Meet Aunt Rachel!

I played a lot of Aunt Rachel this weekend!  A role I love!  We headed to Durham for the weekend to celebrate Marshall's birthday with my family and to meet Baby Bennett! I got to be Aunt Rachel twice this weekend!  We met the Moore's over at the Blalock house and had japanese food and some DELICIOUS cupcakes that Adam and Ashley picked up!    We had a great time hanging out and swooning over Bennett- what a heartbreaker he will be!  Ashley and I took turns holding him and talked for a long time about the recent life changes.  I thought to myself later the Friends quote- what did we used to talk about?!  On Saturday, we met with the family at my mom's house to celebrate the April birthday's (Marshall, Jessica and George).  We had a great time and even played a game of kickball in the backyard with Logan and Hailey... sorry we didn't snap any pictures of that!  However, the thing you don't want to happen at that time happened.  I was up to kick and we were trying to teach the kids how to play and Hailey was beside Marshall while he was rolling the ball. I kicked it and it smacked Hailey right in the face.  hard.  She was a trooper though- didn't even cry!  It was a really lightweight ball, but I felt AWFUL!  So, Aunt Rachel lost some cool points there.  Another thing that other money-savers/surprise sale lovers will enjoy about this weekend happened when we stopped on our way home to Cheraw for dinner.  We decided to stop at Bonefish Grill for dinner even though we knew it was a little more expensive.  We both ordered the bang bang shrimp tacos for dinner and got our bill for $20 and saw in the insert that they were having a special everyday from 4-6:30 that bang bang shrimp tacos were $5.  We asked the waitress about it and she said that she rang it up wrong and ours should have been $5 each- so our total was only $10 for dinner!!!!  We were super pumped because you got appetizer bread and dipping sauce, tacos and homemade chips and ranch for $5!!!  That kind of made our night!!!  But anyway, it was a fantastic weekend and we got back to Cheraw at a reasonable time on Saturday!  

outake: classic Ashley face....

Can I brag on my Valentine?

I just want to take a moment... or a blog, if you will, and brag on my awesome husband. He is in one word quite amazing. He loves me in spite of my many, many, many faults! I am, after all, a BIG sinner. He is always my supporter, my listener (to my crazy thoughts, feelings, problems, made up ailments... on and on) and he is always willing to sacrifice to make me happy. I am really very spoiled by this man. I love how he is a picture of Christ loving the church and giving himself up for her. As one youth pointed out, Marshall always does whatever you want to do. As I of course, protested to this and then thought back... well yes, we do end up doing whatever I want to do. That's because he is so go-with-the-flow and can do anything where as I usually have a preference. He also always gives me the good couch. Another thing I love about him because I am a little less not really go with the flow- I'm a planner. I love the way we compliment each other in so many ways and weaknesses of mine are his strengths and vice versa. I love how we have the same sense of humor and he can make me laugh no matter what is going on. He takes his day off and cleans the house or does whatever list I have made for him to get done that day so I don't have to do it after a long day at school or during my time off on the weekends. He always picks things up for me if I need it and is willing to run to the store for whatever I need. He is an amazing speaker and great with people and I was so proud of him a couple weeks ago when he preached on a Sunday and did an A.M.A.Z.I.N.G job- to God be the glory! Everyone continued to come up to him and say what a fabulous job he did and I just stood and watched and was so honored to be his wife. He definitely stepped out of his comfort zone and was a little nervous- but that is something I would be TERRIFIED to do! He cooks dinner for me because he loves it and he knows I've usually had long days and am tired. The list of things I love about him could just go on and on. Yes, everyone can see he is so handsome but what everyone needs to know is that he has a huge, wonderful heart too. I just love him. So, there... Happy Valentine's Day to my wonderful husband. Hard to believe we've been together for almost 8 years- 4 dating 4 married. Here's a couple pics for fun.

Christmas!!

We spent Christmas time traveling a lot back and forth between Cheraw, Apex, and Durham. We started off spending Tues and Wed night with Mark and Renae and going to the UNC vs. Texas game on Wed night. On Thursday we got to meet up with the Moore's and Blalock's and go to Tyler's Taproom for dinner, stopped by Starbucks (of course!) and then go back to the Blalock house and play cards. It was really fun to all be together for Christmas (minus the Ferrell's) BUT we did get to Skype them in to our night for a little while! You were very missed! It was a super fun night filled with lots of laughing as you can see in the pictures below. The theme song for the night is "Sexy and I know it". On Saturday, we spent Christmas Eve Day with my family doing all of our gift exchange and food. It was really fun to have everyone together but unfortunately we had to leave early to come back to Cheraw for our Christmas Eve Service. It was such a fun trip traveling. I love this time of year and having the time off of school.

Feeling Baby B Kick! He sure was movin' after dinner!!

Watching a video of Ashley's friends belly move when she was really pregnant.. it was crazy!

While we played cards we had my phone with pandora playing and it played some pretty random stuff... but of course it was always music we could break it down to. This face is soooo Ashley.

Check out Kevin's face... I totally didn't even know he did that until I looked at these pictures. Sneaky.

Dance Party.

Can't keep it together....

Finally a good one...

Mom's house with everyone hanging out.

Me and my sweet nephew Logan. Hard to believe he is a Kindergartener!

Papa and Mom. Of course he was dressed in a red vest and green pants. With Christmas socks. Love him!

Me and Rich. A half- win. Eyes half-open...

Oh, the attempts of getting this picture. They were funny. I decided to put the final product.

Our church decorated for the Christmas Eve Service. Beautiful.

Kevin (Woship Pastor) Dan (Senior Pastor) and my cute hubby!

Thanksgiving in Roanoke!

Our tradition for Thanksgiving is to go to Roanoke, VA every year. We love spending time with the Harper family! This year it was a little different because we left right after my teacher workday on Wednesday and we were coming from Cheraw instead of Durham. It took a little under 4 hours to get from C to R. On Wednesday we came in to Cheri and TG's house and stayed with them like we always do! It is always so great to see everyone since we don't get to see them very often. The ongoing joke when we arrive is that TG calls me Julie because the first year I came he purposefully called me the wrong name the whole time and it stuck! He also introduced himself the first time we met wearing a gray mullet wig... everyone was cracking up and I had no clue that wasn't his normal hair!!!! We had a wonderful dinner that Cheri cooked with BBQ chicken, ranch chicken, potatoes, green beans, rolls...mmm! It was so good! Marshall and Patrick went to the local gym and acted like they just moved to the area and were thinking about joining... haha (since we've joined the gym in Cheraw and been going he felt he needed to go). While they did that I played cards with Cheri, Katie, Kevin, Ben, Megan, Doug, Karen, and Chase. We played a game called Scum that I've never played before that was a lot of fun! Then we watched the Duke basketball game at 10.

On Thursday, we were super lazy because we didn't end up going to bed until about 1:45 the night before and woke up around 9:30. Cheri cooked a big breakfast and Katie and I helped to make sausage poofs (I think that's what they were called). It was sausage and cream cheese stuffed in crescent rolls into little balls and then baked! They were delicious! We also had biscuits, eggs, bacon, sausage gravy...! Like I said, I was not lacking in the food department!! Thursday night we went over to Inez and Bob's house and had Thanksgiving dinner with the whole fam! Another tradition we have is that everyone brings Black Friday AD's and we all sit around after dinner and look at them and make lists of what to get the next day. It was crazy this year because some of the stores were opening at midnight so we left a little earlier to shop that night instead of the next morning. Marshall and I went to Old Navy at midnight and some people had already been there since 10:30 that night in line!! We got in with the 2nd wave of people and I was able to get a lot of the stuff I was going for! After Old Navy we went back to Cheri's and went to bed until about 7:45 then got up and went to Dick's and back to the mall to the rest of the stores! We got some awesome deals!

On Friday afternoon we got back and watched Christmas Vacation and took some naps and then went out to dinner at Cheddar's with everyone. That night we rented Horrible Bosses and watched it and then the Carolina game. It was such a long and relaxing Thanksgiving break! I always look forward to this time of no-stress, no-school, no-responsibility, and retail therapy through Black Friday! On Saturday, Marshall had been looking forward to going to downtown Roanoke to go to the Roanoke Weenie Stand. I've never been and it had been so long since he'd been that he was excited! Downtown was sooo cute! We walked around all the little vendors downtown and then hit the road back to Che--raw and got back around 5:00... what a wonderful trip! :)

The downtown shops and vendors

The weenie stand...

Look how cute!!!

Downtown area

The Dr. Pepper sign!

My new no-metal watch!!

Cheri and TG's house!

Me and Cheri

Marshall and Bella (or as they call her Meow-Meow... it just happened...)

Gooo Panthers!

I had the wonderful privilege of going to another Panthers game! This was a special game for several reasons: 1) It was Panthers vs. Redskins --I am a Panthers fan and Marshall is a Redskins fan 2) I got to see my mom who I don't get to see as often now that I've moved 3) My cousin Richard was coming to this game who I only get to see like 2 times a year! So, yeah! I was pretty pumped about making the trip to Charlotte! It was a BEAUTIFUL day! High of 70, sunshine... gorgeous! Me, Marshall, Mom, George, Richard, my Aunt Bobetta, and my Uncle Bash all were able to go to the game, which made it so much fun! I loved getting the chance to spend time with my Mom and Richard! We also had an interesting lady sitting in front of us who entertained Marshall, Richard, and I the entire time we were there. Needless to say, every time a song came on the loudspeaker she felt the need to stand up and shake everything she had! HAHA! Luckily, Richard captured this on video and sent it to my phone for me since he, in his words, "thought I might want to have for my personal library" - If anyone is interested in this video, I will be happy to share :) Anyway, here are some pictures from our trip...

Aunt Bobetta (her hair is growing back!), Uncle Bash, Mom

Me and Rich