Elections are coming to Helena

http://www.woodman-for-helena.blogspot.com/
I am so excited to use this forum to promote a man I truly believe will help push Helena forward and make her an even greater city than she already is. I have known his family for a few years now and I am thrilled to be a supporter! Please visit his website and VOTE for

HAL WOODMAN

I will make a regular Post tomorrow, for now let's just all take in the wonder of

HAL WOODMAN

Weekend update!

It was a great Saturday!

We had such fun being together today. I love our weekends!

We hit the BIG sale at OLD NAVY and it was hopping that is for sure. Everyone got flip flops $1.00 a pair how was I going to pass that up? So you could probably guess we all got more than one pair. We got t- shirts and sweatshirts and little Orren got a new raincoat. Yellow and navy blue it is so precious. Our fashion Diva found lots of cute little shirts and we stood in line for about 15 minutes. I thought I was going to Six Flags. (I know even on the best day I would wait longer than 15 minutes at Six Flags, but it was a really long line)

We have been on a gnome hunt in our neighborhood. I hear tell that many gnomes live here in Old Cahaba, but we only found one tiny little green gnome. Guess that magic has them on the move (possibly to avoid the covenants restrictions). I have had an idea and I need to get with our resident gnome expert in Helena about it. I am hoping it is something we can do, my children will love it! AND they will believe it. Sort of a local version of the traveling gnome. So Hewy I need to talk with ya.

Not sure I want to find these gnomes, and we might should ban them from the festivities! I found them @ Gnomeland.co.uk

think we will leave them there, but they were very funny!

Hope you all enjoy the rest of this glorious weekend!

Thank goodness it is Friday

Olivia feeding the Lorikeets at the Zoo

Orren playing on the floor at home

Well, Orren and Olivia and Joe and I ate at a local place here, called Frankie's for dinner tonight. It was good, I really enjoyed the beef tips and rice and gravy I had. Joe got the catfish and was some what disappointed. It was one piece and not the greatest. Olivia had the chicken fingers and they were the size of her head! Orren had rice and cheese. We most likely won't go back, but it was cute and we enjoyed being together.





We talked to Aunt Christy tonight, it was wonderful to have a few minutes to catch up with her. We are all eagerly waiting to find out what Kayla's baby will be.... girl? Boy? We are ready to start shopping. It should just be a few more weeks. But, so far all is well and everyone is healthy. Our nephew TJ is a typical teenage boy, and full of mischief. Our sweet Dawson told us he loved us over the phone and we hope to see him soon. I can't believe how quickly he is growing up and how precious his heart is.





Michelle and Salah are still house hunting and we hope they will soon be on our side of town.





Chief and GrandMaMa have had lots of visitors since returning to the land of sea and sun......


Aunt Kay Ivey was down on yesterday and their college friends are with them now. We hope that they are having lots of fun with everyone.





Things are nice and calm for now and hope that they stay that way! We have some yard work to do.... we got a covenants violation letter today. Seems our "tree" on the corner of the house has died and we need to remove it sooooooooo guess what Joe will be doing tomorrow. OOPS!





The children both got "happies" today from Learning Express. Orren had his first I want this and I am not putting it back episode today. So we came home with a knight on a horse. Both are "dressed" in full regalia Blue with gold Lions. Could he know already that he is a nobleman? Instinct maybe? Lord Breland.


Olivia got a pumice stone that is shaped and designed to look like a lollipop and lip gloss. SHE KNOWS SHE IS A PRINCESS!





We will hopefully all get some rest tomorrow and just get to enjoy being together. We will check in again soon!

Breland Babies everywhere are growing up

Well, Orren turned one and now our baby bird family is learning to fly. We have been so blessed that for 3 seasons the same Mother bird has returned to lay and hatch her eggs in our courtyard. Now an entirely different family has joined us. Three little babies are learning to fly and we have had such fun watching them. What wonders our heavenly father sends us if we only take the time to appreciate them!

Not too much going on here today, we are running some errands and I am going to pick up the things we need to make homemade cookies! I want to bake a pie and a cobbler also. I am in a baking mood! Olivia is so precious she is always ready to bake anything. I love having that time with her in the kitchen. Just the girls. Olivia is growing so fast, she will be 10 this Jan. She is such a little lady and a true Princess. I am so proud of her.

We may need to do a roast for dinner, oh yes, that sounds so good. I better get that going now! I can almost smell and taste it, rice and gravy...carrots... potatoes... broccoli casserole. OK I really need to finish this post so I can get dinner going.

Is it too early in the summer to say how ready for Autumn I am? I love that time of the year when there is a blustery crispness in the air and the foliage is turning. Football is in the background, and friends have gathered. When spices fill the air from pumpkin pie and banana bread. It has to be the most wonderful time. So on this hot muggy June afternoon, my heart and thoughts are looking forward to the rush of cool Autumn air on my face.

We have Orren's appointment with the GI doctor in July. The 28th at Children's. We will be praying that all is well and the report is good.

Today is SHANA'S Birthday! Happy Birthday Shana!

Tomorrow we will be packing the pic nic basket to go to Friday night flicks in the Park. It should be lots of fun!

Love to you all,

Lazy days of summer

Swimming in the pool
Chief enjoying the pool and Orren's float.

We had such a great weekend and we are now back to our normal life. Joe is suffering from a spider bite still ( he got it back on Father's day at the lake) I am beginning to worry about it.

Our downstairs air conditioning unit is still not cooling and they still have NOT come to fix it! So we are puddling and sleeping upstairs where it is like a cave! I mean who has ever heard of that..... upstairs being so cold you freeze and downstairs is an oven?

We just keep saying maybe tomorrow!

Orren is trying to get the hang of this walking thing, he has lots of toys to help and he is enjoying them very much!

Joe and I are so blessed with our life and our family. We could not imagine anything more perfect. We are so very thankful to our Holy Father for his love!

Have a great rest of the week!

Birthday Party @ The Birmingham Zoo

Birthday Boy passed out from too much fun!

What a great party! All of our friends and family that came were so precious and generous to Orren and we cannot thank everyone enough for coming and being with us. Especially in the heat! My goodness I don't think it could have been any hotter! It was so wonderful to have everyone together and we missed everyone who could not be with us. We just realized that we do not have any pictures of Chief and GrandMaMa at the party! How did that happen?

Orren how old are you? ONE!

Orren and his cousin Grayson, all the way from MS
Orren's Birthday Cake from the ZOO

The Hayes boys eating cake and ice cream!

Olivia and Ameer petting the snake during the animal showJoey, Andy, Zachary, Ramsey and Ameer eating cake with Olivia
Daddy helping ride the Giraffe
Aunt Jo, Aunt Clancy, & Grayson
Ready for the train ride with everyone

Mommy, Daddy, Aunt Michelle, and Uncle Salah

Happy Birthday Orren!!!!!!!!!

Today our little prince turned one! We had a BBQ with our sweet precious friends the Hayes family and the Bonham's. We all got to eat enormous hamburgers and play together and celebrate Orren turning one. We had ice cream cake and lots of fun fellowship.

Everyone was so kind and brought him gifts that were so thoughtful and fun.

The Hayes family gave him a rocket ship to help learn to walk. He has been practicing with it. He will hopefully be walking soon. His Birthday Party will be tomorrow at the zoo!

Happy Father's Day

We had a great day, and I hope Joe enjoyed it. We went with the El-Fallahs to Oak Mountain State Park. We grilled, played on the beach and swam. Then we returned to our house and swam some more. It was a great day!

We also are saddened by this news:

This is about one of my oldest and most precious friends, Shana. We have been friends for over 12 years. We have fought, we have laughed, and we have cried. Tonight we have had a loss that we never saw coming. She has lost her baby at 4 1/2 months. She was to find out the sex of the baby tomorrow, now has found out the heart has stopped beating. So instead of shopping in celebration tomorrow she will be preparing for delivery of a baby that will never take the breath of life. She is as you can imagine, devestated, as we all are. We are mourning this loss of a child which is far different than a first trimester miscarriage( which she had earlier in the year). Over the past few months she had many ultrasounds (weekly). She has seen this child grow. The smile,the fingers, the thumb sucking. As wonderous as technology is and such a gift, it certainly contributes to sheer devestation when something like this happens. Please, please pray for her and pray for my ability to offer support, love and strength. It is only through our Holy Father that anyone could survive the death of a child. I pray for his grace and love over all of us.

I hope that everyone has a great week. We will certainly stay in touch!

The end of Bible school

Well, Olivia has finished all of her Vacation Bible Schools for the summer. Olivia has been on the "friendship Trek" and "surfed her way through the scriptures" this summer.

We realized summer is about half over now. That excites us and makes us sad. We went to Dairy Queen after Bible School to celebrate and Olivia had a sundae the size of her head. OH MY! Orren had a good deal of ice cream as well. He thought that was very good. I cannot wait until next Friday when he will have his first birthday cake and be a year old.

Olivia received her FIRST PLACE certificate in the Desoto's Coloring Contest( a place down at the Gulf where Mom and Dad often frequent to eat). She gets her meal comped the next time she comes! She has on this once before and she is very "proud" to have won a second time.

We are saddened to hear of the death of a great journalist today, Tim Russert. We have watched him on Meet the Press every week for years. The news world will be left with a void because of his death.

Lots of storms and rain AGAIN, today. Perhaps it will soon clear up.

Olivia has issued a challenge to us that she get 5 dollars for every book she reads this summer. She got the idea from her little friend Joey today. So we will see how much money she earns by August 10!

We will home school again, we just love being together all day. She is just happier at home with us.

Orren just has no interest in walking. If we try he just gets down on all fours and scoots. He is so fast!

This is what Joe wants for Father's Day. Gee I wonder if he will get it? If so we will have our own movies in the park.

Well, for now we have Friday Night flicks in the park at the park. It will be wet! I need to go get everything together! Love to all

Olivia's scare

We had a little scare today Olivia fell down a flight of stairs. Thank goodness she is just fine. She has a few scratches and booboos but all and all just fine. Thank you dear God for watching over her.

We had a great day other than that and some hiccups with the neighborhood pool, I hated to leave our pool and safe little world to go there, but duty called.

Orren is learning so much and I cannot believe our first year is winding down. Only 11 days until he is known as a toddler. (sniff, sniff)

Huckleberry is back inside as the mercury is reaching unsafe levels for man or beast. GrandMaMa will not be happy about that, but we have to let him stay somewhat cool. We can't have the children's dog die.

I will post some again this week! Have a great one!

Lazy Saturday

Well, we started our morning off with Eggs Benedict and Champagne. That should tell you the day we had!

We had such a fun day today. We spent the day in our pool and enjoyed all that our backyard had to offer. We had a pic nic and stayed in the pool until we were prunes! Orren and Olivia both had so much fun. I love hearing those giggles and laughing. It makes our life seem perfect. I love every moment that we get to steal from the world where it is just the four of us and no one else matters. Of course we love being with our family and friends as well, but the days we have just as a family are so special!

It was another year without a triple crown, Big Brown came in dead last! How could that have happened? We were disappointed and yet intrigued once again by the equine world! We can't wait for next year!

Another week over

Aunt Katy in Honduras doing such a great service and selfless giving of her time!

Well, it has been quite the week! Olivia finished up Vacation Bible School and will be starting another one next week! She is loving swimming and summer. Joe was very ill to start the week off and Orren is ill to end the week. Olivia and I are hopeful that it won't infect the girls.

Aunt Katy is back from Honduras and seemed to really feel good about her work there. We are so proud of her! She and Uncle Jarrod will be headed down to the Gulf for the spear fishing tourn. in a couple of weeks. They will do some diving while down there also. They exhaust me just thinking about all that they do and have done.

Orren will be a year old in less than two weeks so we are getting ready! We will have a "family" party here at home on his actual birthday and his BIG party at the zoo the next day! I know he will love cake.