ended up looking so cute and I think she felt official, too. :)IMG_3557

The first event she participated in was the fashion revue. She modeled her skirt that she made for the fair. IMG_3522

After the fashion revue, it was speech time. She’s so shy and only 7 years old, and I can’t believe she stood in front of that packed out room and gave her presentation.IMG_3565 She did such a great job. IMG_3586

Other members from our club did so great, too.

Our club participants all won blue ribbons, some even won blue rosettes, and our Cloverbuds got thier green participation ribbons. IMG_3616

During the awards ceremony, our club was announced as winning Top Club! The kids were SO excited and so proud to get the trophy! IMG_3639

Such a fun day and although we wont get to participate in Districts (it falls on a day where everyone who qualified has something else going on), knowing we could have is exciting. Hopefully next year, we’ll be able to plan ahead better and make it happen.

So proud of my girl and I can’t wait to see what she does next! IMG_3603

~amw~

Sunday, April 10, 2016

Strawberry Shortcake

I’ve wanted to visit Rodgers you-pick Strawberry field for a couple of years now and this year we finally made it!

AB had a softball game in Ft. White one Saturday morning and on our way back home we decided to detour through Alachua and then head up to Rodgers.

They took us out to the field on a wagon and dropped us off with our buckets after they’d assigned a row for us to pick.IMG_3402

Grammy & the girls

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Our side of the wagon

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Within minutes, we had enough berries, but we couldn’t stop picking them. IMG_3441IMG_3456We ended up with A LOT, but it was tons of fun and the strawberries were too pretty to just leave on the vine.

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We enjoyed our fresh strawberries for days, and they lasted so much longer than when we buy them in the store. We froze some for making ice cream this summer, and then we decided to try our hand at making strawberry jam.

Mamie and I spent one evening making it, and she had the best time helping me. IMG_4080IMG_4093IMG_4103

We were so proud when all of our jars sealed and we can’t wait to taste it to see if it’s edible. Ha.IMG_4108 

Speaking of strawberries – the girls and I made a cake for the high school alumni association fundraiser. IMG_3187The group hosted a big cake/pie auction, organized by DW’s aunt, to raise money for the new middle/high school. Mamie was so excited to be a part of the auction, and she even got to go (and bid/buy a cake) with her Daddy & Pappy.

She helped me buy all the ingredients for our strawberry layer cake and she told me she hoped the cake sold for $3.00. IMG_3103I was hoping for more than that, but certainly didn’t expect to hear that it had sold for $500.00!!! IMG_3245The auction was a huge success and raised over $25,000.00! I was blown away by the way the community came together to support such a great cause – I hope our generation will always be as generous as the ones before us, and that we will teach our children to do the same.

~amw~

Wednesday, April 6, 2016

County Fair

Since AB already had her photo entry from the SRF, we let her enter into the Levy County fair, too. Again, all her age group gets is a green participation ribbon, but it’s still fun to enter and is giving her some experience doing different things.

We had to pick up her entry on Sunday, so we decided to make an afternoon of it, and let the kids ride a few rides. IMG_2803

Pappy & Nie-Nie met us there and we all enjoyed watching the kids have some fair-fun. IMG_2859IMG_2889IMG_2900IMG_2934IMG_2950

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Nobody loved a ride more than Tucker loved the tractors…IMG_2817IMG_2824IMG_2836

We had to ride them twice…IMG_3021

We shared the traditional must-have funnel cake, rode some more rides, let the kids pet a miniature zebu and the high-light for me was the Banana-Derby.IMG_2965 You haven’t lived until you see a monkey riding on a hound dog’s back.

Pappy dropped the $10.00 for the kids to have thier picture made with the monkey, but Tucker flipped out when that monkey was eye level with him, so just the girls got thier picture made.IMG_3058

The rides were cute, the lines were short, the weather was nice, and we saw a saddled-up hound dog with a monkey wearing a pink sequined jacket riding it - which all made for a pretty great time.

~amw~

Thursday, March 31, 2016

Easter 2016

We decided to go to Georgia for Easter this year. We hadn’t seen Beau & Kristy since the Fall, and it just worked out for us to be able to go up to do a big Easter with the family. DSC_5247
We left Friday afternoon and the kids were such troopers. All of our children have been such good travelers. They might not all sleep in the car, but we have always made it to our desitations with very few meltdowns.
Traffic was pretty bad and we didn’t make it to Aunt Kay’s until after 11:00. Tucker was fantastic, though, and went right back to sleep when we got there.
On Saturday morning, we started getting things ready for the big family egg hunt. Aunt Kay decided we needed to do the big lunch on Saturday instead of Sunday, because the forecast was calling for rain on Sunday afternoon.
We dyed eggs that morning and stuffed plastic ones with candy for the hunt. IMG_2189IMG_2207
My mom had heard about the rice-shaker eggs, so we tried that this year with Tucker. IMG_2192He loved it, and best of all, there was no mess on him. The eggs turned out speckled and cute, too.
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Tucker loved Uncle Beau this trip, which was really sweet. He calls him “Bo-Bo.”
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Everyone got to the creek around 2:00 and the little kids were all ready to hide the eggs. I was so excited that my littles got to hunt eggs with a bunch of thier cousins this year. Usually, it’s just our kids (sometimes, one or two more), but it’s never a big group like we always had when I was little. DSC_5228DSC_5234IMG_2357DSC_5249DSC_5258
Uncle Ronnie must have been feeling nostolgic over all those big egg hunts we had when we were all kids, because he had a plan to make even the BIG kids want to hunt. He had gotten a prize egg for every single one of the kids – from the high schoolers to the babies. Their names were written on the outside, and inside was a Reese’s egg and a ten dollar bill. DSC_5268Everyone had a big time searching for thier prize egg. We were all cracking up over EVERY one of the kids getting a prize egg. When we were little there was ONE prize egg. Our parents are all very different grandparents than they are parents. Ha.
It was the best afternoon with all the kids playing and all the adults just sitting around catching up. I was a terrible picture taker, and could kick myself for not lining all the kids up and getting at least one good picture of them all together or at least making sure I had everyone in a picture. :(   This one is missing five or six of the kids, but I did get it…IMG_2236Something about keeping up with three kids has really taken a toll on my picture abilities. Ha.  We did put sweet Luke in a basket, though. And how cute is that?!?!DSC_5300DSC_5317DSC_5320DSC_5322
It was sweet having Tucker & Hank together, too! We were all excited Steph’s family was in town for Easter, too.
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Speaking of which, Steph’s totally rocking the mom-of-two-under-two role! Multi-tasking is her middle name now. :)
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and my favorite picture last…
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That night, we put the littles to bed with hopes that the bunny would find us all the way in North Georgia.
The next morning, they were happy to find that he had! IMG_2254DSC_5383DSC_5386DSC_5388
We got ready for church and DW snapped a few pics of the kids on Aunt Kay’s porch. DSC_5416We met my parents and Beau & Kristy at their church. We’d never visited their before and we really enjoyed it. Beau & Garrett sang a special and that was super sweet. IMG_2262
IMG_2363After church, we enjoyed meeting some of their church family.
Since we’d done the big Easter lunch the day before, we went out with just our family, to the Mexican restaurant. It wasn’t traditional Easter lunch, but it was fantastic.IMG_2297 The best family picture of my little herd is this blury one, which makes me laugh with the mexican restaurant sign in the background. :)IMG_2270
After lunch, we sent all the men (& Tucker) home to nap, and we took the kids to see Zootopia for Garrett’s birthday. (His birthday was a couple weeks later, but since we wouldn’t be there, we celebrated early). IMG_2304The movie was so cute.
We headed back home on Monday morning, after a wonderful, and always too-short trip.
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~amw~